Happy Canada Day!! From the least Canadian place in Canada.

Happy Canada Day! Celebrating 150 years since the enactment of the Constitution Act, which united the three separate colonies of Canada, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

But trust me to go to the one area in Canada where they care the least about celebrating today. Montreal, and Quebec in general, tend to have smaller celebrations than the rest of the nation. Being such a ‘European city’, with French as the primary language, many of the French Canadians don’t feel much of an affinity with Canada as a nation. So Canada Day is more ‘meh’ than ‘eh!’ for some of these guys. It’s also a source of controversy for many First Nations people - nothing like someone saying ‘happy 150th!’ to a country that you’ve been inhabiting for centuries.

Instead, in Montreal, today is known as ‘moving day’. Now, I find this an incredibly strange way to do things, but in Montreal all leases end on July 1. Can you imagine? Everybody that needs to move, in the entire city, does it on the same day. Locals told me that people know not to drive on July 1 unless you’re moving, because the streets are full of moving trucks. I met a house painter who was spending today rushing from place to place, quickly painting the interior of houses before the next tenant moved in later in the day. And all I could think was ‘who would I get me to help move if all my friends were moving on the same day?!’

Look, to me it seems like an odd thing to do, but I guess that’s just the way things are done here. Sadly, for both the Canada Day celebrations and the moving house crew, it rained consistently all day today.

Since I wasn’t moving house, I headed down to the Old Port of Montreal to explore. The walk through Old Montreal was gorgeous - it absolutely is like stepping into a part of Europe. Something I found super interesting is the architecture of the city. In Montreal, if you construct a new building you have to make sure it contains at least one thing similar to the original architecture next door. So, as you wander around the city you’ll notice some interesting features on the newer buildings, that may not have been there otherwise, and it creates a synchronicity between old and new that makes neither feel out of place.

Note the similarities between the old and newer buildings. Such a cool rule!

When I saw that there was a zipline over the water at the Old Port, I had to give it a go. Tyrolienne MTL Zipline was actually the first urban zipline in Canada, so it’s been around for a while. They only had one rule: you have to scream all the way down. I had no problem with that.

Next I headed to Voiles en Voiles amusement park which, unsurprisingly, was full of children. There are a few different things in the park, including a bunch of inflatable pirate ships and some high ropes courses. Given the rain, I skipped the slippery inflatables, and headed for the high ropes obstacle courses. Note: they were also slippery. So, it turns out the kids are much better at that than me. Hah! I swear I was the slowest person on the course, and I never did make it to the highest one. It was so much fun though! After two hours, a little rope burn on my hands, soaking wet from the rain, and being a little more confident than when I started, I called it a day. Funny, I was finding it quite difficult, and then a clear voice spoke in my head that said ‘it’s just like dancing, beautiful one’. And then, once I treated it like dancing (which I’ve been doing since I was 4 years old) it was actually much easier and I enjoyed it a million times more! Super fun, and I highly recommend, for big kids or little ones.

So now I’m drenched from head to toe, drying out in my apartment before I head back in to Montreal International Jazz Festival.

I've seen some amazing artists so far, and will give you the full rundown in a few days. Hot tip though - check out Djmawi Africa. They were so much fun! (As you can see from the video above)

On tonight’s agenda? Thievery Corporation and Selwyn Birchwood. To say I’m excited is an understatement!!!!

Djmawi Africa!