62 Drive to Tadoussac

Canada
Québec & New Brunswick
Nova Scotia & Newfoundland
Québec & Ontario
Manitoba to the Pacific

60 Ferry to Québec
61 Back in Québec
62 Drive to Tadoussac
63 Tadoussac
64 On to Québec
65 Québec
66 Québec
67 On to Ottawa
68 Ottawa
69 Ottawa
70 Ottawa
71 On to Niagara
72 The falls
73 Canadian wine
74 Behind the falls
75 Morty goes home
76 On to Toronto
77 CN Tower
78 ROM
79 Stocks, tower and dance
80 Toronto Saturday
81 Off to Florida
82 Coping with Wilma
83 SeaWorld
84 Back to Canada
85 Casa Loma and shoes
86 Killarney
87 To Sault Ste. Marie
88 Goulais River
89 To Thunder Bay
90 Thunder Bay

Canada: Québec

Tuesday 4 October 2005

Happy birthday Mum!

Stroll at sun-rise

Still in the rhythm of the ferry we were awake early. Our prize for this was to see the sun rise, the first time we have managed to see a full sunrise on our trip. When I woke I could see a small sliver of orange glowing on the horizon. Within about five minutes an orange ball was gradually getting higher and higher in the sky. It was pretty spectacular to see but I think sunsets do more for me than sunrises.

We clicked back into routine easily this morning and were out on the road a little after 9:00. Last night we had passed through Mingan, home to an Innu population, one of the local First Nation peoples. Wanting to see it in daylight we backtracked and stopped at the petrol station, more to have an excuse to make contact than that we desperately needed petrol. Stef went in to pay while I waited outside. The people I saw looked resigned to a life of little opportunity and low income. Stef had a similar experience from the people inside the shop. They did have a local artisanale with typical arts and crafts but it was shut. The shop itself looked disorganised and generally reflected a low standard of living. All in all we were left with an impression that the people here are not happy with their lot but are not inclined to proactively do anything about it. This seems to mirror the feeling we have picked up along the way from Canadians and is probably why there seems to be little interest in the first nations peoples.

With a long drive ahead of us we soon got going. It was a calm clear day, a good last day on the ferry for those heading down to Rimouski. Our expectation of the landscape from our short drive last night was correct. The road is long and straight, running along pretty flat scenery. There are small villages along the way, literally just a row of houses either side of the road. Stef worked out that the next nearest houses if you travelled northwards would be

The corner "atautshuap" in Mingan

somewhere in Asia.

At lunchtime we arrived in Sept-Iles, with a population of around twenty five thousand it is the largest town for a long way. We stopped here to do some shopping and, most importantly, to phone my Mum to wish her Happy Birthday. Still with no mobile reception we tried the local pay phone which for some reason does not like our credit cards. Wal-mart came to the rescue with an international calling card. It was great to have that contact with home and to chat with Mum and Dad.

From Sept-Iles to Baie-Comeau the scenery changed and became more hilly with more twists and turns in the road. It made for more interesting driving but the wind also picked up again for a while. Driving through forested areas when its windy is actually quite handy as the trees and grasses along the road tell you when you are going to get to a really strong gusty bit.

At Baie-Comeau we stopped for petrol and Stef took over the driving again. There was not much traffic on the road but enough for there to be other people around most of the time. Huge HGV's and petrol tankers came thundering past us, overtaking us on uphill stretches and definitely going faster than the maximum speeds advertised. We have both recalibrated our internal speedometers. For us going at 100 seems fast but this is kilometres so its only really 60 miles per hour. Most of the time we are cruising at 80kph, a sedate 50mph.

The places we passed along the way were tiny and there were no campsites for us to stop at. Even though we can be totally self sufficient in Morty, and as such could just pull up on the side of the road for the night, Stef wanted to make it down as far as Tadoussac. Despite the warnings we have had about not driving in the dark, the last ninety minutes of our journey were in pitch black conditions. I kept telling myself that there was still enough traffic on the road to keep the moose at bay but I did not really believe it.

We made it safely to Tadoussac and drove through the village to the campsite. Again its a small place but there were coaches in evidence reinforcing that this is a tourist trap that people come to for the whale watching. The campsite, Domaine des Dunes, has chalets for rent as well as sites for tents. There are only about eleven serviced sites for RV's and we were surprised that most were full. Its a sign that the remoteness we have felt in Newfoundland and Labrador is coming to an end and we are working our way back towards people. Quebec is only a two hour drive away.

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