Thursday August 9th
Today was a planned rest day so I could whale watch. I had booked a reservation by phone yesterday and was quite excited to see some whales for the first time outside of captivity. I had some time in the morning so I caught up on the blogs and went for breakfast. The breakfast was a straight up omelette for $12 but had fresh fruit and really good cheese and mushroom inside to become the best paid for breakfast of the trip.
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Wednesday August 8th
I want to thank Jean-Claude and Marie Tracy again for their hospitality. I was up early and Marie joined me for some toast and tea. She also slipped me $40 for the cause. I packed up as people slowly made their way out of their slumbers. After a couple of parting shots I was on my way heading North toward Quebec city before heading East again along beautiful farm country. Imagine the rolling hay and wheat fields of Saskatchewan with small tree covered mountains and valleys with small rivers. This is the beauty of the Quebec countryside and I stopped many times to take it all in. Today was going to be a long one so I couldn’t stop too often but I wanted to remember this unique countryside.
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After breakfast Ken’s family and I drove into Levis which sits on the opposite bank of the St. Lawrence river facing the Chateau Frontenac. The town itself is quite nice and has a stunning view of downtown Quebec and the surrounding landscape. From there we took a ferry right to the docks below the city, check out these photos!
Since Ken and Angela had already toured around and I had never been I decided to do some tours on my own. I started with the the ruins of the Chateau St. Louis which fell victim to fire in 1834. However there were many versions of this building starting in 1648 built by governor Charles Huault de Montmagny. The surrounding fort was of course built by Champlain which was also reconstructed many times. The chateau ruins are under the wooden boardwalk in front of the Chateau Frontenac which costs $4 to go see.
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Monday August 6th
Map my ride route details here
I got up pretty early to do me business and start organizing. Around that time I heard a few rumblings upstairs and knew that Mylene would be up. While her boyfriend and her are getting ready for a work day I am riding my bicycles across the country. I was in slow motion a bit but eventually got the bike all packed up, water ready with electrolite tablets deployed and me dressed with bike shorts and butt cream. We took some pictures but not with my camera so I will have to get those later.
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Guess what. MapMyRide is working. They updated their database which is why I was unable to save . This is unbelievable really but I don’t want to get into it. What I can tell as far as good news is the live tracking feature is working meaning you literally watch my progress. When I start a tweet will go out with a link to the workout, please check it out and tell how well or poorly it is working.
150 kilometers ride details
I woke up with a little bit of a hangover thanks to Francois. I’ll get you back some day! I had a couple of bagels while trying not to disturb anyone’s sleep. It is basically a one room apartment where the bed is in kind of an alcove which is art of the living space. Eventually Francois and Maria got up and said their goodbyes. I will visit again I promise!
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Other than get up to go shopping I did nothing but catch up on blogs until about 4:30. It had to be done because the more I get behind the more likely I lose some of the readership. I also figured it will be easy to visit Montreal on another trip. I did venture out in hopes to get a hair cut but they all closed at 5pm so I went for a drink instead. I was expecting to be able to order wine from Quebec but there was no such luck. Alcohol is a little pricey too which I wasn’t expecting so I switched to beer. Around that time Francois messaged me that they were making dinner so I went back to their place for a nice fish dinner made by Maria. We had a few glasses of wine followed by a few beers and talked about our families and generally caught up on things. Before long I was laying on my mattress drinking a beer trying to continue the conversation but I was done for the night and fell alseep. Sorry no pictures!
My friend Ian works at the Strike First Corporation who have donated generously to the cause.
In their own words this is what they do:
Strike First Corporation is committed to manufacturing some of the finest quality portable fire extinguishers in the industry. We back this up with our 6 year warranty and a strong dedication to customer service. Located in Toronto, Canada, Strike First Corporation is a family run business with over 100 years of experience in the fire equipment industry.
Friday August 3rd
For first time in weeks I got up really early and because I had no food was on the road by 7:15 and had covered 30 kilometers by around 8:30 where I stopped for breakfast. I had an awesome omelette to start the day and was back on the road in no time. It is so much cooler in the morning and since I was on a less travelled road at any time it was especially quiet this time of day. It was also another day were I really didn’t pay attention to the time or the kilometers since I new my destination was around 110 kilometers, an easy day by my current standards and terrain which was flat, flat , flat!
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Thursday August 2nd 2012
Still no MapMyRide but about 120 kilometers.
Today was a really great riding day starting right off the bat where I rode to the Ottawa River bike trail instead taking the main roads. Not only is it quiet , peaceful and scenic it is also well marked and easy to follow into the city. Many sections are completely covered by lush green deciduous trees and shrubs make it more than a few degrees cooler than when exposed to the sun. The river is to your left and the shoreline opposite is Quebec! This was definitely a Gopro day so I will let the video do the talking but very briefly I rode behind the Parliament buildings up the Ridal Canal to parliament for some pictures and video.
Note: I tried to upload a special video and it it hasn’t worked yet.
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Wednesday August 1st.
Today was a rest day to see the city so there was no concern about the MapMyRide application failing miserably as it has had a tendency to do since leaving Toronto. Yes I am going to slag them until I get some actual support for the product.
I decided to ride into the city since I was able to leave my bike at city hall with Georgie and I thought I might bike around the city after seeing parliament. Hindsight is definitely 20/20 since the city has a decent bus system and I had all sorts of problems deciding what to do with certain time constraints but my guardian angel Natasha saved the day. More on that later but riding on an off day just feels strange because you are not in destination mode where you knock back a lot of kilometers but you are still on a bit of a time constraint and need to lock up your bike way more often. On that note part, 7 or 8 kilometers in the ride I decided to take the bus. I stayed on until I got to Mountain Equipment Coop where I had the bike guys look at my front and rear rims to determine in they were true. It turns out that it was the tire itself that was not seated properly but the procedure involved a little time to over inflate them and then hope it solved the problem. I decided it wasn’t worth the effort and there was a crack in the complete circumference of the rear (probably because I had folded it) that was at risk of bursting during this procedure. After a quick brake adjustment I was happy and left the store with more chamois cream – for the arse!
China town Ottawa!
When the next bus came it didn’t have a bike rack so I just rode the remaining 4 kilometers rather than wait for the next one. Pulling into Ottawa was fun and though a somewhat busy city I didn’t feel the urgency in the traffic like Toronto or Vancouver where it seems people are fighting for every in of pavement. The first major sight I came upon was the Surpreme court of Canada which is having renovations on the grounds in front of the building. From the road it looks all fenced off but once you go into to the parking lot you can ride right on up to the building. Unlike Washington DC there is one police car in front and no barricades of any kind protecting the building. Of course I know this is probably not the case when the court is in session and I am sure there is a tonne of security that you can not see. I didn’t look around because I wanted to get to City Hall before I started going in out of buildings since I didn’t bring my bike lock which was another hindsight thing. It is so frustratingly apparent sometimes when you have poor planning. Normally this would not bother me but today would have been so much easier if I just bused in. Okay enough about that!
Supreme court of Canada.