Quebec City 3, Quebec, Canada

We slept in today, made breakfast and chatted with our neighbors. This is the family I wrote about last night. I thought it was an adult couple and parents or in-laws however it appears that the two couples are about the same age. They are in town for a big international rodeo.

Since we did not have anything scheduled today, Peter put up the outside lights on the trailer. He also put up the “hot air balloon” we purchased in Albuquerque last summer.

Then we decided to go somewhere after all. We heard about Ile D’ Orleans and decided to take a drive there since it is not far. It was a dream! I was bewitched by its beauty and peacefulness. “Agritourism, landscapes and history come together on a 21 miles long and 4 miles wide isle on the St. Lawrence River.  We crossed a long bridge to get to this haven which seemed like a world apart. Crops seem to consist of mainly strawberries, potatoes and apples. Oh, and vineyards. There were also two chocolate factories and stores/restaurants.  It’s a perfect place for walking and biking and plenty of people were doing this in spite of the rain. The rain was sporadic during the day. There are a just a few restaurants with locally sourced food of course.

June Yvonne on the tower

We stopped at one of the chocolatiers and ran into neighbors that camped at our RV Park. They were also at the RV Park when we were in Cumberland outside of Ottawa. They are from Vernon, British Columbia in the Okanagan Valley. By the way, in the past we have considered retiring there.

However, Ile D’ Orleans beats out the Okanagan. We fantasized about living on this island and took pictures of some of the houses. We quickly came to the realization that we would not want to live there in the long, cold winter.  We did find an RV park on the island but you could only stay for 3 weeks.

As you can see I was enchanted by this island as it seemed so idyllic at least in the summer.

Tonight our neighbors to the right invited us to sit and talk by the campfire. Many French Canadians know some English such as this couple because they are required to learn it in school. So between the English they know and some French words that sound like Spanish we managed to have a good conversation. Of course they wanted to know about US politics so we asked about their prime minister. They said he is a rock star. And that his father Pierre Trudeau at least had a vision for Canada, but his son lacks experience. They said that at university, Justin Trudeau studied acting. (So, he looks good and knows how to act.)

Tomorrow we plan to visit Chute Montmorency. These falls are actually higher than Niagara Falls, just not as wide.

Until the next blog.  Bonne Nuit.       JY

Slept in this morning and finally got out around noon.  Decided to go the Île d’Orléans – an island in the middle of the Saint Lawrence River.  There is a 2.75 mile bridge from the mainland to the island.  Our first stop was at a chocolate factory where we meet a couple that we met at the last RV Park in Ottawa, Ontario.  I had a ice cream cone dipped in chocolate and JY had a coffee.

We started driving around the island and were very impressed with the beautiful homes constructed of rocks.  Some were very large but generally small as they were built at least 150 years ago.  The island is known for the preservation of it’s history.  We drove slowly around the island and had to pull over every couple of miles to let cars pass.  We came upon the smallest church I have ever seen

We stopped for a coffee break along the way, checked out an RV Park and at the north end of the island stopped at a park with a tower.  When you climbed up the stairs to the top you were above everything and could see all the way to the Gaspé Peninsula – amazing.

We drove home, prepared dinner and started working on the blog.  I went outside to take a picture of the lights around our trailer and the next door neighbor was standing around a campfire.  I said bonjour, he (Pierre) responded and immediately invited us to sit around the campfire with his wife (Isabelle).  We accepted the offer and he provided beer.  We had a wonderful conversation for about 2 hours.  Wonderful people.  They are French Canadian and speak broken English.    PRC

360 degree view from top of tower – long video – could not get it vertical