We pulled out of Antigonish at about 3:30 after a quick turn around for the correct passports and swishes through a rainy drive to Halifax Stanfield. Departure was smooth. We booked with Porter and tucked ourselves into the comfortable leather seats, relaxed and left all behind!!! Our flight left on time and landed perfectly at Trudeau. We planned to catch the 747 downtown. As it turned out we walked out the doors to have it waiting to take us to the heart of the city. Really slick! For $7 and a drop off just steps from our accommodation it's pretty hard to go wrong. We got checked in, found our room and settled into the Fairmont Queen Elizabeth to enjoy the view.

The plan for the evening was to get out for a look around, stroll a bit on a late fall evening in Montreal and perhaps source some authentic smoked meat (always a favorite of mine)! We used the metro, basically located underneath our accommodations, to head for Sherbrooke Station and St Laurent Blvd. Montreal's subway is excellent... And we used it to get to several of the attractions we had selected. St Laurent is a busy part of the city, with lots of line-ups to access bars and pedestrian friendly routes.

Our destination was Schwartz's, the exalted diner famous for it's smoked meat sandwiches. Pretty old school and modest in all ways except taste... Our waiter was no nonsense and had our food in minutes. The ambience and bustle there felt very "New Yorkish" to me (minus the language of course), and the mismatched tables and narrow seating somehow fit nicely.

Moreover, great sandwiches (although I think we should have gone for some leaner meat). Janie enjoyed a nasty garlic pickle on the side. Great stroll back to the Metro through some very established Montreal neighborhoods on a cool, clear late November evening. Our metro passes went "kaput" on the way home but the transit guy pushed us through. We actually ended up picking up new ones Saturday morning. Great little trip... a little cool but really quite comfortable.