It was like walking into a fairy tale.
As I swung open the heavy wood door of our River View King room at the Auberge du Vieux Port in Viexu Montreal, Quebec, it literally felt like stepping into an extremely romantic room in Cinderella’s castle. A massive bed with an iron frame filled the room, its headboard backed up to a wall completely made of brick, which stemmed from a wall of stone. The cafe table in the corner looked straight out of a Parisian sidewalk cafe (& held an anniversary-celebrating bottle of wine from the crew at Auberge).
The floor to ceiling windows were latched closed at the time, only to be thrown open in true European fashion later in our stay. The window ledge made the perfect perch to watch the world go by.
The bathroom revealed more very old school exposed brick & a very new school, very awesome multi-spray shower head – nay, shower system!
The lobby of the hotel was more modern, with comfortable furniture & refinished wood floors.
One of the highlights of our stay at Auberge was the staff: they were all fantastic. Always smiling, always pleasant, & always able to instantly switch back & forth between English & French. They ordered us taxis, made dinner recommendations & reservations, helped us with our bags & always called us by name.
All these things are what makes staying at a boutique hotel so special. The Auberge du Vieux Port might be our best boutique hotel stay yet.
If you stay there…
– Your room rate includes breakfast at the hotel restaurant. While not a speedy affair by American standards (we didn’t get out of breakfast in under 45 minutes any morning), it’s plentiful & good. You have a choice of a “hot” meal (although usually our egg dishes were only lukewarm) & a variety of continental breakfast items. May I recommend the pain au chocolat? We ate an embarrassing number of them every morning…
If you haven’t had it before, I’d also recommend one of the dishes that comes with Canadian maple syrup (when we were visiting the options included french toast or crepes). Real maple syrup just makes the stuff you buy in the grocery store seem that much more disappointing!
– If you’re a light sleeper, you may want to reconsider a river-facing room. I was woken up several nights by the squeak & squeal of a passing freight train. B, who could sleep through a hurricane, slept through any train or street noise.
– The floors of the hotel are hardwood, which means you hear every footstep your upstairs neighbor makes if they’re wearing shoes. Remember that when you’re walking around your room – actually, the slippers Auberge provides are great for eliminating this potential problem!
– The elevator in the hotel is a little slow. We were on the 2nd floor, so we used the stairs as an opportunity to walk off all that pain au chocolat!
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