First Lake Champlain sunrise!

Blog for yesterday in progress. Might be awhile. Very limited power outlets & only small area for wi- fi at campground.

Saturday, September 6 - Day 4 of the Long Walk

        We were back on my prepared route today. It was one of the easier days in that we walked in a straight line for most of the day. Just to add a little challenge, the forecast was for rain. Don't you hate the days when the forecasts is correct?

        We had to pack up from our B&B this morning as we were to move on to a new location. We hated to leave the B&B as it had been so wonderful but the walk continues. Even with waiting for packing until this morning, we were still ready to walk by 9:15. Although the forecast was for rain, it was barely misting as we started. Our first stop was just down the road from where we finished yesterday at a building that looked like it came from my childhood. 

        As we went down the road, we found that we were not alone. There were two interesting characters within the first few km.

        I was glad to have been able to see them as I was doing the car shuttle again and only going a couple of km before returning to the van to move it forward.

        As the day progressed, the mist became heavier and at last turned to rain. It only rained hard for about 15 minutes but it is possible to get very wet in 15 minutes. Our motel room is full of damp clothing this evening and the motel is quite a comedown from our B&B. It is costing us a lot of money in comparison and, although looking clean, it has a stale smoke smell. The motel owner said it was a non-smoking room but then we wonder why it is full of ashtrays. Sigh!

        Tomorrow we camp in Vermont. I am sure the smoke there will be of a better variety!

Day 3

Long walk - Day 3 - Friday, Sept. 5

Plans changed today thanks to Frederic. He told us about a bike path that went to our next stop point. So we started on the opposite side of the river from the rout i had planned. At first it was on a fairly busy road and we wondered if we had made an error, but Fleur-Ange saw a side road that connected to the canal and we were off on a much more pleasant waterside walk.

At this point i started back to town to do the car shuttle. I took the canal path back instead of the road to see where we had gone wrong. It turned out that we had not gone wrong at all as i had to do dome rock climbing and weed walking to get back to the road.

I worried about finding Fleur-Ange and Pauline as the canal path was not visible from the road but then the road turned and crossed the canal. Just as I was crossing the canal, Fleur-Ange & Pauline were a few metres down the trail. I moved on down the road to find a parking spot and returned down the trail to meet them. At this point the canal was quiet and not very close to the road. Also, at that point there was a lift bridge with a story.

After meeting Fleur-Ange & Pauline, I walked back with them and then further on the trail..Just past the lift bridge the trail joined a road. Along that road were some of the most expensive houses that we have seen so far. When I turned after a couple more kilometres, I was treated to the view of one of the more exotic cars that I have seen. It was a little, fire red Lotus convertible! I know it was very expensive as the poor man did not have enough money left to repair his muffler. Sorry, I did not get a photo..it appeared and disappeared to quickly for me to get out my camera.

The trail and road were side by side for quite a while so I thought I would see Fleur-Ange & Pauline as I went by. I missed them. They were shopping for material and fruit in some little stores just before the trail moved into a stretch between the river and the canal. Fleur-Ange and I made contact via iPhone messages so I did find out where they were so I drove ahead to look for a trail access point. I did not know when I could get to the trail as the road was on the other side of the canal. Of course there was road work ahead and the road was closed. Soon I was on a detour with no clear idea whew the trail was or where I was for that matter. Thank goodness for Google maps. I did find the road and trail after some wandering about and did find some canal locks with a pedestrian bridge across. I was 5 km ahead at this point as the trail only had access to dry land at the bridge and the locks for those 5 km. I walked back until I met Fleur-Ange & Pauline. As we returned we saw a man swimming and fishing in the river. The water was both swift and deep so he was having a good time with his flippers, mask, and fish spear. He did have a good sizes fish on a line with him so it was not just fun but productive too.

The canal bike/walk trail finished just beyond the locks so the rest of the day was on city streets in Saint-Jean sur Richelieu. I thought I would give Fleur-Ange & Pauline a break and stop early but they didn't' want to stop. (The canal trail made the walk 2 km longer than the road walk in the original plan.) that being the case I drove to the end and walked back to meet them and we finished together. Pauline's Garmin recorded 22 km. with all of my shuttling and walking back and forth in only walked 19.4 km today.

Oh, just for the record, we started our day with homemade granola. I had two of my granola bars, an apple, and a peach for lunch and we all went to a restaurant for a pizza supper. No, I did not avoid glutenin today.

Day 2 of the Long Walk

It was a very different day for me today. I started the shuttle routine. I walked with Fleur-Ange and Pauline for the first two km and then returned to get the van and drove ahead of them. I parked the van and then walked back to meet them so i could walk with them again. It was great that the first two km were so nice. It was a shady bike trail with a good number of bikers and other walkers as well as runners. 

Finding my way out of the side streets was not as difficult as i expected. Just after I parked the van I got a text from Fleur-Ange asking mr to go to the Toyota dealer further down the road to get the needed oil change. I declined as i did not want to deal with mechanics that probably spoke English as well as I spoke French. When I met Fleur-Ange and Pauline we stopped for lunch at an ice cream place…unfortunately, the Ice cream place was not open yet so we missed out but did enjoy the shade and tables that were provided outside. 

There was also an interesting sculpture almost across the street.

As we continued down the road we did indeed find the Toyota dealer. Fleur-Ange went in to check out the possibility of getting an oil change. Oh yes, there was an express oil change section. Just drive in and out in less than 20 minutes and they did have some English speakers, so I was out of luck and Fleur-Ange was in luck. I walked back, got the van, drove it to the express oil change location and only had time to visit the washroom and read a couple of e-mails and the van was finished and I was only off the trail for about 12 minutes.

I caught up with Fleur-Ange and Pauline just before the next road change, moving from a smaller street to a 4-lane highway. I walked down the highway with them for about a kilometre then returned, again, to the van to move it ahead to the end of the highway section where the selected route would take us to a lesser used street again. Temperatures were getting quite warm and there was no shade on the highway so I was just as happy to not do the whole distance even it was only just less than 3 km. 

In driving to catch up, I missed the road where we were supposed to turn as the street sign on the right side of the highway was not the same as the one on the left so by the time I realized my error and got back Fleur-Ange and Pauline were already at the corner. They had found a shady spot to sit so they did not miss the turn but it was close.

At this point in the day, we were within 5 km of the end and our B&B so I took the van all the way to the B&B and then walked back to meet the others again. As I walked, I noticed a bike path next to the river just a ways off the street so when I met them I suggested the bike path which we took. It passed by a historic fort next to the river and there were various information signs along the path so it slowed the pace down a bit but it did make the last few km of the day more enjoyable.

End of day two, 40 km finished, and Montreal is only a distant view already.

Long Walk - Day 1

       Having talked with Nicole, the B&B hostess yesterday in person and her husband, Frédéric, on the phone we had detailed instructions on how to drive to the end of our first day and then take public transit to our beginning point. We had decided to leave about 9:30 to avoid the Montreal rush hour but left just a bit early to be on the safe side. We had some discussions re the best route to drive as the given instruction looked to be longer than the Google recommendations but we decided, upon looking at the traffic to take the written instructions from our host. It worked well and we were soon parked a few metres from the end of the day’s walk. We walked to the bus stop, with some help from some neighbours that Fleur-Ange talked to and waited about 20 minutes for the bus.

The first bus took us to the Metro Underground where we did the usual rat maze of tunnels above and  underground to find the correct subway. 

Three stops later, we got to the second subway and then watched as more and more people got on board. Glad we missed rush hour as the cars were quite full even at this hour of the day. When we got off the subway we had to find another bus. In spite of all the instructions, it was still a bit of a challenge to find bus 21. There were lots of numbered bus stops on three streets by the subway exit and, of course, it was he last of our three choices that had our bus. It took us within about 4 blocks of where we wanted to go and, finally, at 11:33, we were off on our walking adventure.

 First stop was the park washroom and then onto the streets. We took a side street from Parc des Hirondelles over to one of the main north/south streets Avenue Papineau. At that point Avenue Papineau had a green area in the middle so we chose to walk on the grass with traffic on both sides until the grass disappeared. At times there was a wide grassy boulevard at the side of the street upon which we walked but for the rest of the time it was hard sidewalk.

We had a stop at a bakery for lunch about 1:00 and rested a bit and had some tasty sandwich treats. The cakes and pastries were very tempting but we resisted and got back on the hard sidewalks. 

 (My leg muscles are used to long distances but I found the sidewalks very hard on my feet and before 10k my feet were burning at times. Fortunately, the feet can only feel extreme pain for a limited time and then the nerves just quit and the pain goes away for a while. Unfortunately, the “whiles” don’t last all that long and the pain reappears. One just carries on.)

The Avenue Papineau part of the walk was almost 9 km long then, after a couple of twists and turns on a bike path we got on the Pont Jacques-Cartier. The bridge was definitely one of the high points of the day for me at least. It was over 3 km long and rose high above the surrounding streets before arching over the St. Lawrence River.

 It touched down briefly on the island where the Montreal Expo 67 had taken place and then bounced back up to cross more river and canals and streets before settling down on the far side of the river.

A few more twists and turns on the bike path and we were back on the streets and returned, again, to Rue Papineau for a bit before coming to the Boulevard Jacques-Cartier. I had almost convinced myself that I had made an error in my map work as I could see no way across the Jacques-Cartier but my map work won and we found the street to take us across and onto the last bit of bike trail that returned us to Fleur-Ange’s car. 

As I write this in the early hours of Day 2 my feet are still sore so it may be a long day or the start of a series of long days. Time will tell. We also have no wi-fi this morning so I am not sure when this will be posted. (Posted after day 2's walk at 4:30 p.m.)