Day 21 Gananoque ON to Montreal QB 260km

We snuck out of the KOA at 7:30am more because that’s just when I woke up than a real desire to get on the road early. As part of our ticket to Fort Henry we had a free pass to a place called Upper Canada Village. This area is called upper Canada since the water flows from high to low and since the flow of the St Lawrence is South to North,  Kingston, ON would be considered upper Canada and Montreal and North, Lower Canada. Confused yet...?

The brochure for Upper Canada Village is a bit suspect. Photo opportunities include ‘a picture of the ox pulling a cart’ or ‘Ben and Barney the two oxen’. We allowed 1/2 hr to see if this place was any good and again, as with many experiences so far, it was awesome. We stumbled out of there, exhausted 5hrs later!

The main difference between this recreation of a real village and others is that the ‘actors’ or people working there really do work. The tinsmith really does make all the tin products in the entire village and sells them at the gift store. He told us he has been working in the little tin shop for over 20years. The ladies operating victorian stoves really do make pies, soup and stews. We were able to sit down for a traditional meal of the period. We split some delicious red pepper soup, hearty beef stew and a plowman’s lunch between the four of us. We were not stuffed as portions in the 1860s are somewhat smaller than what we have come to expect. After wiping our plates clean with the home made bread we made our way to the activity centre where we were able to try some games from the era. Ryan bashed out a flower on a piece of tin and ‘since he had done so much work on it’ he was able to bring it home.

A guided tour of the village before exploring in more detail on foot

Ryan getting to feel the weight of an iron pot (empty)

A crazy tourist trying out the hoop 

Ryan's finished project

All the time the thermometer was climbing. It hit 36C during our drive up into Quebec. This is quite a milestone for our trip. Our entry into the Province of Quebec and the end of our third week on the road and, On Sunday, the commencement our our three week immersion course.

The KOA is located in South Montreal which meant that we had to tackle Montreal Friday afternoon traffic as the road we wanted skirts south Montreal before heading south over the St Lawrence (very wide at this point).

My first impressions of Quebec:

1. Speed limits posted 100km maximum 60km minimum! Great idea.
2. Montrealers drive like the Italians - no that is not a compliment. Actually, they drive more like the British. Fast and aggressive. It’s not so easy to reciprocate when towing a big green pea pod.
3. Traffic lights (the actual lights) can be square, round or a combination of both. I will try to find out why.
4. Everyone here speaks French. That may sound like an odd statement but i thought that in Montreal some would speak French and others would speak English.
5. Jenny and Jemma speak French. They demonstrated that for me today as they ‘jabbered’ on to the KOA lady (and Jemma to a gas station attendant) and I had no idea what they were talking about.

Don't forget to check out our updated expenses and data over there ⇰ (expenses and kilometres)