Road Trip

Breakfast In New Brunswick

This summer we are going on an old fashioned road trip, driving from Dartmouth, up to visit our daughter, Alisha in Kejick Bay, Ontario. On the way we plan to stop in Quebec City, Brockville, Peterborough, Toronto, Sault Ste Marie, Thunder bay and finally Kejick Bay. Some stops are just overnights, but we are visiting our son Ryan in Toronto, and finally getting to meet some of Derek, our daughter's fiance's family.

This trip was completely organized by me. Anyone who knows us will know that this is not the usual, as Regis normally does ALL of the trip planning, but this one I have done myself. The goal was to visit Alisha, so it was organized around getting to her school before the last day of school, so she could bring her parents to visit her school. I simply split the trip up on Google Maps into reasonable driving distances with stops in Toronto, Peterborough and Thunder Bay to spent time with people.

This did not work out so well . . . . our planned stop in Quebec City coincided with the G7 meeting, so visiting the beautiful old part of this lovely city was not advised. Even out where we were there were busses full of RCMP who provided security for the meeting. As well, we could not bypass Quebec City for Montreal, as the Canada Grand Prix was being run, so it would also have been way too busy. Then, our son who we planned to visit in Toronto called to say he was suddenly told that he had an unavoidable two day meeting in Halifax during our two day stop in Toronto.

A chilly picnic lunch

The first part of the trip from Dartmouth to Toronto is very familiar for us, as we have been visiting our son in Ottawa and Toronto for over 10 years, so the drive is comfortable but it is always interesting to see the differences. Since we started driving the route through New Brunswick into Quebec, the road connecting the Trans-Canada Highway in New Brunswick to the Quebec Highway 20 along the south side of the St. Lawrence River has been under construction. Every year there is a tiny bit more that is twined but there does not seem a lot of interest in completing this 95 km section of road into a real highway.

Dinner In Quebec City

We have a routine for this section of the trip. We get up early, stop outside Moncton for breakfast and then in Edmundston for lunch. This usually got us to Ottawa in time for dinner with our son. This trip we are trying something different. I put together a little two person Picnic bag, and we have a nice 12 volt cooler for the car, so we plan to stop for lunch at rest stops or picnic areas. It was a good plan except for the chilly 10° temperature at the first rest stop in Quebec, so our first picnic stop was a bit of a rushed meal to get back in the warm car.

I hope I can find interesting topics to write for the blog on this road trip. I appreciate all the people who told me they were looking forward to me travel tales.