2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Daylight Shot of School Building

Could not resist a few parting shots of the school building and environs as we boarded for our last night of the cruise, including this daylight photo taken with the Bigger Cahoona.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, House Boats

Saw these houseboats on our way back to the ship after the tour.  Seems like a neat way to live, but not cheap...these guys cost several hundred thousands of dollars apiece.  When I taught at Clear Creek High School back in the day, one of my fellow teachers and his also-teacher wife lived in a boat nearby, which I thought very intriguing.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Falling Ice Sign

Don't see many of these around Houston...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Closer Look of Boardwalk Hotel

A closer look at one end of the hotel...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Boardwalk Hotel

Toward the end of our tour we walked down a long boardwalk, where I finally got the view I'd been wanting of this hotel.  What an incredible structure, and if you fork over enough cash it's possible to spend the night inside!  A little above our station in life, but it's pretty to look at.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Black Statues on State House

Getting closer allows a better view of the black statues in each alcove.  Looks like the one below might make a good bookmark:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, State House with Fountain

Now this one is a government building.  Normally it would be open, but there'd been an attack in the not-too-distant past, so it was heavily guarded and closed to tourists.  Still, got some good exterior shots of this awesome state house.  Wider view below:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, City Street with Apartments

A pretty neat street...all those colors, then a steeple at the end.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Open Fountain

 

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Touring PE Class in Session

Our guide told us he was going to show us something interesting, but we'd have to be quiet when we got there; said he's been kicked out of the place more than once.

After seeing this it was no wonder.  He nervously scoped out the area, then we stepped inside this entryway that opened into a courtyard.  Another guide in period costume had a group already in progress, but the kids appeared oblivious to their presence.  Still I backed off some lest the clack of the Bigger Cahoona's mirror draw unwanted attention.  Evidently this place has great historical value, but don't remember what it was...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Dead Bishop on Bier

Just off the rear end of the sanctuary was this sarcophagus with presumably a dead guy inside.  The shepherd's staff indicates a church leader who supposedly shepherded the flock under his care.  The hat makes it appear that he was a bishop.  High-level stuff, but seems the ones in England look a little bit better.

It was very dark in that portion of the sanctuary, so had a great deal of trouble holding the Bigger Cahoona still enough to get a halfway decent focus.  This pic only was rendered blogworthy after extensive sharpening, and brightening, in Photoshop.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Opulence in Church

Not sure what this is used for, as it's elevated and has a halo thing up top right in the middle of the congregation.  Does this elevate the stature of the one standing there?  Seems that opulence is an oxymoron in a place that supposedly preaches humility and compassion for the poor...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Church Frontispiece

 

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Gold Ornamentation in Church Interior

Canada is by no means impoverished, but you do wonder how much something like this costs and where the money goes once it hits the plate.  It's the same in poorer, undeveloped nations.  Not sure, but think it's probable that at least the statuary at top is plated with 24 karat gold.  Closer views below:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Red Candles in Church Interior

We did go into one church, where I got some pretty good interiors.  Above we have the traditional candle stand often seen in Catholicism.  Other church candle pics posted here.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, More Bookmarks and Another Sihlouette

Made a couple of bookmarks from the spire posted a couple of days ago, this time two peek-a-boo shots.  Semi-silhouette of another spire below:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Herbaceous Cannon Fodder

Canada is known for its progressive liberalism, so wasn't surprised to see this.  In fact it's a great message, and reminded me of the time a hippie stuck a flower in the barrel of a trooper's rifle during the 60's anti-war movement.  Also makes for a unique photo-op...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Black Squirrel

Squirrels are squirrels, I suppose, and they're everywhere wherever in the world you go.  But it's interesting how they are different colors in different regions.  In Texas they're gray, in Taiwan they're red and black, and here in Canada they're either red or black.  Had to sneak around before catching this lucky silhouette; closeup below:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Building with Spire

 

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Architecture Bookmarks

Saw a couple of opportunities for bookmarks as we were walking along.  Had to do some quick grabs, as the guide and Chenjean would be a block ahead if I dallied to perfect a composition.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Cat in Window

Cats in windows make great shots.  I posted another one a while back from somewhere, but had no luck in finding it among the thousands of pics published.  Maybe when the index I'm working on is finished...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Alleyway Labyrinth

We were led by the guide through a unique alleyway that is supposedly old as the ages.  I snapped away because of the patterns and angles, in wonder that people actually live here and daily get to walk through this labyrinth of history.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Wall Piece with Found Edges

Not the artwork highlighted by the sign, but thought this wall piece would look good in Found Edges:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Little Man Artwork

Most of the remainder of posts here will be taken on a guided tour.  We hired this company to meet us at a hotel, and of the six signed up to go with the group we were the only ones that showed up.  Thus, we were able to get a very personalized experience, and the very nice guide catered to exactly what we wanted to see (unique, weird, strange, not too many churches).

Using our list, the first thing he showed us was right across the street from the hotel where we met.  The yellow sign was one of many posted around the city, announcing an artwork that could be observed nearby.  Do we see from here what that artwork is? ...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, More Perspectives of Flower Bouquet

Three more perspectives of same bouquet, with the last one catching the sunlight coming through our sliding glass doors...

2025 NE Cruise - Yellow Flower with Green Pistils

This would be one of my favorite pics of the entire trip.  September 5th is Chenjean's birthday and we were on the ship, so I arranged with the room service guy to get a bouquet of flowers delivered to the room so she'd see them when we returned from breakfast that day.  They managed to pull it off, for which we were grateful.

Two more perspectives of same below:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Building with Green Roof

Had to wait a day to get the lighting acceptable for this pic, shot from our stateroom balcony.  Lots of buildings in Québec have green roofs like this...suppose they're made primarily of copper.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Downtown Silhouette

A more complete silhouette of the school, at left, among other notable buildings in the downtown area.  The taller building to the right is a hotel, daylight pictures of which will be posted later.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, High School Silhouette

Later on the Bigger Cahoona and I were able to capture this image of the same building and make it into a semi-silhouette.  Complete silhouette to be posted tomorrow...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, High School Building

From our vantage point there on the dock, this is one of the first buildings that catches your eye.  Perched atop a hill in this large city, with a commanding view overlooking the town and harbor, one may reasonably assume that it's a grand government building of some kind, with offices for the mayor or even state governor.  Well, to our amazement we found out that it's a high school, which is government related I suppose...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Factory Conveyor Belts

 

Liked the angles on whatever this is.  There's a highway going off to the right, so I included this structure in an 8-shot panorama that turned out fairly well, but those are too big to post or appreciate on a small screen.

And it's the panoramas that I like to do the most.  As soon as we get home from a trip, once the pictures are sorted, culled and categorized, the first thing I do in Photoshop is stitch together any panoramic series captured.  Could be because I'm a so-called "resolution head" and enjoy how much detail is preserved when zooming way in.

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Tall Building with Steam for Promotional Card

...but this is what I was holding out for.  When the wind blew the steam over sideways, knew the space underneath would be ideal for lettering on a promotional card.  The above is what I initially imagined, but while creating the card felt that the one below didn't look too bad either:

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Tall Building with Steam for Bookmark

As soon as I saw this guy with the steam coming out of those pipes I knew what I wanted to do with it.  This might be acceptable as a bookmark...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Twin Silver Steeples

Many of these first posts from Québec were captured from the ship's Lido deck the first morning we docked there.

It was then that I met a woman talking into her phone shooting a travel video.  Travels and vlogs about it to make a living that she very much enjoys.  Must be nice in your older age to do such a thing...

2025 NE Cruise - Québec City, Two Cityscapes

Our final stop on this 10-day cruise was Québec City.  With a population of more than a half million (800k+ in the metro area), the opportunities for the Bigger Cahoona were vastly superior compared to the small towns visited thus far.  The above is a 2-shot panoramic cityscape captured as soon as we docked.  We stayed there for two nights, so was able to grab another cityscape the first morning with the iPhone 15 Pro Max just as the sun rose to highlight the buildings.  If you ask me, the pic below is the better one, and much less work to prepare for the blog: