On the Road for a Year - Part Two

SPREADING WING  - Available at amazon.com and Amazon Europe - Book or Kindle form.
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Sudbury is a city with no living trees within miles, except for tiny replants. A giant nickel mine is located there, and the fumes from the plant just killed everything except the people. (Maybe I should say, the remaining people?) But, they had the most fantastic hands-on science center I have ever seen. I wondered if that giant company had built that as somewhat of an apology? I could have stayed in there for days. I even got to give a colonoscopy to a dummy. Not a live one. Before we went the way of the trees, we headed out.

In Ottowa, we toured the Parliament Building, and Barbara got recruited to participate in some sort of play about their government. Outside, a Mountie sat at attention on his horse, full uniform, and Barbara tried to get him to get down and get his picture made with her. He didn't even blink at her, so she just hung onto his leg while I took the picture.

Moving on into Algonquin National Park, we had just sat up camp when a French speaking family walked by. The kids started chasing a chipmunk which ran right up into our camp and into a hole by Barbara. She started talking to them, the parents yelled, “Americans!” and the kids fled in terror. You would have thought they had yelled “Rattlesnake!” but then, they don't have any of them up there. I guess they just have to have something to fear.

I got up really early to drive around for look wildlife, while Barbara slept it. I got a good look at, and several good pictures of, a moose in all it's glory. Barbara was jealous. It would be many weeks before she saw one.

Quebec City is a walled city, from times past. The people seem to look different from others we have seen, but a lot like each other. I've noticed this before in isolated places. Those French speakers would not speak English to another Canadian, and were very standoffish until we told them we were Americans, then they warmed up and spoke English well.

Barbara started reading the Bible through that day, and finished it on the trip. Gives you some idea how long that trip was. 

We discovered Expo Quebec was going on, something like our Arkansas State Fair, but very different. I found a parking spot in a man's yard nearby for a small fee. Then, the man said we had to leave our car keys with him, in case he had to move cars around. Now, that was not something I was accustomed to doing at our state fair, so finally, I just took everything of value out of the car, put it in a big backpack, and carried it around all day. When we got back at the end of the day, he was still standing right beside our car, guarding it. I felt bad, and I could tell his feelings were hurt, but he was nice about it.

We saw a lot of new stuff at that Expo. Cheese sculptures, sand sculpture, all very intricate, chickens with feathers down to the end of their toes, milk cows with giant udders, and a woman diving from a 40 foot tower into a play pool of water six feet deep.

When we got back to the RV park, and were loading up, Barbara drove the car up the ramps onto the car dolly. Those french women screamed with amazement, then they all came over and hugged her! You would have thought she had just dived off a 40 foot tower or something! Trying to drive out of the park backwards, because I couldn't read the sign, I got hung up between two trees. All those people turned out and started directing me, in French.

Moving on out the St. Lawrence Seaway, we blew a tire on our car dolly at Bic. The man at the only station had only one tire that would fit, and there were no other possibilities anywhere around. But he still gave me a cut-rate deal. I'm not really sure if he just liked me, or he was helping me to get on out of there, but we always got very fair treatment at the hands of French-Canadians. Little did we know, they were about to save our necks in a major way, a little bit farther down the road.

Farther along, we left the seaway and headed inland, across the mountains to the Acadian Coast of New Brunswick. The Acadians were kinfolks of the Louisiana cajuns. Traveling across the mountains, I started hearing a strange noise in my motor. It got worse. As we got out of the mountains, it would barely run. We entered Caroquet, a very isolated little town out on a peninsula. I rolled to a stop, literally, right in front of the only truck repair place we had seen in days. I went in to talk, and they could barely speak a little English. Finally, they figured out I was having motor troubles. They came out. The motor access was right beside the driver's seat. They took their shoes off,  so as not to make any mess, spread out a cloth around the whole area, and opened it up. The diagnosis was a thrown rod, and I knew that would cost a couple of thousand at home. He suggested they could tie that rod up, and we could limp on home one cylinder short. “Can you fix it?” I asked. Yes, they could. It would take all day tomorrow, and they would have to bring in extra help. I didn't want to face all those hills ahead short one cylinder, so we went for it. They brought out an extension cord, said we could live there for the duration.

Barbara and I went to an Acadian Village the next day, set up like their pioneers lived, and the people dressed the part. Their pioneer life on this cold coast made ours look like a cakewalk. The English had pushed the Acadians up to this lonely, cold coast many years ago.

Back at the RV, they had finished up. The total bill, when changed into dollars, was about $700. They had been extremely nice and helpful throughout, and after paying the bill, I wrote a very nice letter of recommendation, so that other travelers would know they were really good people. We said goodbye, and headed on down the road.