Days 1 and 2

It's been a great first two days of the trip - I don't think you could have designed a better start to any trip, except I'd take out the heavy rain and a little later than expected arrival at the hotel tonight.

Day 1 - Saturday the 8th

We left home first thing in the morning in bright sunshine and our first stop was at The Big Apple, a kitschy (but cool) attraction in the middle of nowhere - it bills itself as the "world's biggest apple" (umm, hello? New York City?), but it's got a pie store, gift shop, rides and llamas to pet. We picked up a couple of apple pies and hit the road again to grab a quickie lunch at Subway before staying on the highway for good to Ottawa.

Arrived in Ottawa about 3:30 pm and drove up to the little hamlet of Dunrobin to the home of Pene's cousin. We were unprepared for how nice the house was, out in the country and right on the Ottawa river, with Quebec on the other side. A gaggle of relatives were there to gather for a barbecue dinner, and the two daughters of Pene's cousin immediately took to entertaining Pippy and Poppy in the backyard for hours. After the BBQ, we went out into the canoe and paddled all over the river with Ontario on one side and Quebec on the other side - it was Pene's first time ever in a canoe, if you can believe that. The evening was capped by a gabfest around a bonfire in the backyard.




Day 2 - Sunday the 9th

After a breakfast of eggs and bacon, we headed over to the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Gatineau along with our host family. If you've never been to the museum, I highly recommend you check it out if you're ever in the Ottawa area. It was perfect for both adults and children as there's also a Children's Museum in there, complete with "passports" for the kids to collect stamps as they explored the area.

We then bid farewell to Pene's family and hit the road, picked up a few lunch items from the grocery store. Zipped right through southern Quebec, waving hello/goodbye to both Montreal and Quebec en route without getting out of the car (even if we did make an unscheduled trip over the St. Lawrence River to touch Quebec City for about 45 seconds). Had dinner at Mikes Restaurant, nice for the kids to get out and run around for a bit, and Poppy actually finished his entire dinner for a change (chicken nuggets).

When we got out of the restaurant, it started to rain pretty hard. The last hour and half of our drive turned into a slightly-hairy two hour drive to the hotel in Edmundston with the two-lane highway twisting and turning in the darkness in the rain. But we did make it safely and did pretty well even if we got there a little later than we expected. The room is huge and more than comfortable enough for all six of us, so we're happy with that. Look forward to getting up in the morning and hitting the pool for a hour or so before moving on to Moncton.