Old town

We stopped for breakfast in the town of Vankleek Hill (ON). It is a very old town, dating back nearly 300 years. There were lots of cool old buildings around. It is nice to see that they keep the buildings up so well, as do so many of the little towns we’ve been through. Obviously very proud of the heritage.

After crossing into Quebec, we took highway 148 towards Lachute (where it turned into highway 158.) This was a route recommended to me by some Quebecers as a way to avoid Montreal. It did that for the most part (although the traffic did get fairly heavy in places), but the condition of the roads was a shock! I thought secondary highways, as these are marked, would be in reasonable shape, but there were some pretty astonishing potholes. This was some of the worst pavement I’ve ridden over. There’s also the old disappearing shoulder trick…one mile it’s there, the next it’s not! It was not really a pretty ride as it passed through the “strip mall” section of several small towns, but also through some farmland as well.

I am relieved that the weather pattern we’ve had for the last week and a half or so has finally changed (or we’ve gotten clear of it). It is still hot – around 30 C – but the humidity is finally gone. Late yesterday a bit of a storm came through, and after it cleared it was no longer humid. The wind also seems to have changed for the better – it’s more or less out of the NW now, as opposed to an easterly headwind. Yay!

We are camped about 7 km west of Joliette. It was a long way to come after crossing the border – although the headwind I had battled to get into Quebec became a taiwind once we headed east! The quality of the roads defintely slows me down – it is hard to get up speed when you are constantly dodging potholes, and rough, bumpy roads also make it hard to get a good groove going. However, I was anxious to press on as far as possible today, to get clear of the influence of Montreal. I did not want to be dreaming about that.

My french language skills are holding up OK so far. It has been a long time since I studied it, but reading those cereal boxes must be keeping me sharp as we have been able to get by our first day without any major hangups. I had to ask a couple of people to speak slowly, but they did. I have not found people to be rude at all despite my horrendous accent.