Things to Do in Quebec City
Old Quebec’s walls
Start on top: walk a stretch of the ramparts that still ring Old Quebec, first inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985, and pass through one of the four surviving gates, Saint-Louis, Saint-Jean, Kent, or Prescott. This is the only fortified city north of Mexico with its walls intact, roughly 4.6 km end to end.
Chateau Frontenac and Dufferin Terrace
The Chateau Frontenac, opened in 1893 and still a working Fairmont hotel, hosted the 1943 and 1944 Quebec Conferences. Out front, the roughly 425-meter Dufferin Terrace boardwalk runs toward the Citadelle, and in winter a toboggan slide built in 1884, nine years before the hotel itself opened, sends riders down at speeds up to 70 km/h. The 1879 Funiculaire drops down to Lower Town in about three minutes if you’d rather skip the Breakneck Stairs.
Lower Town
Quartier Petit-Champlain, the oldest commercial district in North America, spills into Place Royale, the exact site where Champlain built his first habitation in 1608. Notre-Dame-des-Victoires church stands on that same ground and is the oldest stone church in North America. A block over, the 420-square-meter Fresque des Quebecois trompe-l’oeil mural depicts 15 historical figures across 400 years of the city’s story, and the year-round Marche du Vieux-Port sells local cheese, maple products, and Quebecois prepared foods.
The Citadelle and Plains of Abraham
The star-shaped Citadelle is home to the Royal 22e Regiment, the Van Doos, whose daily summer changing-of-the-guard ceremony includes a mascot goat always named Batisse. Next door, the Plains of Abraham, formally Battlefields Park, is where British and French forces fought the 20-minute Battle of the Plains of Abraham in 1759 that ended New France. The Musee national des beaux-arts du Quebec sits on the park grounds with the world’s largest collection of Quebecois art.
Parliament and the Basilica-Cathedral
The Parliament Building, completed in 1886 in a Second Empire style modeled partly on the Louvre, carries 26 statues of historical figures on its facade. The Notre-Dame de Quebec Basilica-Cathedral, rebuilt after fires in 1759 and 1922, holds a Holy Door installed in 2013, only the seventh in the world outside Europe.
Winter activities
If you’re visiting between January and March, build in time for the Carnaval de Quebec (Feb 6-15, 2026), the largest winter carnival in the Western Hemisphere led by the mascot Bonhomme, and the Hotel de Glace, an ice hotel rebuilt every year about 35 km outside town.
Read more: pair this with the Quebec City travel guide for logistics, or see the best places to eat in Quebec City guide for where to refuel between sights.