Done!

Just a quick update to tell you all that we have finished safe and sound. Expect a series of entries over the next couple of days finishing off the trip. First off a big thanks to Lanny for offering, and his dad Max for putting Aiden and I up for a night in Deer Lake, it was a great time. We arrived in St. John's yesterday afternoon completing the cross Canada cycle trip with a total distance of 8401.2 kms. Aiden's brothers Rhys and Elliot were waiting at 'Mile 0' to give us a surprise visit. And a surprise it was (It's OK Scott, I understand.) My friend Shawn met us shortly after we arrived in St. John's and suggested that we go to Quiti Viti harbour to take our pictures beside the Atlantic. Quiti Viti is a scenic little harbour with a very rugged shoreline just a short ride from downtown St. John's and made a great spot to officially end the trip. That's it for now, but check back soon for a proper conclusion.

Nine Down- One To Go!

Right now we are at the base of Marble Mountain which is during the winter time is Newfoundland's ski destination but not so much now. We have a short hop to Deer Lake today as there's a place for us to stay there. We did 140 kms yesterday which was very enjoyable because the tailwind some very lengthy downhill sections. After today's ride we will be a little less then a third across Newfoundland.

So far Newfoundland has been treating us very well. We have no other choice of roads besides the TransCanada Highway but it is a good road with large shoulders and not much traffic. At least the traffic is still somewhat paced to the ferry so there are sporadic waves of trucks and cars. Cheapest campsites since Saskatchewan- one night was 10 dollars and last night was 11.30. We asked how much firewood was at our first campsite and the guy replied in a thick Newfie accent that: "This is Newfoundland- you don't pay for wood here!" Another guy came over later gave us a stack of kindling he chop for us so thus far the people here have conformed to their friendly stereotype.

For bit of a flashback we made to Sydney two days after Antigounish. Sydney is a somewhat post-industrial town with a gritty reputation. Although it's infamous Tarponds were bit of letdown- they looked more like a creek then largest volume of toxic waste dumping in North America. Sydney is also the unofficial capital of Cape Breton Island which Tyler was shocked to discover is in fact an island rather a peninsula of Nova Scotia mainland. Tyler's back rims started failing on the island and about 12 kms from Sydney he had lost 6 spokes on his back tire causing it to rub against the frame. Not too safe so he had to take a cab in and we spent 3 days in Sydney getting new rims. We stayed at my friend Phoebe's apartment. We last saw each other when I as eight so it was super nice of her to let us crash at her place. We got a bit of sightseeing a we made it over to the Glace Bay Miner's Museum which I highly recommend if your ever in the area.

Should be a nice short ride today and we will probably be completing our journey in a week's time- w00t.

Coast to Coast? Check.

After taking a day off in Fredericton, Aiden and I began to make our way to the Atlantic Ocean. The first glimpse of the Atlantic was in Shediac, NB a place that certainly seemed to like its lobster as there was a giant plastic one outside the info center and more lobster restaurants than I have seen anywhere. From Shediac we were only a morning's ride to the Confederation Bridge that links PEI to the rest of Canada. While waiting for the shuttle bus to take us across the bridge (cyclists aren't allowed to ride it themselves) we met two other cyclists who were also waiting. One was a French gentleman on a mountain bike who we had seen the day before and the other was an older guy riding across Canada solo. The man with the mountain bike had done some riding in some pretty interesting places (Argentina and Chile were two he talked about) so I suppose his choice of bike made sense.

I had been warned by several cyclists along our travels about how hilly PEI was. Our first day on the island heading towards Summerside certainly disproved that; it wasn't any hillier than what we saw in Saskatchewan. In Summerside we were lucky enough to have accommodation that wasn't campsite, we were hosted by Brian and Daphne (Daphne, a friend of Aiden's mom, knew Aiden from when he was a little kid in Halifax.) It was our first home cooked dinner in a long while which was an excellent change. Thanks again for having us! The next day we did what seemingly everyone else visiting PEI was doing and that was to visit Cavendish and all of the Anne of Green Gables stuff. I haven't read the book, but the house that inspired Anne's home in the novel was nice. I thought the best part of the town was Cavendish Beach, I really liked the steep red cliffs.

On our way to Charlottetown we took advantage of the old railbed that has been converted into a bike path that runs the length of PEI. The path was some solid cycling, and in a uniform good shape, so I didn't break any spokes this time. On the ferry from PEI to Nova Scotia both Aiden and I were disappointed when they didn't have BC burgers for us at the cafeteria, other than that it was similar to what BC Ferries is like (except for the boat being a little more retro.) We had a long day into Antigonish, but it was good in that we have just over 200 kms of cycling left in Nova Scotia, so hopefully two relatively easy days await us before Newfoundland. More on the theme of running into cyclists, we saw Brain and Pat again at the Antigonish campsite, kind of funny how we keep running into them. Bed time.

The Maritimes- ah the Prodigal Son returns

So we have made it to Fredericton- the capital of New Brunswick. Tyler has never been to the Maritimes and I haven't been to this area for 15 years since my family left Nova Scotia where I was born. Certainly getting a different view then my hazy recollections of Fundy Bay. We have been rocking out on secondary roads in the St. John River Valley. The roads are in good condition with little if any traffic. It is very scenic farmland and forest area as well.

In New Brunswick culture, we have witnessed the big money of prominent NB families at work. We camped in a campground outside of a Irving lumber mill and have seen over a half dozen stores of their province wide gas station chain. One day near Grand Sault/Grand Falls we biked by a McCains plant and that same day we camped in Floranceville the "French Fry Capital of the World" which has a giant smelly French fry plant, the McCain Corporate headquarters, McCains R&D division, and New Brunswick only potato museum.

We started our New Brunswick portion in L'Acadie so it was very similar to Quebec though people were generally bilingual especially in Edmundston which made it much less of a production ordering Subway with our mangled French. Saw a few Acadian flags though they were mostly paired with Canadian and New Brunswick flags. But we moved into English New Brunswick fairly fast and wont be back to the Acadia portion until Shediac and that coastal region.

Now is time for a flashback of our last few days in Quebec. We dealt with horrendous headwind upon leaving Quebec City. And La Route Verte map wasn't too accurate on the location of a campsite so we ended up camping behind a gazebo beside a church in the very foggy hamlet of Saint-Denis. At least it was free. The next day we had lunch at Riverie-du-Loup. From there to Edmundston, NB it was 135 kms on an unpaved trail of an old railbed. A little hairy in the rain but pretty fun. And no traffic save for a furtive car or two taking illegal shortcuts. Tyler only lost 2 spokes- w00t. We camped our last night in Quebec under a shelter with a fireplace in a Cabano campground. The next morning we ran into Brian and Pat- two trans-Canada cyclists we had met in English River, Ontario- about 2500 kms ago. Their website is here and has a picture of us.
Now we are going to get some tuneups tomorrow and leave towards Moncton. We'll be thru PEI and into Nova Scotia in no time.

Je voudrais une poutine et demi-litre bouteille du vin s'il vous plait

Well, we are in the heart of La Belle Province now. Quebec City is really nice even if it is a giant tourist trap. It is celebrating its 400th anniversary so it is particularly hopping this summer. The people are super friendly as well- while biking around the city looking confused we were asked if we needed help four times. Three of them were fellow cyclists who spoke decent English and each of them just told us to follow them so they could show us the best route. Paul McCartney is here preforming (not sure who figured that one out- he's not exactly linked to Quebec is anyway or even speaks French). As a result we can't get to Plains of Abraham, or the Citadelle with its Van Doos museum. Tyler is convinced McCartney has a personal vendetta against us. That aside Quebec City has alot to offer.

In general, Quebec is the most bike friendly province so far. In Montreal I scored a English guide to La Route verte which is a Quebec-wide bike route. It go through some classic Quebec rural villages each with the requisite massive Catholic Church. Great views of the St-Lawrence Seaway are easy to come by as well. It's interesting how you can see much of the original seignural system of land distribution of the long narrow farms so everyone had access to the river.

Quebec is also the home of poutine my favourite dish. I got a poutine avec cheese curds, chicken and peas for dinner tonight at the Chez Ashton a Quebec fast food chain. Probably the healthy thing around. Between poutine, crepes, and half-litre stubbies of wine you can get from any depanneur we are eating well in la belle province.

La Belle Province

So far both Aiden and I have been very impressed with the cycling in Quebec. The province has a series of bike paths that connect the majour cities under the name "la Route Verte." There is a map book that you can by to accompany your journey along the paths that lists cyclist friendly accommodation and other things that interests cyclists: condition of the shoulder on the road (when the route goes on the highways) or things like elevation charts for hilly areas. I heard some bad stories about the roads in Quebec from some of the other cyclists I've run into that have done this trip, so far we haven't seen any of it, so we're hoping they took a different route...

On our way into Quebec City we ran into three different cyclists that went out of their way to help us. The first showed us the best way to get downtown, which happened not to be on la Route Verte, and the second and third both helped us to find our way to our first night's accommodation in Beauport. We were staying in two different places in Quebec City because it was next to impossible to find a place to stay and this wasn't the first time this happened on the trip. The first time it was hard for us to find a place was in Saskatoon, SK. The night we showed up was in the middle of a particle accelerator convention; I kid you not, that is what it was, and as a result most of the hotel rooms in the city were gone (Saskatoon, apparently, has the only particle accelerator in Canada.) The reason for the lack of hotel rooms in Quebec City was due to Paul McCartney performing on the Planes of Abraham for Quebec's 400th anniversary. I'm not much of a Beatles fan, and even less of a Paul McCartney fan. I saw him and his motorcade zipping around the city today, I wasn't impressed and wish I had my seal pelt on.

As a city, Quebec City is certainly beautiful. We spent most of out time walking around inside the city walls of Old Quebec City. It is like old Montreal, but much larger, and seems more genuine. It was definitely like visiting a well preserved European city, and gave me a good idea what it would have been like here a long time ago (something that is rare for a North American City.) There was quite a bit I couldn't see today because of Sir Paul and the security associated with his concert (bahhhh) so I think I'll be back.

So Close, Yet So Far

We made it to Montreal in one day, and in one piece. Google Maps told us the distance from my place in Ottawa to my brother's place in Montreal was 198 kms, but we were hoping that we'd be able to push it over 200 kms. Alas those folks in Mountain View know what they are doing so my cycle computer recorded the final distance as 198.20 kms. Guess we are going to have to try again to get a double century.

The actual ride was nice, we had a solid tail wind blowing us to Montreal all day long, and the highways so far in Quebec have had more than enough of a shoulder. About the only gripe I had with the route we selected was that the 40 kms or so before Laval we were obviously on the route to the Montreal garbage dump. It was a nice little secondary highway, but our experience was punctuated by full garbage trucks passing us on the way out of town and empty ones heading back into town. In case you were wondering, there doesn't seem to be a great difference in the smell associated with a full or empty truck.

Aiden had another bit of bad luck with a sharp little piece of metal on the way through Laval. The leak was slow enough that he was able to make it all the way crest of Mt. Royal along Cote des Neiges before he elected to change the tube. It turned into quite the ordeal getting the tire back on and involved ruining another tube in the process, needless to say it wasn't something either one of us wanted to do after cycling 190 some kms. Luckily for us, Aiden's mom is here to visit so there was the promise of a good meal waiting for us. Today is a rest day and we'll be heading out tomorrow to start our way onto Quebec City.