Trekking Fall 2016

Yes, I've been busy of late.

Departed Oakville on Thanksgiving Day, October 10^th Canadian Style around 5:00 AM after a hectic couple days of moving into the Roadtrek. The struggle began a week earlier when I got a slow leak in my right rear tire repaired after picking up a nail. Second flat in a million miles. Getting to the tire and paying for the repair were both a pain, at least it was repairable. Next came a couple days of shopping.

The trip across the top of Toronto was remarkably quiet though watching the thermometer drop to one above and frost appear in the fields beside the highway was unexpected. “Be ware highway may be icy.” Breakfast at Dennys in Napanee to mark a break and wait out sunrise. I was not amused when I realized the toll collector at the bridge across the Saint Lawrence on HWY 30 east of Montreal had cheated me out of 15¢--no going back and it's the principal of the thing. Always some yokel who decides to speed up when you go to pass him. Didn't bother with the cheesy Wi-Fi at Camping Alloute, spent a quiet evening for $29.00.

Fog over the North Shore of the St. Lawrence but mercifully didn't extend over the Eastern Townships. The only slow down was in construction just East of Quebec City, Levis on HWY 20, where I drove by a sign advertizing gas at 99.9¢ only to pay $1.05.9 at the next exit where a median and construction made getting back on the highway a pain. Ratty old Shell Station at that. Rough roads ahead. Right turn onto HWY 185 south to Edmundston, NB where construction is finally complete after at least a decade. The earliest portions already need repaving. When I reached Woodstock, NB discovered the cottage/campground complex there was closed for the season despite online checks that declared otherwise. Another 100 KM to Fredericton and Hartt Isle where the high season rate is now goosed to $75 and the low season rate was $56 with taxes—any port in an emergency. A quiet, cold night with fog off the Saint John River, but no rain.

Wednesday now, stopped for gasoline down the road and used a scraggly squeegee and dirty fluid on the bugs adorning my windshield. Next stop was lunch at the Nova Scotia Welcome Centre which was quiet but still open. Stopped a few miles later at Masstown for honey and maple syrup. Decided I was good for a few more miles so drove to Halifax, took the construction riddled Hammond's Plains bypass narrowly missing being caught in a one-mile tie-up. Dropped in on my Aunt Muriel appearing in front of her just as she was saying she didn't expect to see me this year.

Camping at the Lunenburg Board of Trade Campground was $42.00/night + Wi-Fi that finally works. Made it just before the office closed. Went for a walk along the Lunenburg Waterfront and said hello to the Bluenose moored awaiting its new wooden rudder after the 5-ton steel debacle. Spent Thursday with my 97-year-old Aunt Muriel who gave me the dope on half of Lunenburg County, the other half being planted six feet under. She had requested this picture of me with a beard which makes me look like her father who died before I was born:

Stopped at ESSO for gas on the way home, it went up two cents/litre overnight.

Friday the rain hanging off I wandered around Lunenburg early in the day stopping at Foodland for Tancook Sauer Kraut and cod bits to get $100 cashback so I could go buy tickets for the Nova Scotia Symphony that night at $30 and Old Man Luedeke Saturday Night at $21.50. At the Ironworks Eau de Vie with an actual pear in the bottle is only $125 for a small bottle. Since the rain held off drove up country to pay my taxes in Bridgewater and see the Olde Sod. Visited with the neighbour across the road before paying my respects in the Midville Branch Cemetery mourning as much the missing church spire just up the road. Walked back to the old home place to visit with the new people there. Dan was headed for the library to return borrowed books and Fred was about to sow winter rye on a field. The drive back to camp was bittersweet.

Walked over to St. John's Anglican Church and scored an eighth row aisle pew for the concert. In that acoustic the symphony was extremely 'present' and the piano in Chopin's First Concerto was well balanced with the orchestra. Beethoven's Fifth was exciting. A nearly full moon lit my walk home again.

Spent a quiet day Saturday catching up online. Construction on the blockhouse siding got me up Friday Morning. Had to look up Zion Lutheran Church on Fox Street. My printed ticket showed that evening's concert half an hour late but I arrived early and got a front row seat. Christopher Luedeke stood alone in the chancel with his banjo and sang before a mike, the mixing board in front of me. Excellent concert. Moonlit walk home again.