Château Frontenac

We arrived in Quebec City about 12:30 PM and drove into Old Quebec, the historic section of Quebec City, to give ourselves a sense of the neighborhood. After checking into our hotel, we all walked into Old Quebec and ended up at the Château Frontenac, an imposing fortress of a structure and a grand hotel of impeccable standards and quality. The hotel is one of a series of "château" style hotels built for the Canadian Pacific Railway company during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It opened in 1893, six years after the Banff Springs Hotel, which was owned by the same company and is similar in style. (Ed. note: I visited the Banff Springs Hotel in 1977 with my mom, dad, and four younger brothers, on a family road trip to the Canadian Rockies.) The Frontenac is generally recognized as the most photographed hotel in the world. Needless to say, it's a cut above the Comfort Inns and Quality Inns that we've grown accustomed to on our road trips.

Here's a photo of the hotel taken during the day and at night from the same location.