I have found that I get out of camp about 40 minutes earlier by myself. I like this because my pasty white butt does not like cooking in the middle of the day. I say this now because I know tomorrow I will leave late and all that I said before will be negated.
The morning was nice. I not to hot, no wind to speak of, and my legs felt surprisingly good considering I pushed it yesterday. In the first 25k I saw a few things that I have never seen before. The first were grass farms. I guess this should not surprise me but I just found it odd to think that a farmer’s job is literally to watch grass grow. Next there will be a profession to watch clouds form…. Wait that a weatherman. Sorry many kilometres and a good day have brought out the lame jokes.
I was at my rest stop and managed to order myself two donouts when really I wanted one donout and chocolate milk. Then this specific Tim Horton’s would not take debit so I had to run out and grab my other wallet. When I come in I find that this gentleman I was talking to before had purchased my donouts for me. I thanked him multiple times and was off on the road. At this point I knew that it was going to be a day in Quebec I would look back fondly on.
I was trying to race off of the 158 because it is inland and I want to be next to the river, which is road 138. There I am time trailing down the road when I hear a whistle. It is a bike tourist at the side of the road and a shrine toping up on water. I considered just waving and leaving but for some reason I stopped.
This is where I meet Bruno. A young horticulturist from the grass-farming town I had just passed. Right away we started talking and getting to know each other. He is just on a short 3-day tour, so he was blown away that I got here in less than 40 days. I did not think much of Bruno in his wife beater shirt, sandals, and beanie on his head (while his helmet rested on his back bag). I was promptly proven wrong when my steady 27km/h tempo was pushed up to 30km/h. Never judge a book by its cover. I would like to think his cannondale bad boy also helped him with this.
Because we were going at a faster speed then I had anticipated we hit all of our stops in very good time. Just outside of Louisville we stopped for lunch at this sit down semi fast food place. It is hard to describe but at that point I was mainly paying attention to my stomach. I had my first poutine in Quebec and it set the bar a little higher then all of the ones I have had in BC. I can’t wait to experience the ones that are not from a semi-fast food joint.
I had a wow moment at a place called point-du-lac. All you see for kilometres are white beaches bordering the river, with a beautiful steel bridge in the background. It was a picturesque moment that I did not get a picture of.
Tois-rivers was where I was going to stop initially but we arrived there at 3pm so it was to early to stop when my legs were feeling good. This is also where I said good-bye to Bruno. It was very nice having someone to ride with and just talk to normally for most of the day. The town itself is very nice. The main drag was lined with old buildings, and every parking spot was filled with a motorcycle, which was cool to see. As a side note today I saw my first and second t-rex motorcycles. They sound really nice when they are ripping past you at a little above the speed limit. I was also blown away by the amount of can-am spyders I saw today. These road snowmobiles were everywhere. In total I counted over twenty of them which is odd because they are not the largest company in the world
After departing I got onto the chemin du roi. This road is wonderful if ever you are in Quebec and want to waste a little extra time spend it here. It was the road the king took when he visited Quebec back in the day so it takes you through all of these older towns. I love looking at dilapidated building but I was a little let down here because it seems like every house in Quebec is very well maintained.
By this time I was ready to camp so I stopped at this house that had three ladies sitting on the porch. Just my luck they speak English. They said the next campsite was 20minutes away. They then offered to top me up on water, and I was on my way.
Well I passed the campsite and it was not a place I was going to leave my equipment for the night so I made the educated choice to move on. The next town was another 10k down the road, which is a conversation piece because here in Quebec every 10-20k there is a village. It is not like in Ontario where we had to pack days worth of water with us just to survive.
When I stopped at the info centre they said the only campsite was at the marina. The way this guy said it made me think that it was going to be sub par. When I arrived I got to cross the coolest bridge so far. It was all steel with a gridiron base. No pavement and no shoulder. This meant that I got to ride right down the centre and take in the view.
The place where I pay for the camping is also a restaurant and the music is something else. I have to say the mix of music is amazing. In the time I have been blogging I have heard everything from 70’s funk, to modern electronic, and even jock jams. This has to be the first time I have heard jock jams played on the radio since a Vancouver grizzlies game back in the day. I have fond memories of those games. All you did was do the wave the entire game as they pump woop there it is, while you watch big country miss every free throw, and mike bibby do little to nothing. It was a great time to be had; even more so because the team was so bad that they gave away tickets.
Trip Distance: 199.51km (we can round that to 200)
Ride Time: 7:50hr
Avg. Speed: 25.46km/h
Total Distance: 5429km
Total Ride Time: 250hr
Destination: Batiscan, Quebec
ps I got rid of my gloves because they were falling apart. I regret that now because other then one round spot on my hands everything else is burnt to a crisp.
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