The Lone Wolf

Being alone on a travel may not ‘always’ be a preferred option but, trust me when I say this, stumbling upon moments of solitude and the consequent emotions of joy in heart and mind makes traveling alone all the more worth it. This time, I was in Vieux-port de Montreal.

The breeze was cool enough to allow walking in the mild summer sun, a pleasurable experience. The sun and clouds were playing hide-n-seek as I made my way out of ‘Champ De-Mars’ station, up the steep ‘Rue Saint-Denis’ and finally onto ‘Rue Notre-Dame’. There it was, the cobblestone streets of vieux-port de Montreal. No matter how much one reads about these pebbled streets on blogs, magazines and travel guides, one cannot be ready for the transformative effect of physically walking through thin, barely 10 feet wide streets lined by tall, bending and crooked French façades. The long, thin and curving streets were as loud, dirty and congested as the 17th and 18th century bustling port of Montréal, except that the yells and screams of traders and hawkers were replaced by awe-inspired conversations of flocks of tourist.

Before I could bask in the glory of wandering in strange, unknown streets covered by French baroque architecture, there was a gradual increase in commotion as French speaking montréalais were rushing in and out of their restaurants, bakeries and taverns to set up the chairs, tables and chalkboards along the streets to offer a wide array of food from la crème da la crème of culinary food to such humble, warm and comfort food as Poutine.

As the dying light of sundown made its way down the sloppy streets of vieux-port towards the waterfront, pale light from replicas of antique French incandescent street lamps illuminated the narrow crisscrossing streets which end up in ‘Place d’Armes’; a sloping square surrounded by dimly lit French facades, packed with tourists, vendors, street magicians and performers. By now, cool breeze from waterfront had cooled the night.

There is an intense feeling of living in the moment with an unexplained smile on face and a realization that each passing moment is neither better nor worse than the one that follows. I like to believe that I was sharing the same feeling of content and tranquility as that old couple, arms in arm, sitting on a safely away from public eye, listening to live Canadian pop music in a rather funny French dialect or that five or six year old boy who dared not to blink an eye to miss even a moment of juggling knives act.