Where are you UnhappyT?

Well No sign of our buddy. Where the hell are you UnhappyT? Your car is parked at the campground.

Trailer Bound!

We were up and getting camp broken down in a fair amount of time. The sleep was good once again. While Cheri showered I geocached right here in the campground. It took a bit but found the container hanging in a tree. The cache Le Halte was small but I left a travel bug there.

We were going to do another cache across the street but after walking about 10 minutes it looked like it would require bushwhacking so we skipped it and instead got on the road. We were going to play to The oldest disc golf course in Quebec but unfortunately for me this was the one weekend this year that the course was closed. I don't just mean closed like no one to take money, but closed with the baskets taken out and the tee signs removed. Very disappointing as the reason for picking this area to camp was so i could play the course. DAMN!

Travelling fast toward Montreal we decided to get off and go to a Space Center The CosmoDome right next to the highway. Unfortunately when we got off the exit we could not figure how to circle back, it actually took a few tries circling around before we figured ie out.

It was a cool place that honored the Canadian Space program and their nine or so astronauts. We wandered around checking out the exhibits, trying desperately to sneak up on the unhappy traveler and get his picture. It was not to be though. It was a nice break from the road. We had sandwiches in the parking lot and hit the road for the final few hours back to the trailer. There was a bit of traffic in Montreal but we navigated our way easily. At the border the inspection was a bit more comprehensive, as they checked out our documents and asked questions about our trip. Still though not bad, I guess the two of us do not fit the profile of smugglers or terrorists. Oh yeah that's right, UnhappyT decided it was a cool idea to test the border security. He got out of the car out of site of the border and said he was going to sneak in. We waited for quite a while after passing into the country but he did not show again. Hope he is okay, it was a pretty foolish thing to do.

We arrived back at the trailer in the evening and Maryrose took care of us with food and drink. watched the kids play with sparklers and had another good night sleep.

Had MaryRose take one more picture of us before heading home the next morning.

Finally A Shorter Drive!

The camping was great with the air mattress making sleeping easy. I have backpacked for years and have never been totally comfortable but car camping with an air mattress is just a pleasure. No sore shoulders and no constant turning over through the night. Damn though was it a cold night. Looking up the low at the Canadian Weather site I see it was 45 degrees.

We woke to a beautiful day, the warmest it has been on the trip. Cheri cooked up a killer breakfast of eggs, sausage, bagels and hash browns. We took our time and enjoyed this lovely place. Unhappyt's cowboy coffee was not very good but hey caffeine is caffeine. We showered and broke down the camp at a leisurely pace. No rush today with only five hours of driving to do. We got on the road by 11am and skipped right past the caches in this area. Get some miles between us was the thinking.

We were supposed to stay at Camping Le Huard the night before and we passed it on the drive south and boy are we glad that was not the place we stayed. Just a big grass parking lot , no shade no privacy and no fun. In town they were cleaning up from the forrestry competition over the weekend but we were a day late for that. Cruised down and out of the lakes and into more lakes but these ones with mountains. A long drive but short in comparision to yesterday, about five hours. Skipped right past the caches in the area we left. Maybe I can get some when we get to Saint Adolphe -D Howard. It was a lovely warm day. Suffered through the Genesis CD to get to some really cool stuff, Bush, Sonic Youth, Janes Addiction, Smashing Pumpkins.. Got to the Campground by 4:30pm or so. It was a nice place near a large lake community and pretty much was a small grassy area surrounded by roads. Still far enough so we felt somewhat alone. Almost noone was staying there. We set up camp thinking we were going to get rained on and it seemed we were doomed as we had too little tarp for the tent we had. It started raining harder and I was bumming. Then as quickly as it came it was gone again. Cleared and was nice all night.

We hopped out to a close store and picked up firewood. Had another delicious dinner and sat by the fire for drinks and cribbage. Beat the Unhappy T in a couple and Cheri in all we played. My luck was good at the game, winning all six we played on the trip. Cheri got a bit tipsy with her 8.1 beer. We didn't go to bed until midnight. Another good nights sleep. The hotel party long forgotton, If I ever found out who thatwas I would kick his or her ass. Party at 3 in the morning. I left Cheri and T out by the fire and went to bed, he was bitching about something to do in the bathroom, whatever. Why did I invite that guy?

Drive, Drive, Cache, Drive, Eat, Drive, Drive, Drive

Yeah that about covers the second day. In planning it I knew it was stupid but wanted to get really far north, but the reality of it is that it was just way too much driving. Sure we stopped here and there but all figgin day was just getting to the next place. The place we never actual got to. Which was good but we will get back to that later. Early morning music Albert King and then Frank Black

The early morning part of our trip was to go to Tim Horton's and get coffee. Tim's is the Dunkin Donuts of th north and we appreciated everyone we saw way up there. we thought that we were going to get some sight seeing done in the area but it was too early for the good stuff around the lake.

Apparently Saint Jean was here but now he's gone but left his name to carry on. There actually was a lot to see including a big waterfall and old historic town, a zoo and there was a bike trail all the way around this freakishly large lake. Cheri and I were out so early that we were way past this area by the time anything was open. We stopped in at the historical society to check out the lake, saw old Saint Jean and took some pictures and then it was on the road for a very long day of driving. We are passing this old local guy on the way back to the car and Cheri says to me, "Who ever said it was summer up here." and the Guy says "It's always this way." It is 53 degrees under gray skys and breezy.

Turning northwest at route 167 north we drove and drove for hours, closing all the while on Chibougamau. Picking up the musical pace we have Aerosmith in the player. The road to Chibougamau is 140 miles one lane in each direction with passing lanes up the hills. After 70 miles we reach the first of our two caches on this part of the trip. We stopped twice it gave us a break from the road and allowed the Puss and boots travel bug to have some fun seeing other caches. Learn more at geocaching.com. The names of the caches we did, and you can look them up and see maps at the site were:

CHIBOUGAMAU-1- BAIE-QUEYLUS-N-8 and CHIBOUGAMAU -2- UNE TOUR -N-9.

Ask Cheri about her attraction to porn.

Finally at about 1pm we went through Chibougamau and continued north for another half hour before deciding this was as far north as we could get before heading back to rooute 113 west just south of the town and driving another freaking four hours to Senneterre Quebec.

Our furthest point traveled north by car is now.

Buffalo Tom and Red Hot Chili Peppers

The road was awful and the bangs to the car were at times frightening. This section of road is not worth seeing, just trees running as far as you can see. Not that you could look up from navigating the patchwork pavement. Even Unhappyt couldn't stay awake to complain about the boredom of this drive crashing most of the day but for a couple periods here mumbled about the Cree Indians. 9.5 hours of driving in 8.5 hours we made it across and were looking for Camping LeHuard in Senneterre. We did not see it and seemed to go past the street number so we stopped into another campground. Instead of getting direction we panamimed to the woman to get a site there. It turned out to be just the most beautiful sight.

First we had a panic setting up as rain was a coming as we put up the tent, but it ended up just being a passing shower. We made some dinner and chilled out before crashing out. Great place with nice stars at night.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bonjour!

Good nights sleep! The honeymoon suite suited me well even though I was all alone. Quiet and isolated I got a fine nights sleep. Woke up at 4:30 but stayed down until 5am. Cleaned up the tent and went to Dunkin Donuts for coffee. I can not stress how essential this coffee bit is. Being completely addicted to the routine of 24-32 ounces a day forces a system of seeking and drinking not to be ignored.

Sat around the camp waiting for Cheri to wake which was about 6:30am or so. Down to the showers for another of those routine things. I was wondering how many people have to shower every single day and how many are fine only showering when needed. Seems a very American thing to shower daily.

The road trip started at about 8am with Cheri, the Unhappy Traveler, Puss and Boots and I crammed into a over stuffed Toyota Corolla driving up route 93 north. Of course 11 miles from the camp I realized that I left the camera back at the trailer. So we had to turn it around and get it. Good job! UnhappyT gave me shit about it for hours. Radio was the soundtrack for this part of the trip.

Back on the road having only lost a half hour. Northern NH and Vermont is just beautiful, rolling hills with mountains in the distance, green fields and grazing cows turning into pine forest. I would live here except winter doesn't end until mid June, and of course there are absolutely no tech jobs anywhere outside of Burlington.

Crossing into Canada was a snap, couple questions about where we are going and when we will be back and we were through the checkpoint at the border. The woman that checked us in did make a strange comment though, at least at the time. We told her we were heading to Jocquiere for the night and she said "Oh you may see whales." Now I am no Geography expert or anything but I am pretty sure Jocquiere is well inland. As you can see by the image here. We just figured she was didn't really know here geography.

We kicked off our official roadtrip soundtrack here, you can follow the link to the entire list. So with Godsmack blaring and the sweet smell of fertilizer damaging our nostels we cruised into Canada. Route 55n turns into 10 and 55 but somehow we missed that and started cruising east instead of west and north. Took quite a while for us to notice but after stopping in a small town for coffee at a Micky D's we had to make an adjustment in our plans and cut up route 139 to 55 north.

We lost about 40 minutes with this error but these things happen. I just wish UnhappyT was as forgiving as Cheri was because it was my mistake by not navigating well and missing the turn. The music carried us through this part of the trip. The Terrain was bland and after getting to 55N and then quickly to route 20 east we needed it as it was a long flat stretch to Quebec City. we did not stop in the city because we had lost time, about all we saw was a distant view and this bridge.

Oh yeah and we saw the prison too! That is about it, as a matter of fact the rest of the driving for the day was this really long hard to pass on hilly road, route 73 north. We were on this road for hours with nothing but emergency fones and a lake every few feet. Check out the less than stunning pictures here.

The rest all the way to Jocquiere was a haul we were reminded just how big Canada is. Finally though we arrived at the Holiday Inn. Checked in, and went about town for a bit lookingfor the downtown, which there was none from what we saw. Still we found the nice walking Bridge and park on the River, fjord or whatever the water way was. Being a Fjord apparently has its props and one of them is every now and then WHALES come in. So the girl at the border was right. The walk along the bridge with UnhappyT and Cheri was nice and believe me after 7 hours in the car we needed to be outside. Not finding anything that looked like a good place to eat we headed back to the hotel and settled on Mike's for Dinner

Boy it is a shame I did not do more homework on this area before we came, I would have had a day just for exploring and then a week more for Kayaking the Fjord, Whale Watching, fishing, Mountain biking, rock climbing, water skiing, and any number of other activities this area offers. For more try http://www.saguenaylacsaintjean.net/defaultz.asp?lang=an

Knowing that tomorrow is the worst driving day of the trip 9.5 hours we crashed out fairly early withnthe clock set for 6am. Unfortunaely for us there was a wedding in the motal and thee was the bang, bang, bang Bonjour! out in the hall at 2:45am Unbelievable!