Sept. 2 - Enjoyed a killer fun day playing bikes on le chemin de roi (the King's Road)!! It started like other days lately - with me defrosting myself with all my layers on over the first couple of kilometres. As the sun and exercise warmed me up, I passed a large horde of bike riders at the side of the road... clearly something going on today. Soon a speedy groups of cyclists started passing me with their light bikes, creating a moderately irritating chorus of bonjours and whirring freewheel hubs. And then something started happening - my legs which have been pretty firmly stuck at peddling an energy saving 20 km/hr for months now, remembered that they can actually pedal faster than that.:) As the mini pelotons started slowing I started joining in the fun, biking speedily and having lovely conversations; a shocking number of them français (even though I thought I had forgotten how to speak french). Drafting was amazing... I fully appreciated the wonder of biking with other people and not always have to break the headwinds, but don't worry, my panniers and I took our turn pulling too! I rode with a few groups throughout the day, fully passed one and managed to keep momentum up through to my 205 km finish line, completing about 8 hours of riding - pretty much a speed record for me! My legs may not thank me tomorrow but I had so much fun out for a rip today.:) The scenery was also pretty entertaining - I rode along the banks of the St. Lawrence River, passed by fields and houses situated on those good old seigneurial system properties. The houses were gorgeous - lots of old-style farm houses, bellcast roofs and colourful painting. Sadly, there are only photos of my sunrise and sunset views over the St. Lawrence because, well... bikes. I ended the night at a friend's parent's house with fabulous hospitality just south of Québec City - bonne nuit!

Sept. 3 - I started out early and rode into Québec City with a bit of time to explore and still catch the 8 am ferry across the St. Lawrence. The cancelled 8 am ferry gave me more time to explore the cobblestones, so I did! The delayed, short ferry ride was lovely; however, the ridiculous headwinds that greeted me along the south shore of the river were not... c'est la vie. Riding along the south shore of the St. Lawrence led me to accidentally discover the World Accordion Festival in Montmagny. As an amateur accordion player, this was quite a delight for me and I spent a significant amount of time wandering around town visiting different stages where multiple, fantastic accordion acts were playing simultaneously! After reluctantly tearing myself away from the music, I soon encountered another lone cyclist four days into his year long tour, and then a family on their own bike tour. That's right - my photo of cycle tourers has four others in it! We all had fun mobbing along the road until the others decided to stop. Then, almost immediately after I left the crew, it started to rain... boooo. It wasn't a hard, pelting rain but since I seem to have eaten lots of sugar lately, I had to make sure I didn't turn into a sugar cube; rain can be a dangerous thing. After a few more kilometres, my pouting lip started to get awfully heavy and my wrinkled nose kind of tired, so I just laughed at myself and proceeded to continue the 'dance of the droplets' in better humour. Before long I set up camp along the river's shore, about 150 km from where I started today. 

Sept. 4 - I bounced onto the bike and cut away from the main highway onto local side roads. One of the side roads took me to a marvellous Québécois diner where I had one of the best breakfasts of the trip so far!... or should I more truthfully say "two," because I ate two different ones:) Yummm. Eventually, leaving the St. Lawrence meant that I left relatively flat riding behind and I am now in rolling hills, some of which roll quite steeply. On the plus side, I am getting a sneak preview of the pending fall colours show as the leaves are turning! I have also left gravel roads behind to travel on a gravel trail which looked like it was set to lead me through the woods, a good chunk of the way around northern Maine. As I turned onto the trail, a mud-splattered mountain biker came off of it, raising his eyebrows at me - always a good sign. He was the only person I saw for the next several hours as I had fun making my way through the rocky trail. Eventually the trail met and followed a highway and after sticking with it for several more kilometres, I decided to drop down to the highway, acknowledging that the trail was now officially an 'ATV only' track. The highway led me into Edmundston, New Brunswick, where I set up camp near the Saint John River, after a decently tiring 200 km of fun.:)