Quebec to Quebec, day 1

My route this year doesn't sound nearly as impressive as last year's Minneapolis to Boston ride, but if day one is any indication, it will be just as much fun.  I have joined many of the same people I biked with last year for a month in Quebec, Canada.  We are doing two big loops, one up the St. Lawrence to the Saguenay River and Lac St. Jean, returning to Quebec City, and then heading down river to Montreal and again returning to Quebec.

Our group, 16 of us on the first loop, arrived in Quebec City on Sunday and Monday.  After a day of exploring the old city in the rain, we set out for real in great weather today.  The well-marked bike paths made Quebec the easiest city to depart by bike that I have encountered.  Since we return twice and leave once more, this is definitely good news.

Quebec is very bike-friendly in general, we are discovering.  Out hotels greet us with this cheerful sign, which tells us they have safe storage for our bikes and offer basic tools and support.  We hope it also means that they welcome, or at least are used to, large and sometimes both noisy and noisome groups. 

Our route today stayed close to the river as we travelled 42 miles to Montmagny, wandering through several peaceful and lovely little towns on the way.  If your eyes are good, you may spot a parasail on the river.  And if my blogging skills were better, I would include a video of the sailor launching himself quite impressively out of the water.  Of course, we always keep a look out for interesting sights, such as this charming playhouse.

Sunshine, tailwinds, and gentle hills.  We hope for more of the same tomorrow.  

  

Back home again

Yesterday we did a quick 36 mile from St. Raymond into Quebec.  Once again we marveled at the wonderful bike infrastructure, as we rode on well marked trails into and through the city.  We have even ridden on bike detours, as well marked as the main routes, to take us around construction or other obstacles. This investment seems even more impressive when you consider that the biking season is only about 7 months of the year.  Many shared routes are in effect only from mid-April to mid-October, and the metal poles separating the bikers from traffic are removed in winter.  

We drove from Quebec to Lake George, New York yesterday afternoon and made it back to DC today. Guess it is time to start planning my next adventure.  

        

             One more lovely view on yesterday's ride.

                                   

                                      In search of a bathroom, we stopped at a First Nations 

                                      hotel and museum where this wonderful art was displayed. 

                                   

                                       My bike was a frequent roommate on the trip.  I hope it 

                                       won't be lonely in the garage.

       

           In line for 45 minutes at the border.  Things looked different as soon as we crossed back.  In general, everything in Canada seems much neater and better tended.  We definitely appreciated all the immaculate bathrooms and port-a-potties, a subject dear to bikers!

                                   

                                       Yoga on the beach at Lake George this morning

                                    

                                       End of the trail for my bike seat.  It has given me 

                                       thousands of miles of good service.

Next to last day

   We had a lovely, albeit short ride of about 36 miles today, from Ste. Anne de la Perade to St. Raymond.  Last night when we were safely in our auberge, a major thunder and hail storm roared through.  Funny how much more I enjoy the rain under those circumstances.  The morning was misty when we started, but we ended the ride in sunshine.  As usual, there were many interesting sights along the way.

                                      

                                   I stopped to check out the sign.  Susan, obviously, did not!

                                       

                                                            Pretty berries in the mist. 

        

                     I feel like Dr. Doolittle.  Today's conversation was with a family of alpacas.

           

                

                              

                                  I love to stop on bridges to admire the view. 

                                  

                                     Was Susan balancing on her bike to get this picture?

   

              

        Raspberry photo of the day

Backtracking

Our route today took us back up the St. Lawrence on roads we had ridden a week ago.  Because the ride was short and the day was beautiful, John, Susan and I took some side roads to give us more time on our bikes and less time on the highway.  We rode 43 miles back to St. Anne de la Perade, to stay in the same lovely auberge we stayed in the first night out of Montreal.  This time I arrived early enough to go for a very refreshing swim in the river.  Today was the warmest day in the last two weeks, so our timing was good all around.

                                     

    On our way out of Trois Rivieres, we stopped at the Sanctuary of Notre Dame.  This small chapel, built in 1715, is next to a huge and more modern basilica.  Two miracles have been reported here, and many thousands of pilgrims come each year.

       

             We saw this interesting woodwork on our back roads detour.

                           

                           I had to stop for a conversation with a very vocal herd of goats.

                  

    

                                          

       We stopped at an outdoor art exhibition.  It was a good thing I was on a bike so that I couldn't be tempted to buy anything.

              

                                  

                                       Another round of great raspberries.

 

Discoveries along the way

    Today's ride was one of those you wish could go on and on -- beautiful weather, great country roads, no traffic, interesting sights along the way, and a tailwind!  Our mileage from Berthiersville to Trois Rivieres was just 55 miles of easy riding, so we could relax along the way and still reach our destination with time to explore the old part of the city here,

              

            We had to stop to admire a lovely farm and visit a bit with a couple of mares and their colts.

                      

        A ways further down the road, we stopped at a restored general store.  The owner showed us his Aeolian piano player dating from 1904. It is a contraption which can be set to any keyboard and hits the keys, guided by a paper roll and powered by petals.  None of us had ever heard or seen this version of a player piano, so we were delighted to get a demonstration.  

 

       

   When we arrived in Trois Rivieres, we visited the Ursaline Museum.  Five intrepid nuns travelled from Quebec to establish a school for girls and a hospital here in 1695.  The school they started is still educating more than 800 students annually, although in recent years it is no longer run by the order.  This picture is of the dome of the chapel, parts of which date back to the 18th century.  Our visit was interesting, but I would like to know more about the women and girls in the early days of the school.

                               

               One of the towers of the cathedral here, soaring up into a clear late afternoon sky. 

 

R & R (Raspberries and Rain)

The weather today reminded me of what we used to say in Wisconsin -- if you don't like it, wait 10 minutes.  We left Montreal on a beautiful, sunny morning, voicing admiration for the wonderful system of bike lanes and trails.  Some of the bike commuters were a bit aggressive, but we were well protected from motorized vehicles!  We had lunch in a lovely park well out of the city, and I carefully put on more sunscreen.  No more than half an hour after lunch, we were standing in a bakery watching the lightning show.  Not a bad place to spend an hour!  We bought a raspberry pie after we had measured Susan's bike bag and determined it would fit.  Just riding in the rain wasn't enough for me.  I forgot my CamelBak and had to ride back through the rain about 6 miles to fetch it.  My total mileage for the trip from Montreal to Berthiersville was 65 miles.  

                                      

                           The meandering bike trail -- practically a bike highway at this point!

       

                                            An impressive line of thunder clouds

                              

                                     Waiting in the bakery for the storm to pass.

          

                                                     Serving up the pie for dessert.

Montreal in a day

So much for rest on our off day.  There is just too much to see and do in Montreal. 

        

  Our day began with a breakfast visit to the Fairmount Bagel Factory, for Montreal wood-fired bagels.

 

           

 

      We hopped on our bikes to visit Habitat, built as futuristic housing for the Montreal Expo in 1967 and continuously occupied since then.  

        

                                  

            We also saw the Biosphere, again part of Expo and now an environmental museum.

                                   

      Lunch was at the Maison des Cyclistes, home of the organization which set up most of the bike routes we have been riding.  It felt a bit like a pilgrimage to go there.

                       

       We didn't have time to do justice to the Botanical Gardens, but we loved what we saw.

                                      

     Victory!!  We returned to our hotel by way of the Olympic Stadium, site of the 1976 Olympics.

And a fine day concluded with dinner with an old friend and his new wife who drove up from Ottowa to meet me.  I was on my best behavior and didn't take photos of a wonderful dinner at a contemporary French restaurant. 

Ah, the sun again

Yesterday's ride was a slog--rainy, chilly, gravel trails, but we landed safely at a very bike friendly hotel.  We shuttled in the van from Orford for about 20 miles, unfortunately missing what is supposed to be a beautiful part of the ride, trying to keep ahead of the storm.  We only rode in hard rain for a few miles of  the 46 we did ride, and we sat out a good bit of rain in a nice, warm diner, so things could have been worse. Our ride ended at St. Jean sur Richelieu, at a hotel I had visited once before.  The owner is an energetic and charming woman in her 80's who provided all we needed to clean our bikes, ourselves, and our clothes, and even offered complementary wine and beer!  

Today the sun returned, and we had a pleasant 30 mile ride into Montreal.  We explored a bit of the city on foot and ate two fine meals, so we are contentedly contemplating our day off tomorrow to see more of the town.

         

     The Auberge Harris, where we stayed in St. Jean sur Richelieu, has a fine collection of art by local       artists.  This painting is of the hotel.

                                      

                               We entered Montreal on a 2 mile long bridge over the St. Lawrence.

          

             There are lots of bikes everywhere in Montreal.  The blue one would be an interesting ride.

                                          

    One of the paper dresses we encountered in an exhibit in building in the old city. Even the cameo is      
made from paper!

  

        

       Bill, our Kentucky gentleman, Jim, the Michigan banker, me, John, the retired railroad engineer, and Susan, a stained glass artist, at a Tibetan restaurant.  We are quite a diverse group.

Riding in the rain

Predicted thunderstorms didn't materialize, so we could ride, just getting a bit wet.  Our 55 mile route from Drummondville to Orford took us on long, straight roads, a stretch of dirt road, and up a few hills. I can never say I zoom up a hill, but after the training of the past weeks, today's climbs were actually a welcome relief from the flats.  And of course, the ups brought with them some lovely downhill runs.       

   

                                       

                                              Our day started with 20 miles on a straight road.

                                      

                                             Susan and John coming down a wet road.

                                       

        The cat,being catlike, declined to pose.  No question about the politics in this house.

          

                             The reward for climbing hills.

          

                         The reward for a good day's ride -- raspberry pie!

Our luck holds, at least for today

We rode out of Becancour at 6:30 this morning, hoping to get most of our ride in before it rained.  Luckily for us, we stayed dry and even had a fair bit of sunshine.  We don't expect to be so fortunate tomorrow.  Our only issue today was that our support driver for this section of the trip is not a biker, and We had not explained that lunch time for us is based on miles ridden, not time of day.  We had covered about 35 windy miles by 10:15 and were not happy campers when lunch didn't appear until 11 am.  Fortunately, some of us were able to persuade an ice cream store to open early and had an ice cream appetizer while we were waiting.  We were well fortified to finish our 61 mile ride.

Dinner was also out of the ordinary.  As we didn't find any reasonably priced restaurants close to our hotel, all eleven of us climbed into the Ford Excursion to drive to a diner.  We were quite a sight as we all came climbing out.

     

                                    Waiting for lunch

                                      ,

                                        The ice cream selections were as good as the cones.

                                      

         Along the route we encountered a fishing lesson.   We didn't witness any catches.    

 

   

                       

                                   Cars get lots of information from road signs in Quebec.  

                        

                                There are some we don't understand.  Ideas, anyone?