East is east
Gone from Montreal since Saturday and we have some catching up to do from our time on the road; apologies for the length of the post, but we do what we can do…
On Saturday we packed up Brinkman Rose and got on the rainy road headed back east hoping to make it somewhere in Maine. We took as many back roads as we could find on the map (and some that weren’t on the map at all) and gave a surprise to the tragically underworked border guard at a crossing in Vermont. When we explained where we were coming from and our destination and raised his eyebrows and his smile exclaiming, “Well how did you ever get here?” I found it somehow affirming that such an official would ask us such a question. We must be doing something right if we are the last people he expects to see crossing at his station.
Once back in the USA, I was struck again by my urge to consume local goods as we spotted signs almost immediately for “Vermont Maple Syrup.” We weren’t on route to stop at some souvenir stand, nor were we drawn to anything thing that would charge us for the package so we continued meandering through small towns in Vermont. As we came into one of the more populated (and well paved) parts of the day’s journey, we found a sign for our desire hanging in the driveway of somebody’s house. It was an elderly couple with whom we ended up spending the better part of a half hour chatting and exchanging addresses with and we walked away with a quart of Vermont’s finest “Fancy Grade” maple syrup and a couple of new friends somewhere in Vermont.
The rest of the afternoon was spent driving over the northern ridges of the Appalachian Mountains, through New Hampshire and into Maine, ending at the friendly Rangley Lake State Park. I pitched our first tent in the rain while Hanna made a delectable dinner for us to share. We slept well as the rain continued through the night, dampening our tent but not slowing our momentum. Up at 6:30 the next morning we walked down to the lake, skipped some stones, and watched the fog lift off the mountains on the other side. Affirmed again by the sun showing through, we were on the road again, headed for Acadia.
[Hanna’s turn…]
We spent the next two nights in Acadia, doing battle with more rain. It was mostly a losing battle—our penance for inattentiveness to proper camping etiquette was a 10pm trip to the Laundromat to dry our soaked comforter and the lambskin rug we sleep on because we’d left the rain fly off during an afternoon thunderstorm. I raced back to camp in Brinky from the other side of Mount Desert Island where we had just started a 10 mile bike ride around a lake. Thinking I’d gotten there just in time to avert a total disaster (the steam was still rising off the road—it had to have only just begun raining, I thought), it turns out the whole storm had already passed over our tip of the island and, specifically, over our tent. Wet lamb smells much like wet dog (a fact that a rowdy 8-year-old “Princess of the Laundromat” was quick to confirm for us once we got into town) and dries about three times slower since it’s no longer alive, so we threw it in the dryer along with the comforter and pillows. Lessons learned: never leave the flap off; no matter what the labels say, you can definitely put pillows, down, and leather in a dryer with few consequences other than the desired warmth and dryness; rain flap or no, we need a new tent.
After sundry other Acadian adventures (frigid ocean swim, playing in the estuary, watching the sun rise over the ocean), we headed up the coast of Maine to New Brunswick, Canada. I had thought Maine was a pretty unique place in the panoply of American states, but New Brunswick really stole our hearts. The air was perfectly clear, perfectly blue (even bluer than Maine’s, which we had thought was pretty clean—cleaner by at least two degrees from grungy Vermont and New Hampshire). Their “scenic routes” on Canadian byways are visibly more scenic. Tourism seems not to exist, except in a very polite way, ensconced in information bureaus located conveniently off beautiful highways where they offer you free internet access, clean bathrooms, and free maps and books and guides to things. I’m used to thinking of the east coast as having charm, wit, and a few good cities, while the west has a monopoly on traumatically beautiful largess. But New Brunswick proved me wrong – it’s both expansive and gorgeous.
St. John, a bizarre town on the St. John river, hosted us for an afternoon walk after closing time (and really, after 5pm, everything was closed), and then we headed to our campsite about 20 miles north on a fork of the river. We had to cross a little provincial ferry across the river to the Kennebacassis Peninsula to get there (free!), and camped right next to the ferry landing on a little inlet that served as a duck marsh, croaking ground for the noisy frogs, and trading post for the beavers (who provided us with our best, driest firewood so far). We ate Kraft Dinner (mac and cheese) and Bush’s Best baked beans, which was probably our favorite meal so far as well (the fresh clams we steamed in Acadia notwithstanding).
It wa s a beautiful, friendly little campground. It’s only problem is one shared by every other place we’ve crossed that advertises “Camping”—they’re basically parking lots. This one was at least spacious and scenic, quiet and friendly. But I’m becoming quickly disillusioned that the word “camping” has any of the meaning I thought it had. The dictionary proves, of course, that the RV parks have just as much right to the word as I do (“A place where tents, huts, or other temporary shelters are set up, as by soldiers, nomads, or travelers”), but it doesn’t make me any happier about it. Both because these places are weird and because it makes it pretty difficult at the end of a long, wearying drive (especially in our bumpy truck) to reliably find a place to pitch our tent that won’t be somewhat deadening. It’s really no fun at all to be the one tent in the midst of the rapacious beasts, hooked up to sewage pumps and electricity – if only because it reminds us that we have no such luxuries.
This was exactly the kind of place we stayed our final night in the Maritimes, in a spot on a little lake in the spit of New Brunswick that peeks between Quebec and Northern Maine. The place’s spirit was revived by the wonderful little lake, which provided excellent swimming and a floating dock on which to read. It’s main detractor (besides the fact that the well had run dry and the conspiratorial atmosphere that this set off in the parks summer residents) were the black flies, which nearly ate us alive. We were rained out for the last time this week at about 5am and decided there was nothing to do but move again. We aimed ourselves for Quebec City, and arrived just in time for a proper breakfast (about 9:30).
[Switch to John again…]
We wandered around this city of age for an hour or so, lay for a nap on the grassy fortifications of the city, and watched the beginnings of an amateur skateboarding competition. It felt odd and comfortable to be in civility again but from here we decided that in order to make the best of our situation, revived by a served breakfast, we would keep moving down the St. Lawrence River to our old friend, Montreal. We stayed one more night with the ever hospitable Mike and Julia and are now on our way—clean, rested and restore—to a lake house north of Toronto. It is a beautiful blue-skied day and we are looking forward to the drive through Algonquin Park and the comforts of the lake house and the friendship of an old pal for the weekend.
On Saturday we packed up Brinkman Rose and got on the rainy road headed back east hoping to make it somewhere in Maine. We took as many back roads as we could find on the map (and some that weren’t on the map at all) and gave a surprise to the tragically underworked border guard at a crossing in Vermont. When we explained where we were coming from and our destination and raised his eyebrows and his smile exclaiming, “Well how did you ever get here?” I found it somehow affirming that such an official would ask us such a question. We must be doing something right if we are the last people he expects to see crossing at his station.
Once back in the USA, I was struck again by my urge to consume local goods as we spotted signs almost immediately for “Vermont Maple Syrup.” We weren’t on route to stop at some souvenir stand, nor were we drawn to anything thing that would charge us for the package so we continued meandering through small towns in Vermont. As we came into one of the more populated (and well paved) parts of the day’s journey, we found a sign for our desire hanging in the driveway of somebody’s house. It was an elderly couple with whom we ended up spending the better part of a half hour chatting and exchanging addresses with and we walked away with a quart of Vermont’s finest “Fancy Grade” maple syrup and a couple of new friends somewhere in Vermont.
The rest of the afternoon was spent driving over the northern ridges of the Appalachian Mountains, through New Hampshire and into Maine, ending at the friendly Rangley Lake State Park. I pitched our first tent in the rain while Hanna made a delectable dinner for us to share. We slept well as the rain continued through the night, dampening our tent but not slowing our momentum. Up at 6:30 the next morning we walked down to the lake, skipped some stones, and watched the fog lift off the mountains on the other side. Affirmed again by the sun showing through, we were on the road again, headed for Acadia.
[Hanna’s turn…]
We spent the next two nights in Acadia, doing battle with more rain. It was mostly a losing battle—our penance for inattentiveness to proper camping etiquette was a 10pm trip to the Laundromat to dry our soaked comforter and the lambskin rug we sleep on because we’d left the rain fly off during an afternoon thunderstorm. I raced back to camp in Brinky from the other side of Mount Desert Island where we had just started a 10 mile bike ride around a lake. Thinking I’d gotten there just in time to avert a total disaster (the steam was still rising off the road—it had to have only just begun raining, I thought), it turns out the whole storm had already passed over our tip of the island and, specifically, over our tent. Wet lamb smells much like wet dog (a fact that a rowdy 8-year-old “Princess of the Laundromat” was quick to confirm for us once we got into town) and dries about three times slower since it’s no longer alive, so we threw it in the dryer along with the comforter and pillows. Lessons learned: never leave the flap off; no matter what the labels say, you can definitely put pillows, down, and leather in a dryer with few consequences other than the desired warmth and dryness; rain flap or no, we need a new tent.
After sundry other Acadian adventures (frigid ocean swim, playing in the estuary, watching the sun rise over the ocean), we headed up the coast of Maine to New Brunswick, Canada. I had thought Maine was a pretty unique place in the panoply of American states, but New Brunswick really stole our hearts. The air was perfectly clear, perfectly blue (even bluer than Maine’s, which we had thought was pretty clean—cleaner by at least two degrees from grungy Vermont and New Hampshire). Their “scenic routes” on Canadian byways are visibly more scenic. Tourism seems not to exist, except in a very polite way, ensconced in information bureaus located conveniently off beautiful highways where they offer you free internet access, clean bathrooms, and free maps and books and guides to things. I’m used to thinking of the east coast as having charm, wit, and a few good cities, while the west has a monopoly on traumatically beautiful largess. But New Brunswick proved me wrong – it’s both expansive and gorgeous.
St. John, a bizarre town on the St. John river, hosted us for an afternoon walk after closing time (and really, after 5pm, everything was closed), and then we headed to our campsite about 20 miles north on a fork of the river. We had to cross a little provincial ferry across the river to the Kennebacassis Peninsula to get there (free!), and camped right next to the ferry landing on a little inlet that served as a duck marsh, croaking ground for the noisy frogs, and trading post for the beavers (who provided us with our best, driest firewood so far). We ate Kraft Dinner (mac and cheese) and Bush’s Best baked beans, which was probably our favorite meal so far as well (the fresh clams we steamed in Acadia notwithstanding).
It wa s a beautiful, friendly little campground. It’s only problem is one shared by every other place we’ve crossed that advertises “Camping”—they’re basically parking lots. This one was at least spacious and scenic, quiet and friendly. But I’m becoming quickly disillusioned that the word “camping” has any of the meaning I thought it had. The dictionary proves, of course, that the RV parks have just as much right to the word as I do (“A place where tents, huts, or other temporary shelters are set up, as by soldiers, nomads, or travelers”), but it doesn’t make me any happier about it. Both because these places are weird and because it makes it pretty difficult at the end of a long, wearying drive (especially in our bumpy truck) to reliably find a place to pitch our tent that won’t be somewhat deadening. It’s really no fun at all to be the one tent in the midst of the rapacious beasts, hooked up to sewage pumps and electricity – if only because it reminds us that we have no such luxuries.
This was exactly the kind of place we stayed our final night in the Maritimes, in a spot on a little lake in the spit of New Brunswick that peeks between Quebec and Northern Maine. The place’s spirit was revived by the wonderful little lake, which provided excellent swimming and a floating dock on which to read. It’s main detractor (besides the fact that the well had run dry and the conspiratorial atmosphere that this set off in the parks summer residents) were the black flies, which nearly ate us alive. We were rained out for the last time this week at about 5am and decided there was nothing to do but move again. We aimed ourselves for Quebec City, and arrived just in time for a proper breakfast (about 9:30).
[Switch to John again…]
We wandered around this city of age for an hour or so, lay for a nap on the grassy fortifications of the city, and watched the beginnings of an amateur skateboarding competition. It felt odd and comfortable to be in civility again but from here we decided that in order to make the best of our situation, revived by a served breakfast, we would keep moving down the St. Lawrence River to our old friend, Montreal. We stayed one more night with the ever hospitable Mike and Julia and are now on our way—clean, rested and restore—to a lake house north of Toronto. It is a beautiful blue-skied day and we are looking forward to the drive through Algonquin Park and the comforts of the lake house and the friendship of an old pal for the weekend.
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