THE PARSONS PROJECT!                                                 

On our drive today we crossed over to the next Time Zone...Eastern that is! At this point we are now 3 hours ahead of Arizona time. A few other markers were at this stop as well.

It was from the back window that I spotted the beaver in the bay.  He came in to eat the yellow flowers that were growing in the bay.

It was a "Falls" kind of day.  Started out by visiting Kakabeka Falls and finished up at Pigeon River Provincial Park (day use only).

From the  main entrance for Kakabeka Falls, and within a short walk, you are able to see the falls.  This is a provincial park and there was a $6.50 day use fee for a 2 hour block of time. 

After viewing the falls from the main parking lot, we crossed the bridge and did a short hike along the Mountain Portage Trail to see the falls from a farther distance. This was an easy trail and was worthwhile to do.

After viewing High Falls, we enjoyed the trail back to the parking lot. Found an old Chimney site from when this area was used as a vacation getaway back in the day and an explanation of the Canadian Heritage Rivers System.

Our last stop in Pigeon River Provincial Park was a short walk to view Lake Superior.

Overall we preferred Pigeon River Provincial Park more so than Kakabeka Provincial Park, if you had to choose one or another.

Started our 38th anniversary day off with an enjoyable 3 hrs touring the grounds at Fort William Historical Park. It is a re-enactment park (mind you they could have used a few more characters in more of the buildings, all comes down to money though!) and most of the characters played their parts very well. This is a one and done type of place to see.

Finished up our day with dinner on the Thunder Bay Waterfront at Bight Restaurant...it was delicious!! And then walked around the waterfront that allowed us to view downtown (not much of one at that!) and learn more about the land formation called "Sleeping Giant".

This was our last night in Thunder Bay.  Overall thoughts...we would not be in a rush to come back here...it seems old and tired.  The city is very spread out and driving on the rough roads with all the potholes will put a strain on your vehicle. However, the gas prices on the native land (a good 40 cents less per litre!) was much appreciated.

Drove the day along the north end of Lake Superior.

First stop was to see the Terry Fox Historic Person Plaque just outside of Thunder Bay.  Very Impressive and a great visitor center as well.

Took a detour to hopefully have coffee and breakfast at Karen's Kountry Kitchen (a tip from our local waitress from last night's dinner), but it was temporarily closed, who knew! Guess we should have listened to Google! But on the way we did see a cool train trestle bridge.

Marathon is known for Pebble Beach, not small pebbles however more like larger softball size.  The beach access is currently under construction but we were able to find a path down.  From a distance the beach looks rocky but nothing like what it is when you get down to it. I like it!

First stop of the day along the drive was at White River, the home of "Winnie the Pooh"...who knew?!

And the day would not be complete without a stop in Wawa, ON where we learned all about the goose and the POW camp that was there during the 2nd World War.

Lunch was had at Magpie Scenic High Falls just outside of Wawa. This was not an RV friendly parking lot at the bottom of the hill for this viewpoint but luckily we managed to turn ourselves around.

On our way to the Scenic High Falls we passed the Algoma Highlands Blueberry Farm, so we just had to stop there on our way out to grab a pint of strawberries and some blueberry jam. (Fresh blueberries will not be available until the fall).

Beautiful views of Lake Superior on this section of the drive! We tried to stop in at Katherine's Cove picnic area to walk to the beach but the parking lot was not RV friendly! Luckily we have walkie talkies that allow us the opportunity to work on our communication skills to extract us from a unique situation! So we did not take any more chances to stop at any other viewpoints, I'm sure they were wonderful.  This is where a small rig would be a plus!

This is the American side of the lock system that we went through.  As you can see there is a viewing platform for the people to see what is coming/going in the locks...like this Canada Steamship Lines freightliner.

As we had already stopped by the Loonie earlier in the day, we took a short detour to see the Big Nickel (Canadian 5 cents) in Sudbury, ON. Did not take the time to do the mine tour in the Dynamic Earth center but the nickel certainly was "big"!

Yeah, found a great boondocking spot, on IOverlander, to spend the night, just outside of Sudbury for the win!

First stop on our day was to Parry Sound, birthplace of legendary hockey star...Bobby Orr.

All set up in Beavermead Campground within the city  of Peterborough.

Lots of old architecture in the downtown area.   

Took a wrong turn on our way to a winery that I had picked out (set up the wrong directions on google maps!) and found ourselves in Fenelon Falls.  Which as it turns out was a great find only about 1 hour north of Peterborough.  They too have a Lock, number 34 and it appeared to be well used as there were at least a dozen boats that used it during our couple of hours stay in town.

And even though there was not a winery to be found, we did find a brewery!

Some of the beautiful flowers found at the base of Fenelon Falls, Tiger Lilies for one and the other bush with the red flower I am not familiar with.

Yes, we did find a winery on our way home, Rolling Grape Vineyard, just 20 minutes south of our campsite.

Just across the road from our campsite, is Enniskillen General Store. Debbie raved about the delicious ice cream and Ken can verify that it was! 

While visiting with Morgan & Debbie in Peterborough and hearing how we had visited the Giant Loonie and the Big Nickel, they said we needed to see the Giant Toonie in Campbellford.  What a great stop that turned out to be be. After seeing the Toonie, we walked over the bridge to see more of the town and headed to "The World's Finest Chocolate" factory.  We enjoyed a couple of the chocolate bars and even though I am a dark chocolate lover, I did prefer their milk chocolate bar as I thought it was less sweet than their dark chocolate bar.

Staying in Ottawa's Poplar Grove Campground in the community of Greely about 30 minutes from downtown Ottawa.

Main goal for the the day was to visit Canada's Parliament Buildings.  We had been here 30 years ago when it was under contruction so we were looking forward to seeing it completed.  However, work again was being done and the major renovation/preservation will not be completed until 2030ish time frame.  

There are 8 Locks at this location in Ottawa and they are opened/closed manually.  It can take a boat about 1.5 to 2 hours to get through all 8 locks.  We were surprised that only a rope keeps people away from the edges.  And for this to be a World Heritage Site we were surprised at the lack of information or upkeep for the property.

Found a spot for a bite to eat and enjoy a cold one at brewery, 3 Brasseurs.

Along our walk, just after the Mill St. Brewpub, we were on another part of the Trans Canada Trail, or as it is now known, "The Great Trail"

It was an overcast driving day and the terrain looked a lot like Ontario!  

We managed to find a wonderful spot to enjoy a late breakfast at Kitchen 73 in Mirabel, QC on the northern edge of Montreal. A must stop if you are ever in the area, delicious omelets and uniquely delicious seasoned breakfast potatoes. We chose not to visit Montreal this time around as we have been there previously for a Rotary Convention.

Spending the next 3 or 4 nights at a Boondockers Welcome (BW) home.   BW hosts allow travellers like ourselves to stay on their property for free.  It is a way to meet new people and see the local area by having a safe location to leave the trailer. We are staying just outside of Trois Rivieres in Becancour with Claude.  He has been very helpful, giving us good guidance on what to see in the area as well as helping Ken find a local tire shop as one of the trailers tires was worn down to the thread.  Something we discovered when setting up here at Claude's. It is a lovely location and just 20 minutes outside of the city. What a welcome change from staying in an RV park!

When coming from Trois-Rivieres to Becancour, we crossed over the Pont Laviolette (Laviolette Bridge), which is extremely large. Not so much in width but in length & height.  We saw a couple of cargo ships (not loaded) and it appears that they would have no trouble getting under the main section of the bridge when loaded.

These pics were taken from the Becancour side of the St Lawrence River, which appears to very shallow in parts. 

We walked around the old part of town...it's hard to imagine this church being built in 1715! Look for the statues of St. Joseph on the left and St. Augustine on the right.

While in the downtown area stopped at the visitor center to see if any English speaking tours are offered.  They are not, but the nice young gentleman (with broken english) was able to give us a good tip to see The Notre-Dame-Du-Cap Sanctuary.  This was only a 15 min drive to the east of downtown across the Saint Maurice River and very worthwhile the quick stop.

There was an art installation going on for the summer months.  I thought that this one was really cute...AnonyMouse

Viewpoints from the end of the red line walk around the Citadel.

Our last views of Lower Old Quebec as we leave Quebec City tomorrow.

Gaspé Peninsula Drive, QC

The Gaspé Peninsula, also known as Gaspesia, is a peninsula along the south shore of the St. Lawrence River that extends from the Matapedia Valley in Quebec, Canada, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It is separated from New Brunswick on its southern side by Chaleur Bay and the Restigouche River. Wikipedia 

Will take some time to enjoy the views over the next week if the rain holds off.

The last crossing of the St. Lawrence River

Ended our day with a so/so sunset...nothing compares yet to an Arizona sunset!

26 - Rivierie-du-Loup, QC

Stopped along the drive to visit Chutes de Montmagny, it was difficult to get to them but they did have a nice walk in the area with more views of the St. Lawrence River.

We left early in the morning on our way to what we thought would be Rimouski, however when we arrived at about 10:30am, the campground we had hoped to stay at was full.  Turns out that the Quebec Summer Games were being held in town during this week and into the weekend.  Everything seemed very busy so we moved on and landed at Capitaine Homard in Sainte-Flavie. Had a wonderful view of the river out our back window, however we were packed into the campground...neighbors just too close!

After we got settled into the campground we took the next few hours to tour a few of the highlights.

First stop was at the Centre d'Art M. Gagnon. He created these cement figures in the St Lawrence River to be viewed when the tide was out and hidden when the tide came in and called the installation, The Great Gathering. I used Google Lens to translate the French, so hopefully it it close.

2nd stop of the the day was to go to the Reford Gardens in Grand-Metis. This is the kind of place that I would think would be enjoyed many times of the year as the seasons change.  They were quite beautiful.

There were 15 gardens to be viewed. I think my favorite was "The Long Walk", that had all of the roses.

Ended the days activities with a drive and short visit to the 2nd tallest lighthouse in Eastern Canada - Pointe-au-Père (Father Point) Lighthouse

Description of Historic Place from Parks Canada.

The Pointe-au-Père Lighthouse consists of a central octagonal tower made of reinforced concrete, supported by eight concrete flying buttresses that are attached to the tower at each floor level. The lighthouse is 32.9 metres (108 ft.) tall and measures 3.35 metres (11 ft.) in diameter. The tower is surmounted by a gallery with a railing and a traditional cast-iron lantern, which is painted red and houses a 3rd Order dioptric lens. The lighthouse is located in Rimouski, on a point of land that juts into the St. Lawrence River estuary.

OK, the day really ended after we had dinner at Capitaine Homard, (a delicious seafood casserole!) and a pretty good sunset. 

28-29 - Marsoui, QC