This blog comes to you live from the shoulder of highway 132 just moments away from the West side of Perce. Just now the sun is rising over Bonaventure island - the nature preserve we toured yesterday. From the shoulder of the road the sight is quite vivid. I say this because I've just started the 9 km hike back to our campsite from the bus depot where I dropped off our bikes.
This story begins some time in July when a flash flood pushed a house into a bridge knocking it out off commission. We knew the train was out of order but knew that VIA would have something worked out for us. Where this story takes a sudden turn is that VIA had a solution for it's passengers but not one for its cargo. The bus company VIA hired refuses to ship bikes! To make what is a long and frustrating story short we had to find a way to get our bikes home without VIA's assistance. For people who don't have, "it all adds to the adventure" as a motto, the work involved might cause an anurism (sp?).
It was during our ferry ride and hike across the island that all of Lana's hard work paid off. After many calls, conversations and pleading we had a "solution". What we wanted to avoid was having the girls ride in the middle of the night to arrive at a local gas station by 3am to give us time to dismantle and pack up all the bikes. We also wanted to avoid a 10 hour stop in Matapedia, the ghoast town where we discovered blackflies.
The solution began upon our return from a day of exploring. Somehow (picture coming soon) I managed to stack all the bikes and Levi's trailer to my own cargo trailer. Lashed down with everything I had available I added flashers and a slow-moving-vehicle sign from one of the girls bikes and was ready to go. After a nice five minute meal I headed off to the bus station - a tiny gas bar 9km west of our campsite.
The ride went well although it was easily my most hair raising ride of the trip with many stops in the dark to adjust places that began rubbing on the trailer tires.
The ride was slow but not as slow as the service from the two teenage gas station attendants who seemed to get a kick out of my limited abilities with their language. What they did manage to convey over the course of my two hour visit was that there would be nobody at the "bus station" in the mornng to put our bikes on the bus. This is one of those "lost in translation" moments you here about where there is no one to blame. This new tidbit sent me reeling and trying to problem solve two hours after bed time. The hotel across the street was full so I couldn't stay and the local cab company works 8am to 11pm so they were of no use to me.
I ended up packing every bike but my own and removing what I could from my bike to speed me up in the morning when I returned. Yes, return. I arrived back at the campsite at around midnght only moderately frazzled by the notion that I could have been mowed down by one of the hundreds of souped-up honda civics that race aimlessly around these parts.
Lana woke me at 4 am to set me on my way. The twilight moments at that time were even nicer than the sunrise in my opinion. The ride was smooth with a little more light than the night before and I had the last bike to the curb with a good three minutes to spare before the bus arrived.
So I am now probably two or three km into the walk back to Camping Cote SurPrise where the gang is nestled high on a cliff overlooking the touristic side of Perce. My crocs are not serving me very well as hiking boots but I've never been more impressed with a Blackberry - could get used to this walking and typing thing.
We are headed home this evening after a day of shopping and hopefully many lattes in the harbour.
Greg
