Quebec City Tour #6: Limoilou
Poster advertising keytar legend “Gils” at Limoilou’s Pub Chez Jean
The image above summarizes my perception of Limoilou: a neighbourhood locked in time where mullets, keytars, and bikers rule. I don’t go there often, and when I do I always experience culture shock (but I suppose it also makes me laugh).
Largely planned and built in the early 20th century, Limoilou looks more like Montreal’s triplex neighbourhoods than any other part of Quebec City. Spiral staircases, tree-lined streets, and a “balconville” atmosphere reigns. Locals in Nordiques caps and short shorts drink Labatt Bleue on their balconies. It could almost be Rosemont/Petite Patrie or Hochelaga/Maisonneuve, but not quite.
In order to get a different perspective on the place, I asked my British friends Tom Welham and Judith Kirby why they live there. After circling the world a few times and cycling across Australia, Tom and Judith decided Limoilou was the best place on earth. They immigrated from England, bought a flat here, and intend to stay.
Tom claims my attitude betrays a certain uptown pretentiousness, which may be true. I enjoy living in one of the city’s rare progressive and creative neighbourhoods. I have a hard time with the small-minded “gros village” attitudes elsewhere. Quebec City has always been home, and I hate to feel alienated in my own home.
“Limoilou is a microcosm of Quebec,” counters Tom. “Far more diverse than your part of town. I live below a very driven successful woman who just bought a red sports car. A gay hairdresser lives in the flat below me. Then there are my salt-of-the-earth neighbours who I can barely understand. There are biker bars AND alternative student places; anarchist clubs AND bowling alleys; corner taverns AND branché bars.”
“Limoilou has the best bakery in the city, and probably the best I’ve come across in all my travels,” says Judith.
“Yeah,” I protest, “There’s one good bakery and one good bar, but the rest of the neighbourhood is just hot dog joints, tanning salons, and gloomy taverns. It’s dépanneur city. There are more mullets per capita than there were in East Germany.”
“There’s a great Salvadorean restaurant,” continues Tom. “And a new Tunisian one. Plus, it makes economic sense to live here. My flat cost me half what a similar place would cost elsewhere in the city, and a tenth of what it would cost in the UK.“
“That’s because they’re not really apartments,” I counter. “They’re just long corridors with rooms grafted to the side, like the ones in Montreal.”
“But there are balconies, and trees along the streets! It’s the only moderately priced neighbourhood with trees. There are no trees in your bloody neck of the woods, and you pay twice as much rent. All we need now is an Indian takeaway, and Limoilou would be heaven.”
“It would never work in Limoilou,” I argue. “If it’s not paté chinois or poutine, they won’t eat it. The locals would chase the Indians out of town. Quebec City needs a cheap Indian thali restaurant, but Saint-Jean Baptiste is the place to open it.”
And the argument goes on…
See more pictures of Limoilou here.
Tags: Exploring the City, Quebec City
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