Unner's Build, 2001 T4R 4x4

[Unner]

Canada – August 2017

Here’s a trip report from when I went to Canada this summer.

Day 1

My girlfriend and I left from South Carolina bright and early, right around 6 PM… We had hotel reservations in Hagerstown, Maryland. We made it in very late, and went straight to bed. Nothing much to see this day since all the driving was at night. I’ve driven the I-81 corridor multiple times before though.

A blurry West Virginia sign.

IMG_4885 by Unner Unner, on Flickr

Day 2

We got a much earlier start this morning, and had to make it to Boston for the night. She has an uncle in Boston who really wanted to see us, so we made a detour on the way to Canada to see him. I had no desire to drive anywhere near New York City, so I planned a route around. This day I added two new states to the list of states I’ve been to, New York and Massachusetts.

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We got to Boston, and met up with her uncle. He showed us around Boston a little that night, showing us the bay, “the big dig”, and Harvard, his alma mater. We ate at a local Thai place that evening, which was good. The weather was incredible, so much nicer than the hot humid August nights we have down south. Unfortunately I didn’t get any pictures while we were in Boston.

 

[Unner]

Day 3

We met up with her uncle again, to see a little more of the city, grab lunch, and then we would be on our way headed north. He showed us the Atlantic Ocean, a little more of the city, and then we went to get lunch at Floramo’s. If you are ever in Boston, eat at Floramo’s. Seriously, do it. The steak tips were the best steak I’ve ever had. I looked at it and it fell apart it was so tender.

After lunch, we said our goodbyes and began to head north towards New Hampshire (another new state for me), towards the White Mountains. Unfortunately, it was raining so we didn’t get to see much of the mountains, but we enjoyed the cool refreshing air. I imagine it’s a beautiful place when the weather is clear.

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We then crossed into Vermont, another state I had not yet been to. We had to stop for a picture at the Moose Crossing sign, this is not something you see in Alabama…

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We gassed up at the last town before the border crossing, and then we made it to Customs.

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The man working the line we went through started speaking French to us. I looked at him and said “English?”, to which he responded “Of course”. Turns out my 2 years of high school French didn’t stick, who would have guessed…

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The storms provided us with a pretty spectacular sunset, as we pushed further north.

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We drove on as night fell, having to make it to our hotel near Quebec City for the night. I stuck right at the speed limit of 100kph, which was crawling along it seemed. The roads were straight and smooth, better than most US interstates. After getting passed by everyone on the road I figured I could pick up the speed a little bit.

We stayed at Station Touristique Duchesnay, a Ski Lodge, which was very affordable during the summer. We were totally lost when we pulled in as everything was in French, and it was dark, but we figured out check in and got into our room which was cozy… With no microwave in the room, and leftovers from Florama’s in the cooler I broke out the camping stove and we heated it up on the front steps of the lodge. I have Alabama plates, it’s acceptable for me to do this.

 

[Unner]

Day 4

We woke up in the morning, slightly warm due to no AC in the room and started to get ready to head towards Quebec City.

Here was our lodge building, as seen during the day.

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We made it to Quebec City, and realized parking would be not fun in my truck. I thought I found a spot along this road, and squeezed in, only to have a nice local tell me I couldn’t park there because of a fire hydrant I hadn’t noticed. Garage parking wasn’t an option, as all the garages were 1.9 meters I believe. Finally, I found some street parking, and using the google translate app I was able to figure out what the sign said.

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Having finally found parking, we started walking towards the old part of the city. Passing by this cool mirror building, and flower bed with very colorful flowers.

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We ate at a local restaurant, and I decided to try a poutine for the first time. This would not be the first poutine I would eat here…

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Some of the old buildings, and a cruise ship in the St. Lawrence River.

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The cruise ship leaving, a Canadian flag waving in the wind, and the Canadian Coast Guard maybe?

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It was rather cold here for us southerners so we stopped to get a coffee and figure out what we would be doing the rest of the day. We had walked around the old part of the city already. We ended up going by a grocery store to see what they had that was different, and then we ate at one of these places. Pretty good for fast food, I got another poutine…

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[Unner]

Day 5

We checked out of the hotel, and started to head further north. Once we got out of the Quebec City area, we started getting into some very pretty territory. It was pretty desolate out here.

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We stopped at this rest stop, as it seemed like the only place to get gas and food between here, and our destination, Tadoussac. Gas was very expensive here, as well as the food. I paid something like $30 US dollars for two bad fast food meals that weren’t even filling. I’m still not sure what I ordered or what was in it…

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Pulled off at this scenic overlook to find an early 00’s Camaro pulling a trailer. Not something you normally see.

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It was starting to get more mountainous, and there were lakes everywhere. It seemed almost anytime you looked out the window you were passing a lake.

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I wanted to see the Saguenay Fjord, but it appeared the only way to get to it was to either hike in or take some sort of a tour through it which I wasn’t too big on. We were going down some windy roads enjoying the scenery when I see a dirt road appear out of nowhere, so I slam on the brakes and take it, hoping it will lead to where we want to go.

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[Unner]

We drove down the road, which was back tracking the direction we came from, but also taking us further to the Saguenay river, which is where I wanted to go. We kept our eye’s peeled for wildlife, but unfortunately saw none.

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The road started out pretty smooth and open, not much brush up along the road. It slowly got worse with being overgrown. I could tell we were the only ones who had been down here in awhile, but there were no signs anywhere saying anything so I figured we could keep going. Every couple hundred feet I would get out of the truck, push trees out of the way, cut the low hanging limbs and then drive through. It got old after doing this several times, and making very little progress. The road we were on no longer showed on our maps, we were close to the Saguenay River and Fjord, but we made an executive decision to turn around and keep heading towards Tadoussac so we could make it there with some daylight left. This picture doesn’t accurately depict what we were dealing with, but it gives you an idea.

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Headed back out, not victorious.

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Almost back on pavement.

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Pulling into Tadoussac.

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Into the city of Tadoussac, at their little harbor along the St. Lawrence River.

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[Unner]

It was very pretty around here. And the temperatures were pretty nice I thought, highs in the 60’s, lows in the 40’s.

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We walked out onto the rocks to watch the sky change color as the sun set, and the moon rose. We even spotted a couple whales out in the river, one of the reasons I wanted to visit here.

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The moon rising over the St. Lawrence River.

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For dinner we ate here. There weren’t too many options here, which made choosing a place much easier for two indecisive people.

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I once again got a poutine, this one was the best by far. Communication was beginning to become shaky at best up here, we were pretty far north, about 50 miles further north than the northern most point in Maine.

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This night we camped along the St. Lawrence river, on some sand dunes. It was really neat.

 

[Unner]

My girlfriend wanted to try some long exposure night photography, so I showed her how to do it, and we took a few pictures. One featuring a Tim Hortons Box. Tim Hortons was great, we stopped there multiple times.

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Not a bad view from bed.

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It was getting cold, so I took two more pictures of the river and we went to bed.

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[Unner]

Day 6

I woke up early hoping for a great sunrise, which I was granted.

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Watching the sun rise over the St. Lawrence River was like watching the sun rise over the ocean, but better because the water was so still. Spectacular.

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After standing in the cold for a while, I went back to bed. We woke up a couple hours later to this view. Not too shabby.

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These were the dunes we had camped on. These were everywhere around here, with tire tracks all over them too. Some of them were very steep, I wanted to drive around on them, but the danger of flipping seemed really high, so I restrained myself.

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Some more pictures of the campsite.

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[Unner]

We drove a few miles down the road to this “beach area”. There were a bunch of people climbing up and down this cliff to get to the beach down there. The water wasn’t warm, I had touched it the day prior, yet these people were in the water and hanging out just like you see at the Gulf of Mexico when the temperatures are 95+ and the water temps are 80+.

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We went back to the rocky area we were at yesterday, and watched a few more whales. It was really pretty here, so we hung out awhile.

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The ferry we would be taking later.

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Blending in with the locals.

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[Unner]

Then we got on the ferry to cross the Saguenay river.

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Off the ferry, and headed towards Montreal. We drove along the St. Lawrence River for awhile, the water was an amazing shade of blue. Something I’ve never seen from a river.

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We got to Montreal, checked into the hotel, and went to eat. I don’t remember what this place was called, but their thing was pies. They had a blueberry cheesecake pie that was amazing.

IMG_5073 by Unner Unner, on Flickr

 

[Unner]

Day 7

Today we didn’t drive anywhere. We talked to the receptionist at the front desk, who told us how the subway system here worked. We walked to the subway station, and rode that into old Montreal.

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The Notre-Dame Basilica of Montréal.

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Interesting sphere from a park on an island in the St. Lawrence River.

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From here we didn’t know what to do. We saw a bus that said “Casino” across the top of it, so we got on the bus to the Casino, which is where we spent the majority of the rest of the night. We didn’t win anything, but lost hardly anything either. We left late here, grabbed dinner at a Mexican place with open air seating (something you can’t enjoy in August in Alabama), and got on the subway to head back to the hotel.

 

[Unner]

Day 8

This was the day we had to start heading back, but we wanted to see Niagara Falls, so that was the attraction of the day. We left Montreal, and crossed into Ontario.

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I stopped for gas somewhere along here, and wanted to spend the rest of the Canadian dollars I had. I went inside the gas station to prepay the $21.32 I had left, and the lady just looked at me and said you haven’t pumped any gas yet. Apparently here you pump your gas and then pay. They’re very trusting up there. As I walked out I found 3 guys drooling over the 4Runner. I saw very few 4Runners in Canada, which was surprising. I pumped my gas, went inside and paid, and we were on our way back to the US.

We crossed the Thousand Islands Bridge, and we were now back in the US, almost. First we had to clear Customs.

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The US customs officer was much less friendly than the Canadian one…
We made it to Niagara Falls, and started the hike down to the falls.

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At the falls, the sun was starting to get low on the horizon.

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[Unner]

As we were walking to the furthest point, it started pouring down rain, which made my put the camera away…

While it was raining, they turned the lights on, which was neat to see.

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It was fairly late now, so we wanted to find something to eat. We prefer to eat at local places (or at places we don’t have at home at the very least) when we travel, as everything in the area we are from seems to be chain restaurants, which get boring after a while. So far we had been successful for the entire trip doing this, until now.

Everything in Niagara Falls seems to be Indian cuisine, which my girlfriend does not eat. That severely limited our options. So we walked a mile or so to one of the few places that was still open, and was not Indian food. We got there, sat down, and no one would serve us. There were waiters just standing around, not doing anything that could have been serving us. After 15 minutes of this we got up and left. The Craft Kitchen and Bar gets a 1/10 rating.

Now it was even later, and our only option was the Hard Rock Café. Not our first choice, but we ate our expensive sandwiches, and figured out where we would be staying the night. We booked a hotel in North East, Pennsylvania, which is coincidentally not located in North East Pennsylvania, but on the far North Western side…

Day 9

We decided we’d check out Lake Erie before we got on the road back towards home. Neither of us had ever seen one of the Great Lakes. We pulled up to the beach area, got out the truck, and were shocked. The temperature seemed 15* warmer than at the hotel, which was only a few miles away. It was also humid, very humid.

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We hung around here for a bit, but had to get on the road so we got on our way. While driving along the backroads that run along Lake Erie I noticed there were grapes growing everywhere. It looked like the wine country area of Germany. I was not expecting this at all, but apparently the lake provides the perfect weather conditions to grow grapes here. Hard to believe this area got over five feet of snow at the time I typed this, with another foot or two in the forecast…

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The rest of the drive home was fairly uneventful. A long drive, we didn’t make it home until very very late, but we had a great trip. West Virginia is beautiful is something I learned passing through the heart of the state. I had only ever seen the strange little claw shaped part of the state near Maryland. I’m sure there’s some good exploring in those mountains, one day I’ll have to find out for myself.

I know this trip isn’t like my normal trip reports with only wheeling and scenery pictures, but there will be plenty of that once I finish the California Trip Report.

 

[habanero]

Amazing pics, looks like an amazing time and one heck of a fine adventure.

Also, poutine looks gross.

 

[Rockdawg84]

Great report and awesome pics. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Unner]

Amazing pics, looks like an amazing time and one heck of a fine adventure.

Also, poutine looks gross.

Thanks! It's actually delicious. French fries, meat, cheese, and gravy. What's not to like? My girlfriend wouldn't eat it either though...

Great report and awesome pics. Thanks for sharing!

Thanks for reading! Hopefully I can get mine from California up here in a few weeks rather than 6 months like this one.

 

[Road Bull]

Cool adventures man! Also, great pictures too. It's good to have a willing copilot too. I have explored a few spots in Canada on my side of the map. In fact, I will be heading up again in about a week. Good for you for getting out and making a fun road trip happen. Where are planning to go in California?

 

[Unner]

Cool adventures man! Also, great pictures too. It's good to have a willing copilot too. I have explored a few spots in Canada on my side of the map. In fact, I will be heading up again in about a week. Good for you for getting out and making a fun road trip happen. Where are planning to go in California?

Thanks Ryder! Having a good copilot makes things much more fun. Your side of Canada looks like some really pretty terrain.

Already went to California haha. Spent almost 2 weeks on that trip in early-mid December. The big things we did were: Pismo, PCH, Mojave desert, Death Valley, Alabama Hills, and the Grand Canyon. Plus a night I spent at Alstrom Point in Utah by myself on the way to pick up my girlfriend at the airport in California. It was a pretty awesome trip.

Also, GO EAGLES!!!

 

[MattJakobs]

So I heard you bought some cool squishy things. Care to share?

 

[Unner]

So I heard you bought some cool squishy things. Care to share?

I may have bought some fun stuff for the 4Runner today. :spy: