Our Trips: Quebec, Canada. July 27, 2011

Some people in a Newsgroup we belong to toured the Gaspe Peninsula a few weeks ago and posted some nice pictures on the web. We were so inspired that we decided to give it a try. The closest airport is Quebec, but the airfare is in the $1500 RT range, if we want to travel on short notice. However, CO offers a 20,000 mile award ticket; so we ended up paying about $60 per ticket in taxes and fees. Go figure.

7/27/2011 Wednesday. Ellie came by to pick us up for a 10:30 am flight. At around 8:30 am I got a message from CO saying the plane would depart one hour late; I checked the status of the incoming flight and things looked okay. We left at about 8:45 am and got to the airport at around 9:15 am, that’s when I got the message that the flight would leave on time. That’s pretty bad: I wonder if anyone missed the flight because of the erroneous messages.

Flight to Quebec was smooth and we got in ahead of schedule. The airport looks quite modern, with quite a few immigration officials working, but very few passengers. The young lady who processed our paper kept telling us Quebec City is a nice place to visit, perhaps we’ll heed her advice and visit at the end of our journey.

Checking out the rental car (a Dodge Avenger from National) was rather straightforward. The receptionist deleted many of the expired credit cards on my profile. We decided to take a local road, and had lunch at Scores (ribs and chicken) at and then picked up some groceries at IGA. Our drive eventually got us to Baie-St-Paul which looked quite interesting. We decided to then go to the hotel directly and took this mountain road through a National Park (des Grands-Jardins), the scenery was quite beautiful. We got to the hotel at around 7 pm, our room is just so-so. Hotel Chicoutimi was built in the late 1800s (although it burned down and was rebuilt, added on, and otherwise modified.) Dinner at Mike’s down the street: chicken parm for me, chicken salad for Anne. Walked around a bit, including a short stroll along the waterfront.

Our choice of town for tonight and tomorrow, it turns out, isn’t the smartest. Instead of being at the center of tourist activities for the region, this is more like an industrial town. Tomorrow we will have to drive about two hours to catch a Fjord/Whale-watching cruise.

One unmistakable fact: they speak mostly French here, and there is either a reluctance or inability to converse in English.

Ste Anne De Beaupre Cathedral. Anne was the mother of Mary.

Drive to Chicoutimi led us through Parc National des Grande Jardins. This is Lac Petit Ha! Ha!.

Chicoutimi Waterfront at dusk.

Hotel: Hotel Chicoutimi. Mileage: 256 km.

7/28/2011 Thursday. Left hotel at about 9:30 am to drive to Tadoussac to catch a whale-watching cruise. It was about a 2-hour drive. Cruise about 3 hours in duration, including a stop across the river to pick up additional customers at Baie-Sainte-Catherine. All together about 100 or so passengers, at over CAD 60 a head, three trips a day, these guys are raking it in. We did see quite a few fin whales, and a few minke whales. Fin whales are huge animals that can be as long as 80 ft. Took some video clips, quite difficult on a rocking boat. Waters were quite calm, though. Also saw seals and dolphins. The short cruise of the fjord at the end of the journey was quite forgettable. Instead of showing live underwater photos, they showed a movie clip.

These fin whales are huge, they can be as long as 80 ft and weigh as much as 70,000 kg. These may be 50 to 60 ft long.

After touring Tadoussac for a little, we then drove onto Rte 138 which has a free ferry service to connect the towns of Tadoussac and Baie-Sainte-Catherine. Each ferry can take about 70 cars, so the system works quite well with the traffic we had today. The crossing took about 15 minutes, but we had to wait for the dock to clear since there was a ship traffic jam of some sort.

Drove back to Chicoutimi via St. Simeon, and we stopped by La Baie’s Mike’s for a simple dinner. The street below our hotel was blocked for a rock concert. Actually two, one at each end. Quite a few people were standing around, most of them middle-aged or above: there are not that many young people around, it seems.

Tadoussac - Baie Sainte Catherine Ferry. Each can take about 70 cars, and it's free.

Coastal Walk along Tadoussac Bay.

Baie de Tadoussac, where a lot of whale watching boats depart.

Tadoussac, Quebec.

Our whale-watching boat.

Deck of Tadoussac - Baie de Sainte Catherine Ferry.

We saw this yacht again in Gaspe. Some people travel in style and comfort.

Hotel: Hotel Chicoutimi. Mileage: 313 km.

7/29/2011 Friday. Today was mostly spent waiting in line, at least from 11:45 am or so until 5:30 pm. One contributor is Chicoutimi being 145 km or so away from Saint Simeon, where the ferry for Riviere-du-Loup leaves; another contributor is my inability to make a decision and stick with it. Now the long version. We left Chicoutimi at about 9:45 am, expecting to catch the ferry that leaves at 1 pm. When we got to the dock at 11:45 am, we were told the 1 pm ferry was full, and we could either stay in line for the next ferry at 4:30 pm, or leave and come back by 2 pm to make sure we got a space. We decided to go find a place to have a picnic lunch, and indeed found one in a nice little village called Port-au-Perseil, right next to a small waterfall. When we got back to the dock, we were told the ferry was running late and departure would be 5:30 pm. After hesitating for a while, we decided to stay, and as the line of waiting cars grew behind us, and was soon blocked in. With this, we wouldn’t get to Riviere-du-Loup until 6:45 pm or so. If we had decided to drive right away, it would mean backtracking to Quebec City; the trip would take about 5 hours, and we would get to Riviere-du-Loup at about 5 pm. So we stuck around the dock area (walking, reading, daydreaming, dozing off). We were among the last 10 cars to get on – good thing I didn’t listen to the agent but instead got back in line at about 1 pm. The crossing was uneventful, and we managed a quick dinner at the restaurant on board.

Drive from Riviere-du-Loup to Rimouski took a bit over an hour, so it was after 8 pm when we checked in. The hotel is right on the river front, and we took a short walk along the walkway.

Now we need to decide what we want to do tomorrow, having missed the few hours of touring we expected to do today.

We got to the Ferry Terminal at 11:45 am, and didn't leave until 5:30 pm. And it was expensive at over $70 for car and 2 passengers.

We had to wait for this Ferry to go to Riviere-du-Loup and then come back before we got to board. Crossing took a little over one hour, and they served dinner on board.

Boardwalk along the St. Lawrence Seaway in Rimouski, at dusk, low tide. You can see these boulders on the river bed.

Hotel: Hotel Rimouski. Mileage: 281 km.

7/30/2011 Saturday. Today is mostly spent on driving, from Rimouski to Gaspe. We did make a detour of about an hour (80 km) into the Gaspesie National Park but didn’t get to see much; there seems to be generally a lack of information about where to go. I also found some of these so-called “national parks” are national only in the sense that Quebec has some level of sovereignty, not in the sense of a Canada-wide designation. The drive to Gaspe did take us through many small villages and some rugged landscape. There were stretches of “travaux” roadwork, fortunately none of them too long. Also, the Garmin GPS kept giving us routings that use secondary roads. Good thing we didn’t follow them: many appeared to be dirt roads.

Our motel for the night does have a nice view of the bay. Unfortunately it started to rain when we were about an hour out from Gaspe. Good thing it stopped (it’s now about 10 pm) and tomorrow’s forecast calls for a nice day.

We did visit a few somewhat interesting locations. “The Gathering,” located in Sainte Flavie, is a group of roughly made structures from wood and concrete by the St. Lawrence. There is a windmill farm near L’Anse-a-Valleau (Cap-Chat) that consists of 133 windmills, generating 100 MW of power. The largest of them could produce 4 MW but is not working. At the small town of Sainte-Anne-du-Monts we took some pictures of wood art outside a local museum. Some of the works remind me of what I saw in AGO, perhaps the artist there (Giuseppe Penone) was basing his work on local craft? We also saw a cruise ship that sailed down the river for most of our trip. Anne also claims a yacht we saw in Tadoussac is now moored in Gaspe Harbor.

"The Gathering" (plus one) at Sainte Flavie.

Windmill Farm at Cap Chat. This collection of over 100 windmills generates about 100 MW of electricity.

Wood Art outside Museum at Sainte-Anne-du-Monts, with Cathedral as background.

These flying objects are hang-gliders. There were many of them.

Motel Plane, Gaspe has a great view of the Gaspe Harbor.

Grand Etang (Great Pond).

Hotel: Motel Plante, Gaspe. Mileage: 479 km.

7/31/2011 Sunday. Short drive to Forillon National Park in the morning. Highlights include: Hiking part of Mont Saint-Alban Trail; Cap Bon-Ami to enjoy the view and walk down the beach, many nesting birds here; Anse-aux-Amerindiens and walked on the International Appalachian Trial (only for a couple of hundred yards); Lighthouse at Cap Des-Rosieres, the tallest in Canada; and Grande-Grave, a cemetery still in use today. The coastline is quite rugged, and we saw quite a few birds, a couple of seals; no whales, though.

Entrance to Fort at Forillon National Park. Built to protect Gaspe during WWII.

Driftwood on beach along Blvd. Grande Greve.

Anse-Aux-Amerindiens. The International Appalachian Trail is at the far end of this beach.

Cap Bon Ami, a great vantage point to take in the sights.

Cape Gaspe as viewed from Cape Bon Ami.

Mount Saint Alban Trail, we hiked about 2 km of it.

A couple of razorbills perched precariously on a cliff.

Phare Cap des Rosiers

Drive to Perce late afternoon was uneventful. The Perce Rock dominates the landscape here. Motel was close enough to “town center” that we walked over and bought some hot chicken wings for a late snack.

Perce Rock and Mont Joli.

Three Sisters (one can count more), namesake of Auberge Les Trois Soeurs.

Hotel: Auberge Les Trois Soeurs, Perce. Mileage: 187 km.

8/1/2011 Monday. Walked to Quay and bought two tickets on 10:15 ferry from Les Bateliers. Several operators run boats to Ile Bonaventure, but Bateliers seems to be doing the most business. Boat first passed by Perce Rock, then it rounded the Ile, finally making a stop at the island so those who wish to do so may get on the island. We saw many seabirds and quite a few sea lions on the cruise. We took the trail “Sentier des Colonies” to the bird colonies. You could smell the birds about 300 meters from the colony. Quite a spectacular sight. Reports say up to 120,000 gannets gather there during the season, I can’t count that high but won’t dispute the number. Not as many chicks as I expected (one would expect one per pair). They are all different sizes, meaning they hatched at different times. A Ranger we talked to said they migrate when they are ready, by themselves, around September. We actually saw some rather weak ones, and a few dead ones. Survival rate is 40%. We took the long way back, via “Sentier Chemin-du-Roy.” The longer walk was okay, except for the wet mud we had to trek through. Both Anne’s and my shoes are ruined. We did get to see some of the houses people used to live in, including a small one where 11 children were raised, and the family name changed from Hall to O’Hall to Wall, for some reason. We took the 4 pm ferry back to Perce, spending altogether about 5 hours on the island. Our park admission also allowed us to visit the museum of the area, mostly about gannets and cod fishing. Below are some videos we took. We didn't manage to see up close any gannets diving for food, but here is an amazing video posted on youtube; at the end of this clip is a gannet that miscalculated and died of a broken neck.

Chicks eat by sticking their beaks into their parents' mouth.

Gannets are gathered in different areas on the island. Some in colonies such as this, others along the cracks in the cliffs on the side of the island.

The parent is carefully fixing up the nest. It is very interesting to observe and try to understand what the different movements of the birds signify.

If a gannet wants to fly, it would first have to move to the edge of the colony so it has enough runway to take off. This one here thought about it a bit before taking to the skies.

On our way back, we climbed up Mont Joli to have a better view of the rock.

After resting for a bit, we then drove to Mount Blanc. Chemin du Mont Blanc is for 4x4 vehicles, but we made it up and back without too much trouble. Stopped along the way and walked the trail to look at “The Crevasse” which is made by erosion. After surviving on home-made sandwiches for many meals, we decided to eat out and had a buffet dinner at The Biard which is just up the road from our motel.

There was very little driving today, but we managed to walk about 12 km, about the same distance we drove today.

Seals resting on rocks around Bonaventure Island.

Gannets nesting on ledges on cliffs.

At the Ferry Terminal at Bonaventure Island, in front of our boat.

50,000 nesting pairs are estimated to be on the island, resulting in over 100,000 gannets including the chicks.

The return trip on a rather muddy Sentier Chemin du Roy took about 90 minutes.

At some point a family with 11 children lived in this house. At least the wild flowers around them were nice.

On top of Mont Joli.

Crevasse on Mount Blanc

Hotel: Auberge Les Trois Soeurs, Perce. Mileage: 13 km.

8/2/2011 Tuesday. Today was mostly spent on driving from Perce to Riviere-du-Loup, an 8-hour, 560 km trip. There were quite a few “travaux” signs around which slowed us down somewhat, and there was a huge accident about 60 km out of RdL that caused at least a 90 minute delay. The best we could tell, it was a van overtaking another car and get got hit by an oncoming semi-truck. (This is from a fellow traveler who lives a few minutes from the tie-up, he got the information from his wife, via a cell phone.) When we passed by the scene, we saw the roof of a van in a ditch, and a semi that was sideways on the road and the cab in the same ditch.

We did stop by Parc National De Miguasha, which is a fossil bed from the Devonian period (about 380 million years ago.) The display showed the fossils that purported to show how fish turned into reptiles (we could only manage a cursory visit as we were pressed for time.) For me this missing-link stuff from available fossil records is stretching it a bit much, but I don’t know enough to support or refute it. We also walked along the shore where a lot of the fossils were found; we didn’t see any, but can see how the sedimentary rocks can have lots of fossils in them.

Dinner was at St. Hulberts close to our motel. We certainly have had a lot of their chicken and ham salad during the trip, this times I had ribs and chicken, Anne the hot chicken sandwich.

Our route did take us into New Brunswick. Garmin gave us a route that involved a road that probably isn’t used much; we picked a different route which involved a bit of detour. Garmin has been quite unreliable in its choice of routes for this trip, often routing us through bad secondary roads. I can see why some people are stranded (or worse) following the suggested routes blindly.

Sedimentary rock at Miguasha National Park is from the Devonian period. One can see how fossils could be lodged here.

You can admire, but not collect, these nice pebbles at the Park.

These Halte Municipales are clean and convenient. Very considerate of these small villages.

A major accident blocked traffic for 90 minutes. It could be dangerous trying to overtake another car on these highway.

Hotel: Auberge de la Pointe, Riviere-du-Loup. Mileage: 587 km.

8/3/2011 Wednesday. We visited two parks in town today: Parc de la Croix and Parc de Chute, the first was a cross set up in the 60s, the second is a waterfall about 100 ft high. We then drove to Old Quebec, with a stop for a picnic lunch at a highway rest area. We visited the Citadel and strolled around the old city a bit. Reminds us of Old Town Montreal, but Quebec is much cleaner.