I slept like a baby last night. Camping at Wesley Clover was much like staying in a BC Provincial Park. We heard little of anything until about dawn when the highway traffic volume started to increase. This didn’t get me out of bed though and I slept off and on until about 730am. Connie was dead to the world and Zach seemed so too, although later he showed me how his mattress cushions separated, so he spent most of the night sleeping on a board.
That being said, he woke up cheery enough and sang out in his falsetto vocal range ‘Baby…I compare you to a kiss from a rose on the grey’, which has become our trip theme song (Kissed from a rose by Seal). We must have listened to it 5 times throughout the day and tried to guess the actual lyrics.
Before pointing the truck and trailer toward Quebec City, we stopped by Canadian Tire – a Cross Canada trip wouldn’t be right without at least one stop at the iconic establishment. We needed to purchase some Alan wrenches (because I didn’t think I brought my set from home – Zach discovered later that I had), chain lubricant and a pair of scissors. Zach needed to tune up his bike and Connie broke our only pair of scissors the previous night.
We parked in the empty parking lot, collected our supplies and headed to the counter. While waiting in line, a young lady in training waved us over to her counter and a little old gentleman shot ahead out of nowhere and said to the young lady ‘did you call me over?’. She motioned toward me and I smiled and said ‘you go ahead’. I thought this is a nice gesture and what goes around comes around.
After we made our purchases we headed back to the truck and I jogged across the lot to Tim Hortons on the corner for another cup of coffee. Now being a good Canadian I lined up according to the sign that stated ‘line up here’. Unfortunately, the lady behind the counter was short of stature and didn’t notice me and I continued to wait patiently. Then a guy walks in behind me, ignores the sign that stated ‘line up here’, gives me a glance and then steps right up to the counter to give his order. ‘What the?’ I muttered under my breath. ’What goes around comes around eh?’ Incredulous I crossed my arms across my chest and huffed. I’m certain neither the lady of short stature or the guy gave me a second thought and I know this won’t matter in 10 minutes from now but hey I was seriously wondering whether being Canadian is the way to go. To add insult to injury the guy sits down at a table by the window. I thought ‘he’s not even in a rush!’ – I’m the one who has to drive for 5.5 hours.
After walking across the parking lot to the truck my mind went to more pressing matters, like entering the address of our destination in the GPS. Zach thought he’d get a head start on it for me but the GPS lady couldn’t find the address. We both thought the worst but then realized we neglected to change the province. Did that and voilà! Within minutes we were on the road again towards Quebec.
The road between Ottawa and Quebec was smooth, the skies were blue with some fluffy cloud. It was a beautiful morning. We crossed the provincial border just before noon and stopped at the first rest stop, topped up the Tundra and ate a bite of lunch.
On the road again, we began to see we were approaching Montreal. My last trip to Montreal didn’t end well. I spent the night in the emergency room at Notre Dame Hospital. If you are going to have an emergency in Montreal, I recommend you visit McGill University Hospital – just saying. My other recollection of Montreal is that highways were rough…at least riding in the back of the cab felt like we were in a chuckwagon.
As we approached Montreal, I soon discovered things hadn’t changed much. In fact, it is now my belief that the city of Montreal has invented a new game to help weary travellers pass the time. It is called how to dodge the potholes while driving 60, 70, 80, 90 and 100km per hour. Each speed is a level. If you succeed at 60km, you get to move to 70km, etc. You might think this would be fun. Well, try doing it towing a trailer!
This game didn’t help to lower my traffic navigation related stress level. I was soon tensed up, repeating what the GPS lady was saying and generally driving Connie and Zach off the deep end. They told me to relax. Exasperated, I defended my muttering stating I didn’t want to make an incorrect turn. Zach reminded me that I was on holidays so I should expect to take a wrong turn here or there and that I should enjoy the experience. Well…within minutes I did just that. I missed the turn off and ended up going some other direction. Through this the GPS lady remained calm and quickly adjusted to get me turned around and headed back on track. A slight delay but all was well.
We did have some fun reading the French road signs and having Zach interpret. My favourites were:
and a sign with what looked like a tin can with an open lid (or perhaps a very square fist and thumb pointing upward like a hitchhiker) and a red line through it. This one still has me stumped.
Our last obstacle to depart Montreal was a lengthy tunnel and the traffic was horrendous for a Saturday. Three lanes wide and bumper to bumper the whole way. When we emerged on the other side, the traffic thinned and we were able to pick up speed. However, the road conditions remained poor. Frustrated with the continuous bucking bronco motion, I muttered under my breath about the crappy roads. Connie then suggested Ottawa should increase transfer payments to Quebec so they could improve their roads. I responded with, Ottawa already sends plenty of funding. Zach started to debate with me about my bias against Quebec and I suspected I was going to lose this one, and I quickly decided to change the subject.
After Montreal was a good distance behind, the road conditions improved and the trip became much more pleasant. Zach played our theme song a couple of times and then switched to the Eagles and we all sang along. It was a happy time – at least for me.
We rolled into the KOA just outside Quebec City at about 4pm and set up. Zach began to tune up his bike and I sat down to have a refreshment. He then called me over to help him work on the shifter and within minutes I’d stabbed his foot with one of his front forks. Way to go Dad!
However, before long he did get the bike working fairly well and then Connie called us for dinner. Over dinner, we decided to drive to Quebec City and bike the Promenade Samuel-De Champlain. Before we left, Zach’s drink slipped out of his hand, hit the ground in front of me and exploded all over me and the chair beside me – pay back for the foot injury I guess. We all had a good laugh – sometimes laughter is the best medicine.
After cleaning that up, we loaded up the bikes and headed downtown. It was a beautiful and warm night and the scenery was spectacular. Here are a few photos.
Shortly after 830pm, we stopped to take a photo of the sunset – for those of you who know me well, I love sunsets!
We had decided to head back because we’d been biking for about 45 minutes at that point but I thought we should ride just a bit further. As you can see from the photos, I’d been taking a few while riding – kind of like distracted riding. In any case, I was happily riding along taking a photo when out of nowhere a mobile metal post hit me on the front tire! The bike and I went down and were sprawled all over the wooden wharf. It must have been quite the site because two ladies in front of me were laughing. Connie said it looked absolutely hilarious. I got up and brushed off my skinned shin and knee, which were a bit sore but not as sore as my ego. Shortly thereafter, we road back to the truck and when we arrived it was dark. Fortunately, Zach who is always the most prepared had a head and tail light on his bike, so he guided the way and there were no further untoward events.
While driving back to the campsite, I once again took the wrong route and had to be returned by detour by the patient GPS lady. I really don’t know how she keeps so calm.
Tomorrow will be another adventure as we spend the day on foot in old Quebec.
PS. As I’m writing this, the neighbours smoke / carbon monoxide alarm is screeching loudly. Here’s to not having any further adventures tonight.
Mal and Connie's Cross Canada Adventure 2.0 