Can you even believe it? We have now been on our mission for 6 months... 1/3 of the time already gone! Wow! We entered the MTC on Aug. 8 and today is February 8. They say time flies when you are having fun... it pretty much is flying by whether we're discouraged, overworked, teaching, being smurfed (stood up on appointments), or having fun !! We are adopting a saying by Pres. Thomas S. Monson - our prophet - "When we strive with faith nothing wavering to fulfill the duties appointed to us...when we seek the inspiration of the Almighty in the performance of our responsibilities, we can achieve the miraculous." Here comes the next 12 months of miraculous!
Inside we saw that they were setting up to have a wedding there, but they told us just to go ahead and look around anyway...apparently people even come & look and browse around even when they hold services! And as we looked there was a homeless lady who came up and solicited us for money... right inside the church- just steps away from the wedding set-up!
The ceiling is absolutely gorgeous. We really felt awkward being in there as guests were gathering, so we left to go to the next Cathedral. This time it was Notre Dame. Not the Notre Dame in Paris, but it looks very much like it on the outside.
Inside it is absolutely amazing... and they charge you $5.00 each for the opportunity to behold it! The ceiling here is painted blue & they do a special light show at Christmas and other holidays to light it & change colors.
Perhaps you can see from the picture before all the stained glass windows around the chapel. Oddly enough, all the windows on the main level tell the story of the founding of Montreal - nothing really about God, Jesus Christ or Biblical events.
It is quite breath-taking. Off to the right- just out of the camera shot in the above picture is a glassed-in small chapel. It is for the actual worshipers! The tour guide told us that since there are so many events here and constant tours, that it is too noisy to actually worship here, so they built the sound-proofed, glassed-in chapel so that the actual worshipers would have a quiet place they could use!
Next we started our walking tour of old-town Montreal. This is the gate entrance. The streets are of cobblestone and mostly it is several streets of tourist trap souvenir shops and restaurants.
Of course, there are some very French things as well... like this shop. Boucherie (butcher shop) and Charcuterie (cooked meats...like a deli shop that serves sandwiches)
and yes, those are fresh shanks of meat hanging in the front window. Of course, it was really cold and we were walking... so when we saw one of the many horse-drawn carriages go by we asked him how much it would cost to ride. 
The souvenir shop lady had told us that it would probably be fairly cheap since it was not exactly the height of tourist season at the end of January, and since it was so cold, not many people were out. I thought it would be a romantic, wonderful way to see the area. But, like everything else in Montreal, the price was a bit steep. $48 for 30 minutes. SHEESH! And we just were sure that those few blankets he had in the carriage would have kept us all that much warmer as we rode... so, we thanked him and said No. (Maybe in the summer the price goes down?) We were so frozen after walking around for 3 hours, that we decided to head for the car. As we drove, we went right thru Montreal's version of China Town.
As it was, we still couldn't feel our fingers and toes, so we opted just to view it through the car windshield! So, we headed for the mission home and our farewell dinner. The Davis' are from Australia. They were facing a 35 hour trip home, so they loved this last chance to say goodbye.
We had a wonderful dinner and they shared things about Australia... then we gave them some of those wonderful Canadian beanies (or Tukes...as they call them here). 
We are going to miss this wonderful couple. They worked in a very poor inner city Asian branch in Montreal & were such an example of love & dedication. We will miss them so much! (this is the couple whose daughter Rachel & her family live in London and are dear friends to Shannon Ashton - Chad Monroe's sister)
Then as we drove a little further, we passed the frozen lake and saw these:
Then there were more:
And some people even brought their own:
It reminded me of a time when I was only about 6 or 7. We were living in Wisconsin and were asked to go "ice fishing" with another family. We had never even heard of ice fishing. We drove our car right out onto the ice... It wasn't as fancy as these fishermen, we just cut a hole in the ice & had several little stools to sit on around the hole. (I still remember my mother wearing big rubber boots, and an ankle-length fur coat and a fur hat because she was so afraid she would get cold). So, when we saw these ice huts, we had to stop for a picture. Here they mostly rent out these huts as seasonal rentals (for the whole season) - but they save a few for daily rentals. It costs about $45 a day. The company has a GPS and they position the hut on the ice where the fish are, then you must cut the hole yourself and also provide the wood for the fire. Many have a tiny little stove with a chimney in them. It looks cool, but frankly I've never seen the attraction. It is one thing to sit for hours on end fishing in the summer or fall (where you are warm and comfortable) and where you can look around at nature's beauty... it is quite another thing to sit inside a wooden hut on the ice & freeze to death waiting for a bite! Guess I'll never be an ice-fisher-woman... but it brought back many fun memories from over 50 years ago!
When we moved here and the trees were full of leaves, we never noticed it. But since the leaves all fell, we noticed this towel up in the tree behind our apartment. We thought it was funny, but that surely it would blow down soon. And yet, through all of the winds, freezing rain storms, and snow, it continues to hang there. Every single morning now, it is like a challenge... when we open the curtains, will it still be there? And sure enough... it is !