I slid down an icy, outdoor, 133(!) year old slide at 70 km/ hour at night when the temperature was -22C. No, I don’t have a death wish…I don’t think :/

Quebec City has been at the top of my radar for a while now. I’ve always wanted to visit other places in Canada apart from Toronto, and reading about the European charm of Quebec along with accessibility, the winter markets, Christmas / New Year festivals and activities, it was pretty much a no-brainer to go in December. Once of the activities on my trusty To-do List was Tobogganing at Dufferin Terrace. It’s a popular Winter activity in Quebec city and affords you great views of the most popular building in Quebec City, the Fairmont Chateau Frontenac, with a 425m Boardwalk net to the St. Lawrence River that you can stroll along during the warmer months. The Terrace is named after Frederick Temple Blackwood, aka Lord Dufferin, the Governor-General of Canada at the time.

Open every day during the winter months, from 10 a.m. to 5 / 9 p.m., depending on the day. Individual tickets cost CAD$3, (it’s also kid-friendly) which includes a Toboggan and one run down the slide. I think that the option to go down the slide at night is so cool. We did go at night purely due to the early sunset and the insane amount of time it took to get dressed in winter clothes (and snow pants! I haven’t worn snow pants since I was 10!).

That night, although the temperature was at -22,  I foolishly took my gloves off while we were walking to the top to take pictures (see the product of my sacrifice above). Not only was my hand shaking, but after literally a minute, it was frighteningly numb. I couldn’t take any proper pictures at the top, and the attendant looked justifiably miserable as he tried to hit his frozen water bottle against the ground to find a semi-melted sip to take. I wasn’t going to ask him to sympathize with my very irritating and annoying tourist request of taking a pic of us for the ‘gram. My husband managed to get a few shots, although none with the group. Off topic, but Quebec City really is beautiful, and contrary to the rumours of unfriendly people, we didn’t experience any rudeness, snootiness or hostility from anyone.

Sitting on the toboggan, there was a moment of “WHAT. AM. I. DOING.”, especially since it looks extremely steep and we had just played a very entertaining game of “what if” with my friend, who very comprehensively detailed all of the deadly / injurious possibilities of going down the slide. I turned over to the teams on the other two sleds (there are three slides), said “see you on the flip side, suckers!” as the dehydrated attendant flipped the switch.

I screamed very badly for about 3 seconds (you know when you can’t decide whether you’re going to scream in a high pitched voice or your regular voice? No? I’m the only one what does that? Whatever. Shut up.) until I realized it wasn’t as steep as it looked. You gracefully slide down right back to whether you began your climb up, at the café that sells hot drinks ( I mean they sell other things but come on. There’s no wrong time for coffee). It was a great run and I highly recommend it. I would have done it again that same night but I kind of value my hand more than a second run. Ah well. There’s always year 134.