12 years wedding anniversary meaning another couples only trip. Parents are in Taiwan so the in-laws came in to watch the 3 terrible animals. We originally thought about going to Egypt(we’ve been trying to go to Egypt for a while now), but decided we needed a more chill trip since life has been so busy. We decided this months ago, and now that the war is raging in Iran, not going to Egypt is looking like a good idea, seeing as how we’d probably have to cancel just for safety reasons.

First picture of the morning, not quite in blogging mode yet with the photo taking. Breakfast of champions, Salt Lick. This small burrito was…$15!!!!!! WTF.

We are both tired. Even though it’s only a little bit past 7am, we both feel exhausted. Due to TSA’s shutdown and now being funded again, they are still short staffed. The airport recommended that we show up 3 hours early for an international flight. But, since our flight isn’t until 9:40am, I figured we’d miss the very heaviest travel time of before 7am. Sure enough, the security line wasn’t too bad.

Maybe this will help me wake up a little bit. It didn’t.

I got my burrito, RL wants something to eat. We ordered proseccos to celebrate, expected tiny flutes for $14 dollars but they came in these giant cups!! Definitely got our money’s worth.

That’s a lot more than we both expected, we could have easily shared one. Good thing it was dry and not too sweet.

RL was hungry, ate all of her eggs before I even remembered to take a photo.

Now we board soon.

Rainy here in Austin, rainy in Montreal where we’ll have a layover, and rainy in Quebec too.

Plane is kinda old. No holder for phone and no video screen. It did, have like most planes now, free WiFi movie streaming through your own device. The flight also wasn’t very full.

Alright, we are leaving a little bit earlier than scheduled, that’s nice.

Got a little snack on the plane, just in case I get hungry.

Noticed that most of the drinks on the flight were Canadian. Was it always like this or was this a result of all the Trump tariffs?

ZZZzzzzz…she said that she slept on my phone in my pocket so she didn’t fall asleep. I didn’t want to remove the phone in my pocket because I thought she was already asleep and didn’t wanna bother her…I guess we both lose.

About to arrive in Montreal. It looks cold down there.

Why is the Montreal airport code YUL?

Immigration was easy peasy with no line. Let’s go find a place to eat for lunch and sit.

Look, a healthy lunch! Our waitress asked where we were headed to, we said Quebec City. She said that they are rednecks over there and implied that they were a little xenophobic to her friend’s Asian restaurant. Waitress is also Asian and Trans. She mentioned that they looked down on her French speaking even though she’s from Montreal and speaks French like the Quebecois. I guess I’ll set my expectations low for the people in Quebec being nice.

Got some coffee. Freedom pay eh.

It turns out, we left our table at the restaurant too early so now we’ll wait some more.

Remember this from earlier on the plane? I’ve been saving it and figured it was a good time to eat it now. Actually pretty good for airplane food.

We left our nice table at the restaurant too early to wait at the gate. Our flight got delayed.

And delayed again….and then some more after this. We ended up leaving over an hour after original schedule. But insult on top of injury was that the gate agent made me check my backpack saying that it was too big for carry on and that it was a full flight and had no space for overhead bins. Yes, this same backpack that I’ve used to travel around the world extensively as a carry on for 15 years is too big of Air Canada…no it isn’t!! Either way, gate checked my bag and now I’ll have to pick it up at the luggage when we arrive at Quebec City. The worst part is that when we got on the plane, there were TONS of overhead space leftover for carryons…so made me check my backpack for nothing. I’m pissed.

It’s been a really long travel day. Looking forward to this last one hour leg. It’s also golden hour and the sun was beaming beautiful golden light into the cabin.

Look at that cool hue!

I was tired, so I fell asleep on the plane, and I woke up to our plane in a holding position over Quebec City. The captain came on the announcement saying that they had weather issues down at the airport and that we’ll keep in a holding position to see if the weather will clear up. Are they having a bad storm down there below the clouds?

After holding for quite a while, we start descending through the clouds. It’s a lot of clouds, but it’s been cloudy. We descend and I look out to look for the city lights below us. All of a sudden I see lights, but not city lights, it’s the lights for the runway. OMG, we were flying through super dense fog. And as soon as I saw and realize we were only a few feet over the runway, the captain went back full throttle and aborted the landing. I am surprised we even attempted to land in such thick fog with such limited visibility. Why didn’t the tower turn us out. We pulled out of our landing, and pull higher and higher. Sure enough, the captain is flying us back to Montreal. FFFfuuucccckkkk. Now what.

Over Montreal again.

I started looking at possible options to get to Quebec City tonight if we were stuck in Montreal for another night. One option would be stay by the train station in Montreal overnight and then take an early morning train.

Montreal at night. Not foggy here.

Just landed. My very first point A to point A flight. I don’t think I’ve ever been on an aborted landing flight. Oh yeah, also going to the gate while making a turn slowly, the ABS kicked on for the plane and it felt like we were on rumble strips. I guess the standing water on one side of the pavement made the left wheel ABS kick on.

Bathroom line now that the bathroom is open while we fuel up. The captain announced the plan. We fuel up, and then we fly to Quebec City and we try again with the weather expecting to clear up. The flight attendant said that this was her first aborted landing in over 2 years of flying. Honestly…I feel a little uneasy about this flight. I felt that aborted landing was a little too unsafe and too close for comfort. The fog was literally so thick I saw the runway lights a split second before I realized we were over the runway…eek. Fingers crossed.

Fueled up and ready to go again. 3 passengers did request to get off the plane and they were let off.

Leaving Montreal, let’s hope it’s cleared up in Quebec. The captain said that the weather is looking much better, we shall see.

Over Quebec City. It is indeed looking much better with good visibility.

Yay, we’ve arrived!!! What a long day of travel. Could have made it all the way to London with our travel time today.

We made it!!

Gggrrr. Now I need to wait for my luggage, hope they didn’t lose it.

Lucky me, it’s here.

We’ve arrived so late, it’s almost 11pm and the airport is pretty empty. Looking for the taxi stand.

Found the stand, no one was here. Just a jacket and hat over the chair fooling us that someone was sittin ghere.

Went out and found the taxi ourselves. I believe it’s a flat rate to old town.

It’s about a 25min ride to old town.

Reached our hotel, Chateau Frontenac.

The lobby is pretty empty since it’s so late. It’s 11:20pm, we are tired.

That’s a cool onyx wall.

This little part of the hotel looks like it’s from 100 years ago.

A wooden keycard with electronics inside for tapping, first for me to see. We are in a section of the hotel where we’ll need to take two elevators to get to.

Here’s what $518 a night gets you in Old Quebec City at the Chateau Frontenac. I opted for a larger room since it’s our anniversary and all.

The decor is a little bit tired, but we do get a separate living room which is nice.

Such a long travel day, glad to have made it here tonight and not have to spend a night in Montreal. Also happy to have made it here safely after that aborted landing.

To be continued at Quebec Day 2.