Riding Along the Ocean

This entry is coming to you from the tiny seaside village of St. Godefroi. I'm sitting up against a large piece of driftwood, next to a tiny fire, started from last night's embers. To my left is a low, red cliff spotted with gull nests and to my right a long beach bordered by a small commercial fishing marina. Ahead of me is all ocean with what might be the smallest sliver of New Brunswick far off to the South-West. St. Godefroi looks pretty good from where I'm sitting.

With only a couple of days riding ahead of us we have certainly got a few stories to tell - too many for my thumbs to manage on a Blackberry keyboard.

To begin, we had a big decicion to make last Thursday while we were still on the South Shore. We were contacted by VIA Rail telling us that our return trip to Ottawa had to be altered since they had a major bridge washout in Gaspesie. We looked at our days left and our new Gaspesie return point destination and reconfigured the itinerary. We planned a stop at La Pocatiere, a larger city with a train station. The plan was to collect schedule information so that we could coordinate our ride to land at a city in time to catch a train to the south side of the peninsula. Instead, we camped out at a local school playground for six hours and hopped the relatively convenient midnight train to Matepedia. Getting the bikes all boxed up in time for the train's arrival is a story by itself.
The very next morning at 5 am we'd arrived and had our bike gang ready to roll in short order. We left Matapedia with sandwiches from the conductor and the world's greatest train engine tour, graciously offered by the resident heavy duty mechanic.

We immediately noticed a real change in landscape, scenery, and critters. The gently rolling, pastoral farmlands were now densly forested hills. The frequent villages were now fewer and less tourist oriented, and then there's the black flies. Lana and the kids were mauled by these persistent critters on our first break. Instead of the itchy welts left by mosquitoes they leave a burning and itchy hole that sticks around for days. They'd be more bearable if they didn't love nooks and crannies. They go straight for ears, eyes and noses. Most bites are right along the hairline which has left Levi looking like he has Chicken Pox. The good news is that they've become fewer as we head further east.

Our first campsite at Escuminac, called Pirates Cove was small and rustic but had a great view of the ocean and neighbouring New Brunswick. As always the people left the greatest impression on us. We left late the next day with cheers from the resident campers who now knew our story. The campsite owner Joanne had provided us with garden vegetables for our supper and warm eggs, hand picked by the kids, for breakfast. Anse aux Pirates was a real highlight for all of us.

We left a rustic site behind and found what must be one of Quebec's most modern campsites by day's end. This was not before we made a number of interesting stops along the way.

It didn't sound interesting at the time but we were encouraged to visit the local Sauvannerie (sp?) or soap factory. Unlike other soaps, this soap was made using goat milk. The little cottage industry was quite impressive and the product first class. Levi enjoyed feeding the goats for the hour it took the girls to buy a few bars!

Next came a stop at a new fossil museum. Unfortunateluy this turned into a quick lunch stop as we were worried about our time. The funny thing about this stop was the fact that we became the center of attention for a group of people on a tour bus. They took pictures of us and we took pictures of them taking pictures of us. We have drawn a lot of attention on this trip. At our very first Tim Horton's stop just yesterday Lana looked up as we departed and the front window had filled with onlookers as we made ready to leave.

Most memorable was our run in with the steepest and most frequent hills we'd encountered to date. The steepest of which clocked in at a 12 percent grade. Our guide gives us warnings for anything over a grade of 5 percent but being that we have started taking short cuts many of these hills were a "pleasant surprise". The girls are excellent up and down the hills, rarely needing to stop and clocking speeds of 55km/hr on the steepest downhills. If not for the most amazing tailwind of the trip we would have been a sorry lot by day's end. Quinn did suffer and was towed for a few km at the end, my theory is that her spirits were dashed when Colby beat her up a hill for the very first time. Thankfully we had the fastest last 16 km ever on the hills down to sea-level with the mammoth wind still at our backs.

Carelton was a nice place with the nicest campsite. After visiting the Metro for grub we made our way to the campsite located on its own narrow peninsula that runs parralel to the town's mainstreet.
(Bleep: I was rudely interrupted by my family waking up and have had to contine this entry from a place called Pabos Mills, 47 km up the road)
Although an extremely windy location, we got a site sheltered by a tall hedge within earshot of the coolest playground complete with zip lines. I was happy to see a two terminal internet station where I could properly udate the blog.

I was up early the next day to sort through our 1000 photos and to make a backup. Colby was also up early as she had offered to make us Monte- Christo sandwiches for breakfast. Combined with grapefruit and local blueberries made for our best breakfast on the trip.

We have been really enjoying the last third of the trip. We have gotten into a decent groove and all the. Little aches and pains from this sort of travel have mostly vanished. The girls are saying how fast the time has gone and that they understand what a special accomplishment they've made.

Just yesterday we clocked 1000 km , our target distance. A kind lady told the girls that she was impressed by her husbands bicycle journey around the penninsula, "until she saw this." Her husband was standing next to her smiling his agreement. At our celebratory pizza party another woman was flabergasted as she sat with her 11 year old daughter and peppered us with questions. Yet another lady at a blueberry stand took notes and photos that she could use to convince her kids to do a similar trip.

Levi has also come a long way and we've convinced ourselves that this has been an excellent training ground for kindergarden. Sitting quietly in one spot, doing numbers and letters with a dry erase book; colouring and drawing are all kindergarden essentials. More than anything he's a more patient fellow - which was something we were working on before the trip.

We land in Perce today which will be the end of our eastward journey. The locals have all suggested that this is the most scenic spot and that the hills leading into the city of Gaspe are even difficult for cars. We wanted to give the kids a full day at our destination to sightsee and relax while we box all the gear up for a 5am departure on Saturday.