“Charlie, that smells like salt water! And do you notice, they no longer say, “sur la fleuve”, now they’re saying “sur le mer”. That means we’re close to the ocean!!! Can you believe it!!!! We are near the Atlantic Ocean!!!”
Now, I say that with tremendous excitement but I remember the story of the tortoise and the hare and how the hare, who thought he had it all in the bag, screwed up. So just because we’re close doesn’t mean it’s signed, sealed and delivered yet.
We are in Rivière de Loup and we just got express permission from the Mayor of this town of 20,000 to put our tent up outside of Walmart tonight. We met the Mayor when we stopped at a bike shop to buy a new battery for Charlie’s odometer. I was standing outside with my bike while Charlie had his inside and this unshaven man holding a sweet toddler asked me about our trip. So in my very best French, (which is improving daily, I might add), I told him a bit about it. He said that his daughter (who he was accompanying to the bike shop) and her husband had traversed Canada 5 years ago. (Good thing ’cause she sure ain’t going anywhere now…she’s got 3 kids under age 5). He said he’d done some cycling himself including a trip from North Bay to Rivière de Loup. We talked about how deadly highway 11 was and how much easier, safer, nicer it was to cycle Quebec. And then he told me he was the Mayor of this city and that he was on vacation which was why he looked like he did. (I guess I could have told him the same thing because I look like I’ve just crawled out of the bush most days too.)
It was another great ride today. 
We only got a little lost this morning searching for the clinic Charlie had to go to for his blood test. They took him in right away and then we were on the road. Following the 132 highway is foolproof. We did go off onto a firm, lightly gravelled cycle path when the pavement on the highway was rough but most of the day the highway conditions were admirable. 
We saw a few things we remembered from 2 years ago. I love Quebec. There’s so much to see! We passed many lavish churches. Every time I see those I think of how much money it must have cost to erect those monstrosities and how dearly the townspeople must have paid, not only in tithes but also in man hours of (probably free) labor and in lives lost. They are very high. People must have died. I took some photos of one church, (rare to find one open on a weekday), in St Roch des Aulnaies. 
We also saw and photographed the motel we stayed at 2 years ago, where we met Liz Brenchley, a woman in her 50’s from a England who was cycling across Canada alone. Her blog is : Liz and Black Betty”, the black referring to the colour of her bike which she’d named “Betty”. Speaking of which, I tend to name things too, and I’ve decided that my “hoss” actually is not a hoss with no name and that her name is “Surely”. A good name for a Surly Disc Trucker, I think, and because it does ride like a truck, strong and sure. 
We planned on camping tonight but, as we sat in Tim’s, Charlie sipping mint tea, me guzzling my caffeine fix, it started to rain. Lightly at first but it continued. The grocery store was across the parking lot so we had a chicken, potato salad, mixed greens with chipotle ranch dressing salad picnic right in the store, on a bench beyond the tills. There are puddles outside and Enviroment Canada calls for more rain and thunderstorms tonight. Time to search for an inexpensive motel or hotel. We’ll go back to Tim’s, have some more tea and start calling. Tomorrow is a rest day anyway, we think, and the prospect of lying around all morning holds a lot of appeal right now. In case you didn’t know it, I am not a big fan of camping.
Wendingourway:Across Canada by Bike 2017 
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