Off We Go!

On June 20, 2013, my husband and I are off on a 50 day, cross-Canada motorcycle trip. This blog will share our route, travel tips, photos and highlights of the trip. Photos from this trip will also be the source material for my next painting series, "Canadian Roadtrip" which I hope to complete in 2014. Check out my artwork on Facebook at "Kathy Lauriente-Bonner Art" or visit my website: www.klbart.com
Thanks for visiting!

Sunday, 7 July 2013

From Cochrane Ont. to Havre St. Pierre Quebec


June 29, 2013
We both woke up early this morning - around 5am. Neither of us could get to sleep and finally, around 6:00, we decided to just get up and get an early start. I poked a toe out from under the covers and it was COLD!!! Good morning, Cochrane, Ontario - just a reminder, it's summer, right?? 
Not a cloud in the sky, we got up and struck our camp at the lovely train station (after listening to trains all night - maybe not the best camp spot choice but it WAS picturesque) and headed to Tim Horton's for a quick breakfast. On the road by 8:00. We drove through Iroquois Falls and into Val D'Or. By then the clouds had come rolling in and it was raining fairly hard. Very cold (45 degrees F) and windy too. Not much fun on a bike! We caved and ate McDonalds at the local Walmart. Talked to a friendly fellow from near James Bay - he said they come in once a month - it's only about 8 hours away - and do all their shopping. We had originally thought of taking Route 113 north but after talking to several locals who warned us of bad roads and very scarce gasoline, we decided to take the longer route - 117 South, into Montreal. After a quick warm up, we left again and the weather improved only slightly as we headed south. We made it as far as Mont Laurier - just shy of 500kms from Cochrane. We had arrived into larger civilization and hit up Boston Pizza for dinner and sprung for a hotel room as there were no campsites near by. The hotel was no great shakes - in fact, way too expensive for the divey place it was but by the time we got in, we were too tired to care. I WILL say, it had a totally "old school, who gives a crap about conservation" HIGH PRESSURE shower which was ENTIRELY worth the outlandish $95 we paid for the room. We got our money's worth on that for sure... 

June 30, 2013
Got up and was met with heavy, low, dense cloud cover and cold weather - only 50 degrees F. We continued south on 117, heading for Montreal. Now, I have to confess here - Lynn (my husband) had suggested we get our GPS (the Garmin Zumo) and I hedged for quite awhile thinking it would be an unnecessary distraction on the bike. Let me tell you, I LOVE OUR ZUMO!!! Our trusty Zumo got us through no end of freeway cloverleaf mess (complete with construction zones everywhere) with no problem at all. Effortless, I have to say. I'm in love. He was so right on that call...  We also dodged Trois Rivieres and Quebec City without issue and stopped for our first "touristy" thing to do on this trip so far - we were going through St. Anne de Beau Pre and saw the Basilica from a distance. Honestly, it was a church as beautifully designed and built as anything we saw in Italy 3 years ago. Next to it was the Cyclorama of Jerusalem... What the heck is THAT??? All I know is that, in general, I love anything ending in "orama" so we had to check it out. I had visions of camels on 10-speed bicycles, roaring around a track! We had to check it out and it was INCREDIBLE!  Turns out, the Cyclorama is the world's largest panoramic painting - it's been on display in St. Anne de Beaupre since 1895.  It was done by Paul Philippoteaux from Paris (and 5 assistants) and took 4 years to complete. It is in a huge circle around the perimeter of the building and is 14 meters high and 110 meters in circumference. 1540 square meters of painting! It's of Jerusalem during the time of the crucifixion of Christ and was very well researched so it's the most accurately rendered representation of Jerusalem from that time period in existence. It's so well done, you honestly think you're looking at a photograph. Incredible. As you move around the circle, you have different scenes and it's narrated so you appreciate what you're seeing. It was really incredible. 
From there, we went next door to the Basilica and took some photos. St. Anne was the grandmother of Jesus and she is known for the healing miracles associated with this church. Inside are racks of canes, crutches, eye patches, leg braces and all other manner of medical supports that have been thrown off by the healed. I was particularly touched by a leg brace of a 8 year old boy who wrote the story of his miraculous healing on his brace and left it there. 
At  Tadusac, we caught a ferry across a river and saw some beluga whales! Ap[parently, this is an area with a lit of whale sightings! Very exciting for us!
From there, we headed East on Route 40 with a ballpark destination of La Malbaie - Point Au Pic. The terrain started to become hilly and we began to catch our first glances of the St. Lawrence river. Stunning! All of a sudden we were in rolling farm land with little dairy farms, many of them very old. Gorgeous little heritage houses everywhere - lots of them in the Cape Cod style and everything is so well kept. We got to Baie St. Paul and decided to take the scenic route to La Malbaie along the shoreline. What a brilliant decision THAT was!! We went through town and up a hill and there was a pull out with a panoramic view of this little town stretching out to the water - honestly, it was just one of the most beautiful vistas I've seen. We took lots of pictures and video. Lynn put the GoPro on his bike at this point and caught some video of the next 30 kms of the ride, in and out of little villages, through gorgeous farm land and all if it looking out over the water. Unbelievable. I couldn't stop ooh'ing and ahhing... and right when we thought it couldn't get any better - we came around the corner and found "Villas and Camping Des Erables" which is quite truthfully the most beautiful campsite I've ever been in. The grounds are like Butchart Gardens and the campsites are on tiered levels cut into the side of a hill so almost all of them have a beautiful panoramic view of the St. Lawrence. Jean-Jacque and his wife own this campsite and have done a magnificent job of it. I can't recommend it enough. Also, it is VERY  reasonable - only $23/night for a site without power. We went for a quick ride into town to look for some groceries and found some VERY swank hotels, B&Bs and restaurants in La Malbaie. What a fabulous vacation destination spot! And ARTISTS! WOW! Through the towns, many artists hang their shingles and have little studios in their homes or garages. I can see why they are attracted to this area - it's so stunning. We sat in our campsite and ate dinner and watched the lit up cruise ships go by! This area has truly been one of the highlights of the trip so far. 

July 1, 2013
Today, we continued up the coastline with the goal of making Sept-Isle for the night. Another 500 kms. The first place we rode through was La Malbaie - Mon Dieu, what an incredibly beautiful little township. From there, for the most part, the road is very good for motorcycles - the paving is in good condition which makes a big difference in the ride. One of the things we noticed is the HUGE amount of water in Quebec. My God. This will be Quebec's future, I'm sure, as water becomes more and more of a valuable commodity. There are also, not surprisingly, a HUGE amount of hydro electric dam infrastructure. Many people here say that hydro and iron and titanium mining are the main drivers of the economy here. At Tadusac, we took a small ferry across the Tadusac River and saw a bunch of Beluga whales. This entire road along the north shore of the St. Lawrence is called La Rue de Baleine - The Road of Whales. There are a lot of Humpback whales in this area too although we haven't seen any to date. 
From Tadusac, we carried on north east and passed many little fishing village towns. I noticed that there is an increasing presence of Inuit in these villages now. The weather toady couldn't be more perfect - we woke up to clear skies but there was a big forest fire somewhere nearby because there was a lot of smoke. We found out later it was somewhere near Baie Comeau. We stopped for some lunch in Port-Cartier and then carried on to Sept-Isle which is a suprisingly large town - about 10,000 people plus. They have all the ammenities there - I'm sure they service many people from the surrounding areas as well. Lots of shopping and quite a few big box stores like Walmart and Canadian Tire etc. There was even a Harley dealership there! Almost as soon as you arrive in Sept-Isles, there is a gorgeous municipal camping park right on the water. No tenting but you can stay if you have an RV or trailers. All the spots are right on the beach and you have a panoramic view of the whole harbour. Today is Canada Day so there was live music on the boardwalk and fireworks. We had a great dinner and then took advantage of clean showers and laundry facilities to catch up on some basics. We were quite impressed with Sept-Isles - A very bustling, busy town!

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