On Tuesday we got up and walked our suitcases over to the Hilton to get our hire car - a Chrysler 300 and head out into the Boonies. It didn't take long - in fact within 5 minutes we were on a huge wide highway and seemed to be the only car around! Now this is good driving territory. Matt and I shared the driving up to Saguenay - it wasn't that far, there were a few Belvederes to stop at (we had to look that up - view points) which we did, but they really weren't all that scenic.
We stopped at a service station - picked up some lunch (I found some crudités and was very very happy - we haven't had many vegetables this trip - always difficult when staying in hotels and eating out!) and took it to the next Belvedere to eat. We arrived in Saguenay around 2pm, the hotel is massive, has an indoor pool, and outdoor pool, sauna, pool table etc etc. On enquiry regarding laundry - we discovered they had a laundry room and it would cost us just the $2 to do a load - couldn't quite believe our luck - so we spent the afternoon in and around the hotel, sorting laundry, went to the supermarket opposite to buy some breakfast, beer and snacks, went for a swim in the pool and just generally had some nice down time. In the evening we went across the road to a restaurant for burgers - very nice they were too - especially as they were on special offer $15 each so approx £8. We are still finding the cost of everything here quite reasonable - wondering if they have suffered from inflation as much as we have?
The evening was spent playing SkyJo and watching baseball (of course!)
Wednesday we headed to the Fjord de Saguenay National Park Centre. Saguenay is on the river Saguenay - a tributary of the St Lawrence River, just to the east of us is a fjord, so we decided to explore the south side as we are going to the northern side tomorrow. We found the national park centre from where there were plenty of trails. We thought we would go up high to a famous statue at the top - we got there to find that the route is ferme at the top due to travaux (I tell you the WHOLE of Canada is dug up / under travaux at the moment - one new expression I have learnt "Rue Barré"!) We decided to walk it as far as we could, as there was a view point on the way.
It was a tough old walk - it went up and up and up, plus it was hot and sticky but we stopped lots of times and were rewarded with a great view. We continued as far as we could. It was a pleasant walk, in that it was in the trees. We could hear lots and lots of birds.
 |
| Pileated Woodpecker |
+ Pileated Woodpecker
+ Downy Woodpecker
+ Hairy Woodpecker
+ American Redstart
+ Swainson's Thrush
+ Nashville Warbler
 |
| Song Sparrow |
+ Blackburnian Warbler
+ Black Throated Green Warbler
+ White Throated Sparrow
+ Song Sparrow
+ Dark Eyed Junko
+ Veery
+ Tennessee Warbler
+ Red Eyed Vireo
Some of them had the most beautiful calls (White throated sparrow) and the Pileated Woodpecker was MASSIVE - we actually saw this one and it was almost as big as a chicken - we couldn't believe our eyes!!!!!
We had lunch right at the top of the path and then headed down, which was hard work on the old knees - we all had shaky legs when we got back to the bottom. After a sit down and refreshment we did one more short and level walk alongside the river which was beautiful. Got some great views and saw some more birds.
We then headed back to the hotel - we were all quite tired, mucky and sweaty - it was a hard day but very rewarding and worth the effort.
No comments:
Post a Comment