What Québec Wants™

Street-smart?

Macleans magazine is publishing a ranking of Canada’s ‘smartest cities’. The ranking is based on the Canadian Council on Learning’s annual list.

Montréal doesn’t do very well.

Macleans chose to highlight this fact with an article entitled “Why does Montreal rank so poorly? Despite its abundance of culture, attendance is low.”

The choice of photography for this piece struck me. While photos for the other cities discussed in this issue show culture and learning-related images, the image of Montréal is of a young man setting something on fire during the riots that irrupted after the Habs win last week.

 

Tourism Québec claims via its slogan that Québec has been ‘providing emotions since 1534’. Its residents might spend relatively less time in museums and at the ballet but they make up for it with emotions. It’s apparently good for tourism.

 

Love Boat - Part Deux

A follow-up to a previous post about Quebeckers and cruise vacations.

New data from an Ipsos Reid poll conducted on behalf of TripHarbour from January 13 to 15, 2009 confirm the rather significant difference between Quebeckers and the rest of Canada in terms of the  appeal of cruise vacations.

While 33% of Canadians say they would consider taking a cruise for their next vacation, only 17% of Quebeckers say so. What’s going on here? Quebeckers would rather have their feet on the ground? They’re more prone to vertigo? They watched Titanic too often? If someone knows, please comment.

Love boat

Despite the economic downturn, Canadians (69% of them) are still planning vacations according to a recent poll conducted by Ipsos Reid on behalf of TripHarbour.ca

And it appears that Canadians are also increasingly looking at cruising for their vacations. Two in ten  (21%) have taken a cruise vacation in the past, and one in three (33%) say they’d consider taking a cruise for their next vacation.

But it’s clearly a more popular option outside Quebec.

Albertans (44%) are most likely to say they’d consider a cruise for their next vacation, followed by those in British Columbia (41%), Ontario (40%), Atlantic Canada (34%), Saskatchewan and Manitoba (25%), and Quebec (17%).

More boat than love for Quebeckers

Another survey conducted by Leger Marketing last year offers an interesting glimpse at what goes on in cabins on cruise ship. We learn that not only are Quebeckers less likely to take cruises, “Cruise-going Quebeckers are less likely to have had sex (22 per cent) than the rest of Canada. British Columbians and Ontarians boast the highest membership in the ‘Naughtycal Mile Club’ (57 and 55 per cent respectively)” – For more on this fascinating topic of significant interest to the travel trade, read this article creatively titled “Canadians kiss and tell about sex at sea”. I'm waiting for the survey on Quebeckers suffering from motion sickness to draw conclusions.