Day 11. Quebec City, Oui?

  A  9:30am start to a sunny, crisply cool 300 mile ride to Quebec City, Quebec from Ottawa, Ontario arriving just before 7pm. I screwed up the process of saving my ride app that I usually post in the beginning of the blog, getting sidetracked as I was checking in to our B&B for the night. So I got nothing today for road statistics and details, just the Google Maps picture as a representation above. You just have to believe me this time!

  

"The Morning Papers", trying to piece maps of Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic Provinces to figure out our ride today and where today leads us for the rest of the trip.  As you can see, as soon as we crossed from Ottawa into Quebec, everything became French, including all the road signs.  In Ontario they recognized Canada's dual languages. In Quebec, only French exists. Surprising, oui?? No!!

Sometimes you ride to get someplace. Sometimes you ride just to be where you are at that moment. Today we did a mix of both. We spent over half the time on a wonderful two lane roads along the Quebec River and eventually along the St. Lawrence Seaway. The little towns and the slower speeds allows us to take in all the newness and beauty of our new country. But we also jumped on QC40, the Quebec interstate to speed through boring spots and larger cities with the incumbent traffic and stop lights.  

 

 There is a theme in Quebec cities so far to always have a prominent Catholic church, and always with a shiny silvery steeple and often the roof too. 

 It seems like spring is still coming here in Quebec as a few of the trees are still budding. 

 The landscape varies from farmland to broadly treed river bluffs. 

 We stopped in the nice sized and well equipped town of Joliet for lunch.  As much as I like to ride my motorcycle it always feels good to get off and take a break. That helps us see things and enjoy the trip more too. 

 And this is one of those times when we were making time as opposed to riding in the moment. Even though it's a 4 lane divided highway the speed limit was only 100km, about 65mph. I haven't seen anything faster. That's not bad for us as we prefer riding at slower  speeds. 

 As we continue to move east and north  all of the Great Lakes and rivers we've been riding along now combine to form the great St. Lawrence Seaway. 

 French, French, and more French. This was at a small park along the St. Lawrence.  It might have been interesting if I could have read it.  I'm channeling my inner "Ugly American"!

 Trying to capture the enormity of the St. Lawrence Seaway, this attempt at a panorama photograph was just an enormous fail. 

 And more shiny churches.,,,

Checking it to the B&B at St. Augustine in the heart of old Quebec.  I'm not a usual B&B guy but this place was only C$105 for a two bed room and it is in the heart of historic Quebec City. 

 

 After unloading our gear we went for a walk looking for a place to eat. We wandered into this vintage vinyl LP shop and become buddies with Claude who works there.  Claude  is 63 years old but looked closer to 50. He said he quit drinking at age 23 after a black out drunk episode. Since then he's been eating healthy, only drinking a little wine, and taking care of his self. He recommended we eat at La Billig, a crepe restaurant just a few blocks up the street. It was excellent and he stopped in front of our window side table later that evening and waved at us, while drinking a liter of buttermilk!!