After a standard WarPoTay breakfast we bid our gracious host family adieu and headed for the hills (literally).
We wanted to distance ourselves from the high level of traffic on the main coastal road. The early morning showers and clouds cleared as we put our backs to the St. Laurence and climbed over the first set of hills into what we expected to be a long agricultural valley. Alas, road maps are not topo maps and we found our road climbing and climbing, leaving the river valley and adjacent lakes below us. It seemed that here the farms are on the high flat ridges rather than in the steep gullies and valleys between them.
Mind you, this made for spectacular views from the ridge tops all the way out to the St. Laurence.
Alan was busy climbing a long gradual hill pondering how Quebec agricultural communities seemed healthy compared to all of the other provinces we had traveled. Fields were green and yellow, houses are well kept up, and small town infrastructure seems solid and small businesses intact. He wondered why, possibly the strong dairy marketing boards here are at the root of it.
At the half way point of the hill, the first attack was launched as a flash of blue flew by him. He was struck on the bum by a small but embarrassing "burr seed stickem". These are dastardly weapons which stick to anything soft on contact, and are lethally embarrasing when stuck to one's bum or back because one does not know they are there. Then everyone laughs at the victim (the Canadian army might consider using them in Afganistan where family embarrassment would be particularly acute and effective). The most effective shot is in the middle of one's back where one cannot reach it. Immediately following the attack by the Blue Streak (Evan), the Pink Shirt (Leah) behind him started laughing (embarrassing, but also a tip off as to what had happened). As the Blue and Pink shirts disappeared over the hill, the only sensible action was a counter attack. So Alan hunted down a Burr Seed Stickem Plant and armed himself in self-defense.
Ginny collected a few Burr Seed Stickems and joined in an alliance with Alan, but alas, as she is a slower biker, she was often behind the battle at key points so that it was two against one (however Ginny, not being part of the main battles was able to pulloff several sleuth undercover attacks later on). Shane seemed to view most of this as silliness (a reasonable point of view) and remained a nuetral party, After several skirmishes the Blue and Pink shirts charged after Alan, but he cleverly diverted into a gas station only to find the Blue Streak in hot pursuit. Unfortunately between the two, they were hard to overcome. The Blue Shirt was particualrly ruthless with the attacks while the Pink shirt was very sharp eyed and prevented counter attacks. When they could not attack directly, they attempt to hide seeds beneath the cloth on Alan's seat, but he caught on to this quickly. And so it went, attack and counter attack through the rest of the day. Alan caught the Blue and Pink Shirts rearming just before Rimuski, and they did not see him stop after them to rearm himself. Thus the battles raged on.
Ginny collected a few Burr Seed Stickems and joined in an alliance with Alan, but alas, as she is a slower biker, she was often behind the battle at key points so that it was two against one (however Ginny, not being part of the main battles was able to pulloff several sleuth undercover attacks later on). Shane seemed to view most of this as silliness (a reasonable point of view) and remained a nuetral party, After several skirmishes the Blue and Pink shirts charged after Alan, but he cleverly diverted into a gas station only to find the Blue Streak in hot pursuit. Unfortunately between the two, they were hard to overcome. The Blue Shirt was particualrly ruthless with the attacks while the Pink shirt was very sharp eyed and prevented counter attacks. When they could not attack directly, they attempt to hide seeds beneath the cloth on Alan's seat, but he caught on to this quickly. And so it went, attack and counter attack through the rest of the day. Alan caught the Blue and Pink Shirts rearming just before Rimuski, and they did not see him stop after them to rearm himself. Thus the battles raged on.
Luckily we avoided bike accidents in the skirmishes as we traversed Rimuski on the best city bike path to date. There was approximately 7 km of bike path along the waterfront from one side of the city to the other with a spectacular board walk along the Main Street as well as a long green wooded section. One had to be careful on the paths because there was so much biking and walking traffic.
Following Rimuski in the the later afternoon we continued another 20 km to Mont Joli along the shore on a beautiful sunny day. Clearly this was the beach vacation spot for the Quebecois and there were tons of small cottages, a submarine exhibition (go figure),
and a public beach. It was all very busy on a warm Saturday, but it still had an aesthetic sense of being a nice place, unlike Wasega Beach- the Ontario beach equivalent. Finally, tired and unable to find a camp spot on the shore, we turned inland and found a sweet camping spot in a large set of fields in the flight path to the runway of the Mont Joli airport (don't worry, there were not too many 747s landing while we were there).
An evening ceasefire was finally called. But what will happen tomorrow? Will Alan and Ginny be able to overcome further attacks? Will Evan and Leah run out of ammunition (they use their's quickly)? Will they think up more dastardly tricks? Stay tuned.
Following Rimuski in the the later afternoon we continued another 20 km to Mont Joli along the shore on a beautiful sunny day. Clearly this was the beach vacation spot for the Quebecois and there were tons of small cottages, a submarine exhibition (go figure),
and a public beach. It was all very busy on a warm Saturday, but it still had an aesthetic sense of being a nice place, unlike Wasega Beach- the Ontario beach equivalent. Finally, tired and unable to find a camp spot on the shore, we turned inland and found a sweet camping spot in a large set of fields in the flight path to the runway of the Mont Joli airport (don't worry, there were not too many 747s landing while we were there).
An evening ceasefire was finally called. But what will happen tomorrow? Will Alan and Ginny be able to overcome further attacks? Will Evan and Leah run out of ammunition (they use their's quickly)? Will they think up more dastardly tricks? Stay tuned.
Distance: 111.25 km
Time on bike: 6:03:10
Average speed: 18.3 km/h
Distance from Vancouver: 6381 km
Start: 8:30 am
End: 6:00 pm
Wind: north-west (light-cross)
Conditions: sunny
Cheers
- The Warpotay Team
Location:Mont Jolie, Quebec
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