Strawberries in August

Okay, okay...I don't actually have fresh strawberries. I'm just late posting our 2011 strawberry picking, strawberry jam making experience.
This was the first year I took Gage with me picking. I wish you were there to see just how excited he was. I told him before we left that we weren't allowed to eat any of the strawberries until after we paid for them ( I know, I'm a cruel mother) - but in my defence, if I didn't say that he would have eaten all of them.

It was an overcast day which was perfect for picking. Especially with a young child. He was very proud to have picked the "most humongous strawberries" in the whole field.

This was our lot for the day. Plus Gage's bucket that he refused to let go of. All of these strawberries in the picture above went into making jam. We now have enough jam to last us until next winter I think, though that won't stop me from picking more next season and making more jam.

Local dinner for one

Just realized that outside of the bread and butter, my dinner tonight is quite local. 100 feet or less, local.
Cucumber and tomato (both from the garden) sandwich + a hard-boiled egg (The egg was laid by Pecker...incase you were wondering).
Delicious.
Sorry no pictures. One camera broken and the other is with my better half.

What's your favorite local meal?

Day 4

Dolbeau-Mistassini to St. Felicien. This was our longest day of cycling. 70km. The weather was beautiful, the ride was beautiful and we were all in great spirits. We stopped along the way to pick some wild blueberries that are scattered along the trail. Can you get more local than that? We also stopped at a cheese making shop. A 'fromagerie'. Fresh curds and more blueberries were a welcome snack near the end of our ride.
Gage says his favourite part of the day was stopping at the St. Felicien Zoo. 'Zoo Sauvage'. We arrived around 5:30pm. The cashier was nice enough to give us a 50% discount since we were entering so late in the day. The zoo was separated into 5 sections. The 'Parc Des Sentiers De La Nature' (Buffalo, Moose/Meese?, Deer), 'Montagnes' (Mountain goats, Lynx, Cougars, Grizzly Bears, Turkeys, Wolf), "Asie' (Tigers and Monkeys), 'Mongolie' (Camels, Wild Horse, some other mountain goat-looking animal) and the 'Foret Mixte' (Beavers, Seals, Fox, Racoon, Rabbit, Porcupine, Polar Bears).
Gage's favourite animals were the seals. They had an underwater observatory as well as an above ground. The seals just kept swimming in circles and showing their bellies to everyone. Needless to say, we purchased a stuffed seal animal in the gift shop before we left.
My favourite were the polar bears. One was laying in the sun while the other played with a huge traffic cone in the water. At one point the cone ended up on the bear's head and it wasn't quite sure how to get it off. You couldn't ask for better entertainment! Hilarious.
After the zoo (we basically Olympic speed-walked through the whole thing) we headed back to the bikes to go to our next B&B. We should have known something was up with Gager when he refused to eat any dinner. We just thought he was too excited to be at the zoo and wanted to get back out there. Were we ever wrong! After I put him in the trailer, he vomitted all the fresh cheese curds and blueberries he had had 4 hours earlier. The smell.....uck.
After another hour of waiting for him to vomit everything out enough to get back on the bike, and we were off. I don't think I've ever biked that fast in my life. It was getting dark, I didn't have any lights on my bike and I had a sick kid towing behind me. Lance Armstrong, move over.
The B&B owners, who we had called saying we were on our way just before Gage got sick came looking for us in their car. How sweet is that? They showed us the way and we got Gage to bed asap.
It was a long day but it was great day (even with the vomit).

Picking blueberries. Delicious!

This was our view most of the way. Beautiful rolling hills of green

This field is planted with Canola. It kinda smells like cauliflower and manure.

The beginning of the end. Cheese curds and blueberries!!

The underbelly

This was the Polar Bear after if figured out how to get the cone off it's head. I love how all the kids were cheering!

One of the bridges overlooking the monkey and tiger exhibits.

Eric pointing out the tiger.

Just before the vomit...

Just after the 2nd vomitting episode (see left corner - sorry), in fresh clothes and cleaned shoes. Gotta love the Crocs.

Day 3

St. Monique to Dolbeau-Mistassini. Total distance was 49.75Km. The second day of cycling was much better than the first, despite the rainy weather. The route was less hilly and the rain was light enough that it felt nice. We had the BEST lunch at a tiny restaurant in the back of a general store. Spaghetti and chicken noodle soup. Delicious and much appreciated when it's wet and rainy out.


Gage navigating the map




Me taking a break on Eric's trike




A museum we stopped at but didn't tour.




The museum's shop. They had an art installation of 'heaven and hell'. Heaven was this blue and white cloudy, puffy, comfy looking thing and hell was, well, exactly what Gage was drawn to.




Gage refused to bike past these cows because they were too close to the bike trail. He's scared of cows.




Enjoying the homemade apple pie with real cream after our amazing lunch.




Nap time




The Mistassini River. Don't worry, Gage was being yelled at to get off the fence.





Enjoying Daddy's dessert.

 A great day!

Day 2

Day 2 consisted of a 45.82km ride from Alma to St. Monique. Both Eric and I were told (on separate occasions) that the ride around the lake was nice and flat (something I'm familiar with). Yet, our first day was basically all uphill. It was extremely discouraging considering I was left with thinking that the rest of our four days would be similiar (they were not) and my knees were so sore that neither moving or laying still helped. Thanks to some Advil and Tylenol and sheer exhaustion I was able to fall asleep. Eric, was great. He didn't hurt. Gage was great. He got pulled around most of the day.
Okay, enough complaining. The good parts of the day: Gage biking by himself for 5km. A stop at a national park for lunch, swimming and rest. Beautiful weather and finally arriving at our next destination.

Us before leaving on our first day. Those are my fancy new cycling clothes. Padded carpi pants (a God send).

Our first break (an hour in). We take up quite a bit of room!

Gage needed a pee break. This trail was beautiful. Despite the severe uphills.

A very nice cyclist we met. He helped us figure out where we were going. He also made it to St. Monique and back to this store before we were out of the forest trail (see previous picture). He's a rockstar.

The National Park that I can't remember the name of.

Eric's view.

Some much needed encouragment.

The map. If you look closely, you can see the path we took all around the lake.

A river passed over.

Finally! You can see that I was totally exhausted and wondering who got me into this mess (me). Gage on the otherhand looks like he had a great day!

Our distance.

Day 1

We started out driving to Alma, Quebec. It's about 7 1/2 hours away from Cornwall (where we left from...in-law's place).

(Ignore the dates on the photos...their wrong). When the car is closed it doesn't look like we took that much...

Shazam! It was packed.



Us before the long drive. We bought Gage one of those car neck pillow things and he's already having a blast with it.



It's like a smurf beard

My beautiful bike.

Once you past Quebec City and head north, this is what you drive through. Amazing!

One of the many 'look-outs'. Some very nice tourists took this for us.

It wasn't all fun and games, as you can see by the look on my face. He was a little terror at dinner (in his defence, it's an hour past our usual dinner time, and he's quite the scheduled kid).

Our first B&B. Eric fell in love with the brick wallpaper. I have a feeling our interior walls will look similar soon enough.

After a very long day driving it was great to fall into a comfy (though not your own) bed. I found it hard to fall asleep because I was so excited to start cycling the next day. It was like Christmas Eve! (Believe me, the next night...I wasn't feeling so chipper).

Our Family Vacation

We're currently driving home from our 2011 summer vacation (Don't worry, I'm not driving...Gage is).
This vacation was nothing I ever thought I'd do. Both in ability and want, but of course it turned out to be fantastic. I am proud of our little family unit of what we accomplished. Tomorrow I hope to catalogue all our photos and share them with you.
As of now, I'm looking forward to sleeping in my own bed tonight. Bliss.