9 Toronto to Nova Scotia, Canada. June 2022

Entry 9 – Toronto to the town of Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada. - June 2022

It was Sunday 19^th June and it just happened to be Canadian Father’s Day. We met up with our North Bay mob at a restaurant for a Father’s Day brunch/breakfast. With full stomachs, we said our farewell’s to our “North Bay family” and we were driven to Toronto by our son, who was flying back to Australia later in the day. We re-joined our trailer partners, Ernie and Taylor staying the night in Toronto at a trailer park near the airport.

Monday morning, we started our planned road trip towards New Foundland. Our ferry crossing from the Province of Nova Scotia to New Foundland had been booked and we were in need to drive about 2,000 kilometres over a period of 11 days. Taylor the navigator with Ernie the driver did a magnificent job getting us through Toronto. We primarily drove along crowded multi-landed freeways, with constant deviations onto other freeways. At times it was a split-second decision, navigating into a correct lane with many optional choices for different freeway lanes presenting at the same time. It was an exhausting experience for “us,” “rear seat passengers.” It was about a 1 ½ hour period of driving in congested traffic conditions, until we popped out of the confines of Toronto, eventually connecting with the main highway to Montreal.

We spent the night boondocking in the front yard of a harvest host (people who provide fellow travellers a cost-free parking space for a night or two.) It felt good to be in a nice quiet location again. We enjoyed resting up under some beautiful trees and spotting a turkey vulture.

The following morning, we enjoyed a walk along a river trail in the nearby town of Napanee. The trail had been beautified by volunteers, whom maintained it in pristine condition. Napanee presented itself as a beautiful proud town.

We continued driving, diminishing the required kilometres we were in need to cover. We crossed into the Province of Quebec, a French speaking Province. There was the difficulty, communicating with the French spoken people whom most understood little English. And the street signage created another level of anxiety, making it rather difficult with decisions like, “which road do we need?”

We spent another night at a harvest host location, with a twist. It was a produce outlet / come restaurant with a requirement to purchase some items from their store for provision of a free camp site. The girls did get a bit excited about the different variety of foods on offer, spending more money than the price of staying at a trailer park. The hosts were nice people along with their son, aged 3 or 4 years, who spoke fluent French and English. We provided the lad with an Australian flag and a tattoo for his arm with “Australia,” written on it.

We continued onwards with Taylor presenting a proposal to move away from the main arterial roads and to zig zag around the country side a bit. We thought it to be a good proposition, where we could experience the real feel of the Canadian Quebec Province. Taylor’s proposal was accepted with nil objections. We all perked up enjoying the scenery away from the boring highway.

We did incur one minor problem whilst away from the main roads. In one of the small-towns we were travelling through, streets seemed to get narrower and narrower until we could travel no further with our large rig. We were in need to back track, driving around in circles until we could pick out a route to escape the squeeze of small suburbia streets. We did incur some strange looks from many of the locals, watching us drive by.

After three days of primarily, just driving we set camp at the residence of another harvest host in the township of Nicolet about half way between the cities of Montreal and Quebec. Our hosts, Mario and Carmen were some of the more delightful people we had met during our Canadian travels, making us feel very welcome. Their first language was French and they spoke with reasonable broken English making for some interesting conversation and interpretations. We provided them with an Australian hat and flag as a special thank you. Our hosts had some bird feeders strategically placed in their front yard attracting some beautiful bird life for pleasurable viewing. We even saw a musk rat which looked a bit like an otter or beaver.

A nearby drive to the city of Trois-Riviere, provided a great drive across a large, high bridge spanning the Saint Lawrence Sea-Way. The Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway is a deep draft waterway extending about 3,700 kilometres from the Atlantic Ocean to the head of the Great Lakes in the heart of North America. This includes 13 Canadian and 2 American locks. We could even see a ship below as we drove over the bridge.

Nicolet was a lovely small town we enjoyed walking about.

Another great experience at Nicolet was a walk to a lookout for viewing the Saint Lawrence Sea-Way. It consisted of a raised walkway about a kilometre in length, winding its way through a wetland forest.

After resting up for a couple of nights we continued on with our driving duties. Our research showed a lack of accommodation/camping options along our next planned route. We ended up driving for about 450 kilometres for the day, setting camp at a provincial park near the town of Edmonston. We had just crossed another border, moving into the province of New Brunswick. Our bodies were feeling very weary by the time we reached our destination and it was much appreciated having another nice Canadian camp setting.

We enjoyed the serenity of the Republique Provincial Park campground, staying for three nights.

At the nearby town of Edmundston we spent several hours, viewing many of its public art displays. We visited a farmers’ market, explored some magnificent walking trails, viewed some plant sculptures and enjoyed some of its murals.

 

Leaving the Republique camp ground, we had planned to travel about 220 kilometres for the day. We decided to keep a lookout for anything that might catch some one’s attention whilst en-route to occupy our day. It wasn’t long before signage to the Grand Falls caught our attention and we left the main road. The water falls did look grand.

We were in the falls souvenirs shop and something was said about a potato chip manufacturer where you could do a tour of the factory. We thought there was something different to do for the day and proceeded to enquire about it. One of the customers took over the answer, providing good directions and information about the chip manufacturer. As it turned out the customer was a truck driver who did deliveries at the factory.

Taylor yelled out for us to come quick as Ernie had decided to have a go at the zip line, (Australia a flying fox) and we watched Ernie fly across a wire high up in the air above the Grand Falls. On the other side he walked up a hill a bit where he flew back across the falls. It looked so good Steve just had to have a go. We not only got to look at some good waterfalls the boys had a go at a zip line.

Steve occasionally helped with the driving duties. This was one of those days and for a change Mary sat in front. It felt strange with us seated in the front and the truck owners relegated to the rear seats.

Next stop was at a potato chip manufacturer. It was a self-guided tour where we got to watch the production process. At the end of the tour, you were provided with a packet of unseasoned chips each fresh off the production line. Then you got to select your own choice of flavouring from about 50 different flavour options. Wretchedly, they had quite a large shop front with a large variety of different large chip packets at supermarket special prices available. We left with 13 different packets of chips. There was a discussion as we left the shop concerning our over indulgence on our purchase of potato chip packets and it was suggested we now had a supply for 2 to 4 months???? It was starting to become apparent, we were enticing one another (egging on / stirring) to partake in treats we should be accountable for and failing miserably. Gosh we were consuming lots of delicious foods.

Down the road a bit, we arrived at the small town of Nackawic where we viewed the alleged biggest axe in the world.

Nackawic was our destination for the day where we camped in a home brewery car park for the night. Another boondocking location for a night.

The following day with more kilometres to travel we decided to just drive and get in the required kilometres as soon as possible. We all may have still been a little tired from our previous day’s activities and what a wonderful day it had been.

Our next destination was the town of Shediac where we set camp in the Parlee Beach Provincial Park. It was another beautiful setting and we got our first sighting of a pheasant wandering through the campground. The morning of departure we heard a commotion nearby and we saw two pheasants having a stoush.

 

We were happy to see the arrival of blue skies with the sun providing nice mid 20’s temperatures. The beach was about a 10-minute walk away and we experienced our first ocean water dip in Canada. It was initially cool but after a while our bodies adjusted.

Shediac had a large selection of fresh seafood shops and restaurant’s specialising in seafood. We enjoyed a seafood meal at one of the restaurants. The food was delicious, tasting much nicer than the provided photograph of our tucker.

We spent two nights at Shediac and it felt nice having a day’s rest from driving chores.

We spent another two days of driving finally stopping at the town of Sydney. It was another boondocking night and in the morning, we were to make our way to North Sydney to board our ferry to the island of New Foundland. A six hour ferry trip.