Gaspe Folks and their Ways

We noticed how colorful the houses were as we drove through the area around our campground.  I mean really colorful--fushia, lime, pink, bright blue, baby blue, midnight blue, purple, sunshine yellow, lavender, and I'm sure I missed a few.  Also some of these houses had  more than one of these colors on them.

I asked Dan Rose, the owner of the campground, about this.  Of course, there is history to this!  Gaspe has fishing and tourism as their main industry, and tourism only more recently as an earlier blog entry describes.  Also agriculture is very limited as this is a beautiful, but harsh land.  Consequently, most of the year many folks have no income other than what comes from the Canadian unemployment compensation.

So, in early spring, folks who are needing to paint their homes, go to the paint store and buy what is on sale and the amount of paint that they can afford.  If lime is on sale, that is your color.  But, they have only enough money for part of the job.  Next spring, you guessed it, they go back to the paint store for paint that is on sale, and, you guessed it again, lime is not on sale this year, but purple is.  So we paint another part of the house purple and so on and so on.

Dan, said until more recently, they never painted the back of their houses since no one could see back there.

However, once the folks realized that economics could improve if they could bring more tourists to the area, they did and their economy improved somewhat.  They bought televisions for the long winters and learned that white houses apparently (I never realized this) meant you had arrived.  Now many houses are painted white, but I will tell you those colorful houses bring character to Gaspe.  I figured, they did it because it really brightened (really brightened) up the landscape in the long, cold, dreary, winters in the Gaspe. - tg

 

 

 

 

RV Musings

When we started our full time rving, we had not camped for nearly 18 years.  A campground is a small town, but a gated community where you can only enter if you are camping there or have a pass to visit someone in the campground.

There are your different cultures--so far:  French, British, Oriental cultures, Mexicans, Americans, Canadians, Germans--there are those who are very well off, down to those who are just starting out in life.

Mornings are interesting.  Tenters, pop-up campers, and travel trailers without bathroom facilities bring out folks in their pjs.  There is an endless variety of pajamas which I would never have imagined.  People go to the bath house with their shower kits and come out sparkling clean with wet clinging hair.

Mealtime!  The food smells are wonderful.  Today, I smelled beef stew.  Yesterday, it was vegetable soup from our RV and corn chowder from our neighbors'', RV .  We have heard the sizzle of grills and woks.  The smells of China and  American grilled steak.  Before dinner, most people sit out with a glass of wine or a bottle of beer, just relaxing and chatting before dinner.  Of course, mornings bring out the bacon and coffee aroma.

Evenings--there are always the glow of campfires and that wonderful smell of wood burning in the fireplace.  A night stroll finds a sky with stars that shine like diamonds.  I had almost forgotten how wondrous the sky is when it is full of stars.  I love evening walks because it is cool in the North and you see people around their campfires or lights from people in their tents, pop ups, trailers, 5th wheels and motor homes, and you are walking in a silent world--no cars, no horns beeping, no loud music, no bright lights, just the silent beauty of nature.  tg

 

 

 

 

Gregg - Retired Truck Driver from New Hampshire

Since we own an Alpenlite Fifth Wheel, I always try to talk to any other Alpenlite owners in the campground.  This was how I met Gregg.

 

I introduced myself as the other Alpenlite in the campground.  His New Hampshire rig has a map of North America  - like many Rvers - with many states in the US and Canada already colored, but the West Coast states - California, Oregon, Washington, are still white.   His Alpenlite fifth wheel is 5 years old and has a lot of small and major enhancements.  His truck, a Ford Powerstroke Diesel, has a chip ( modified engine control computer software to boost diesel engine power beyond the parameters set by the factory).  His wife prefers to stay inside her RV.  They RV 6 months each year and have been doing this for 5 years. 

 

We compared maintenance issues, and since he was a self avowed gadget man, I had to show him the GPS, WiFi wireless network, computers, TiVo, and other gadgets in our rig.   When I invited him in the first thing he saw was Teri at her notebook computer, and he exclaimed, "" Oh man - you guys are real computer nuts!""  He confessed he knew nothing about computers and that while he worked computers were the ""enemy"", because he worked for over 30 years a s a truck driver and the computer would always indicate he should already be at such and such place - which would have him always under pressure.

 

As he left I asked if he and his wife would join us some evening for a fireside visit on our deck overlooking the cliffs and the Gulf of St-Lawrence.  We had enjoyed the same with Klaus and Margaret, so - we keep doing what works!

 

We had a few stormy and foggy evenings after that, so we could not have our get-together the next night.  It turned out that Gregg was always outside chatting to someone, and that his wife never came out.  

 

Finally, we had a nice evening and made a good fire in our outdoor deck fireplace.  It was a chilly evening so we reserved the deck spaces closest to the fire for our guests.  We finally had a chance to meet Greggs wife.  She told us that she had bad knees.  It turned out that Gregg''s family were Rvers, and that she was not as enthusiastic about Rving as he - especially now that they had a grandchild.  We had a nice evening chatting about our Rving experiences.   They told us that they are Catholics, and talked about their faith on a few occasions.

 

One shocking story from Gregg: when they were kids their mother gave them a bag every time one of their female cats had a litter and asked them to put the kittens in the bag tied with stones inside and throw them in the pond.  

 

We were interested to hear that contrary to our style of always planning our itinerary in detail and making reservations well in advance, they never make reservations.  They do not use computers, so must depend on paper guides and maps, which can often be outdated.   The Ford is their second truck.  They had to trade because their first truck was a short-bed and this led to an accident when they were doing a sharp turn with their rig and a front corner of the fifth wheel hit their back window.

 

I had told them during our fireside chat that I had messed-up by getting a digital only cell phone instead of a trimode, and that we were spending a lot on public phone calls.  The next day Gregg brought us one of their expired Sams Club Calling Cards; it turns out we could buy a refill and continue using their card without any issues.  That was really thoughtful.

 

On the other hand, Greg surprised us on a number of occasions with his comments.  For example, he called the Quebec unemployment compensation system here ''communistic''.  It turns out that in the depth of the winter here in Gaspe the unemployment goes very high because the atrociously cold winters and relative remoteness of the area.  Apparently, Quebec provides fairly generous unemployment compensation and it is difficult to hire people cheaply at those times.  He also complained that they had no current newspapers in English here, and projected a somewhat condescending attitude towards the French-speaking population of Quebec.

 

On another occasion he brought us a Montreal newspaper he had finished reading.  He told us that it was full of  ''bad things about America''.  It turns out that when I read it cover to cover there were two articles that could fit that category: one was a report about a republican congressman from either Arizona or North Dakota - not sure which - who had declared that ''knowing what I know now I would not have voted to support the invasion of Iraq''.   It turns out the congressman was a senior republican member of the House Intelligence Committee.  He dared say this only because he was retiring from politics and sent a letter to his constituents declaring that he now believed that there had been significant distortions of the available pre-war intelligence and that he as well as the American people had been misled.  The other article was about the American biowarfare program between 1946 and the early 70s.

 

On Sunday morning I happened to run into Gregg by the service building and he told me that they were going to Church.  He then told me that they were going to pray for us.  I smiled and waved goodbye, and then he told me louder ''we are going to light candles for you''On the day before his departure we were chatting with another Rver from California and Gregg told us that he had found Quebecois were against the US invasion of Iraq.  He told us that he declared to a Canadian ''America is being nice - we can take over the world if we want to and nobody can stop us - we can take-over Latin America with a couple of well-placed bombs''.   He told us that the Canadian ''did not like it''.   I later noticed that his truck had one of those yellow ribbons with the words printed ''Support Our Troops'' and that he had placed an American flag on the hitch.

 

This experience showed me well that we will gain insight on a variety of people''s attitudes and beliefs.  Learning about people is one of our Rving adventures.

Dan Rose, Owner of Tete D Indien Campground, Gaspe

Dan is an American who operates the campground from April to mid October, then winters in Mississippi where he has a number of rental properties.

Dan came to the Gaspe in the early 60s and bought about 100 acres of land with side acreage along the Gulf of St. Lawrence and then the rest surrounded by hills and pine trees.  It is a hilly piece of property.  Once you hike up the forested path he prepared, you come to the back side of the property which goes down to the sea.  There are large rocks and caves which are very common along the shores, and to our great surprise, there are several colony of seals offshore.

Dan built these campsites himself in the summers while teaching biology in Mississippi during the school year.  He has a wonderful small two-story red house with red metal roof that he had restored.  One interesting thing is that is has two beautiful two-story high stain glass windows which he said he bought from a local priest to discover after they were in place that the priest had stolen them from the church. I am not sure how all that was resolved as the windows are still in place at his house.

Dan was here during the stormy separatist movement of the French wanting Quebec to be a separate country from Canada.  He said in earlier years, the French owned and worked this land.  Some were uneducated and basically farmers and laborers.  The more educated French were the shop owners, town council, and people with businesses that made money.  After Americans won their independence from England, Loyalist Americans to the crown were forced to leave America and came to Quebec where they forced the business French out and basically confiscated their property leaving only the poorer French.

Now fast forward to Dan's beginnings here in the early 60s.  He said if you were not French and went into a store to purchase something from the non French shop owners, if there were French customers ahead of you, the shop owner would attend to the non French.  Dan said the French were treated like the blacks had been treated in the U.S. prior to the civil rights movement.  They were very humiliated by this treatment.  To this day, on their license plates in Quebec providence, is the saying we remember which refers to this treatment. 

Eventually, the French separatists came to Gaspe, murdering a number of the shop owners and basically having a bit of a violent re-taking of their lands.  Dan said it was a very difficult time.  The French went through stages after that.  At first if visitors came and didn't speak French, they were not served by the French.  This put a big dent into any tourism in the area.  Fishing and farming were and are their main way of earning a living and both in this climate are seasonal.  Finally, the French realized that if they were more tolerant of others and made the tourists feel welcome, then they would find their economic situation improved and that is what has happened.

We have found, the people here to be friendly and helpful.  When we go to the shops, the French owners will spend time speaking with us and telling us about their business--like the fresh fish store, the owner showed us his freezers and holding tanks and discussed the different fish and how to prepare them.  like the goat cheese farmer who explained the different cheeses to us and that they had 97 goats.  It has been a wonderful experience.  A smile goes a long way to breaking down cultural barriers.

 

 

Hiking in Forillon National Park of Canada - Gaspe

We drove to Forillon National Park over roads with 15% and 17% grades.  It was spectacular with the forest on one side and the Sea of St. Lawrence on the other.  We went to the north side and decided to hike (2 1/2 miles) to the observation tower.  From the parking lot, the tower was atop a shear cliff that seemed impossible for any human to reach.  However, there were humans on the observation decks.  So, we decided to start and see how far we could go.  We saw some very young people and some very old people heading up the trail so why not us?  It was such a crisp, clear day how could we not try?

To our great surprise the trail was wonderful.  After an initial very rocky, very steep part, the rest of the trail was prepared well with caked dirt and small flat stones and when you came to very steep parts (like a 20% grade) they had provided wide wood plank steps going gradually up the grade.  It was unbelievable because without this great trail, you would die before getting to the top. 

The trail had many sections with fir trees and once in these groves, the scent was that of Christmas.  It is amazing how that aromatic scent can conjure up winter, Christmas trees all decorated, and all those warm memories of Christmas.  I could even smell cookies baking.

At the top, we could see 80 or more miles in every direction.  We could even see our r campsite through our binoculars.  We were above the trees and above the birds and the view of the land and sea was that like you see from an airplane.  This is such a beautiful beautiful place.

Once we descended from the top of the cliffs, even though our legs felt like Jello, we descend down to the rocky beach.  There was a cascade of water coming from the mountains and when we put our hand in the pools of clear water, it was like putting your hand in a bucket of ice water.  Two or three seconds was maximum tolerance in this icy water.

The beach is unique from our beaches in the U.S.  You have a crescent bay with huge rocks and caves along the sides, the sand is really all smooth flat small to medium size rocks.  There were dozens of rock sand castle (minus the sand) that people had made all along the beach.  It is like building with lego blocks, and they were very creative.  Elaborate like the sand castles you see at our beaches.  They find flat, lightweight stones and try to skip them across the water.  Walter was very successful at stone skipping.

We took our weary bodies and headed home.  What a place!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Klaus and Margaret

Tete D Indien - Gaspe

This star filled evening we sat around a roaring fire and our neighbors Klaus and Margaret joined us.  They are in their 60s and from Germany.  Klaus is tall with balding gray hair, a distinctive German accent and a very interesting and intelligent person.  Margaret is slim and petite with a head of white hair and beautiful blue eyes.  She is sweet, very smart, and so soothing when she speaks.

They were so interesting.  They immigrated to Montreal in the late 50s or early 60s.  He was a merchant marine.  After being in Montreal for a couple of years, he read an ad in the paper for diesel mechanics to work at gold mines in northern Quebec providence.  He went to an open forum on the jobs offered , and said he was interested in this diesel mechanic position.  He and Margaret were sent to northern Quebec for a look see and Klaus accepted the job.  He had never worked on diesels in his life.  However, once there, other jobs, using his engineering training, were found for him.

All the homes in this community were brand new for the workers.  Stores, etc were built and opened.  After two years, the mine was depleted and the next mine would be in Africa.  Klaus and Margaret did not want to go there.  Also, the French separatist movement was in full swing, and anyone not speaking French was being treated badly.  They don't speak French so they decided to leave Quebec because of the hostile environment. 

Once the mine was closed and all the families on to other mines or other places, the town with all its houses and stores was bulldozed and the mine owners were required to re-plant the area as they found it.  Interesting!

From there Klaus and Margaret moved near Ottawa, Ontario where Klaus was hired by Nortel, ended up in management and retired 5 or more years ago.  They bought a 60 acre farm when they moved to Ontario and planted many acres of trees and grew vegetables for their own family consumption.  Both worked full time and tended their farm evenings and weekends.  Since retirement, they sold their farm and have RVd all over Canada, Alaska, and all the rest of the U.S. except for about 7 states.

 

 

 

 

 

Whale Watching

August 12, 2004 - Perce, Gaspe

Today arrived bright and clear in the mid 60s and it was our morning to go whale watching.  With great excitement, we boarded the pontoon-like yellow and green boat.  The sides had windows that could be raised for better viewing or closed to keep the wind and splash out of the boat.  The French boat captain was your sea man with ball cap, weathered skin, and deep blue eyes that penetrated the horizon as he looked for whale and guided the boat.

The water was calm at the start and by 1 1/2 hours, no whales, clouds lowering over the water, and rougher seas.  At times, it seemed like the boat was going up hill, but in the way of the seas, this was really not anything outstanding.  At this point, I felt we would not see any whales. 

We passed in front of Bonaventure Island which is the nesting place of thousands of birds and seals.  Looking at the cliffs of this hilly island, it looked like the cliff was covered in snow and that it was actually snowing, but it was thousands and thousands of white gannets and sea gulls on top of the cliff and the snow was gannets and sea gulls flying above the cliffs.  What a sight to see. 

Just in front of Bonaventure, a school of whale was spotted.  How exciting.  There must have been 8 or 10 whales and for the next 30 minutes or so, they put on a display.  They would blow water out of their blow holes to a height of 50 feet and then rise out of the water--not fully out, but enough to see how wide they were and what we saw looked to be about 40 feet long.  These were Minke whales and at times they were within 10 feet or so of the boat.  Several times, two at once would blow these water spouts and then in unison rise over the surface of the water. 

The captain received cheers and clapping for his accomplishment.  We were very fortunate to see the whales in their own environment.

On another note, on our drive to Perce from Tete D Indien, we went down a 17% grade.  Imagine reaching the top of a ferris wheel, seeing only sky, and then plunging down; that is a 17% grade.

 

 

In the Gaspe Peninsula

August 4, 2004

 

This morning we left Alouette near Montreal to begin our journey to the Gaspe Peninsula.  We said good-bye to our Canadian friends Real and Nicole Savard.  We hope to visit them in their Florida winter site in early January.  For the first time, we are beginning to see road signs that say Moose crossing.

 

August 5, 2004

 

We stayed the night in a lovely campsite in Montmagy called Camping Parc Sirois La Baleine.  It had about 105 sites with about 25 for long-term residents.  Their sites were beautifully landscaped with flowers, fencing, and waterfalls in a garden setting. 

 

On the day we departed, we had decided to leave several chocks behind for some other camper, as these chocks were too small for our big rig.  They were hardly used, and we hated to throw them out.  After we were traveling about 20 minutes, a van pulled in front of us signaling us to pull off the road.  We figured something was wrong with our rig, and they were trying to warn us.  Walter got out and immediately started checking the rig, but could not find anything obvious.  He started waking toward the van when the driver stepped outside, and I recognized him as our neighbor at the last campground.  He thought we left our chocks behind and was hoping to find us to return them to us.  He spoke only French and when he tried to give us the chocks back, Walter motioned to keep them; we do not need them.   After going back and forth over who should have the chocks, finally the neighbor kept them, and Walter and he shook hands.  The neighbor had a unit in which he could really use these chocks.  I can not imagine anyone trying to catch up with an RV to return something they left behind.  For one thing he did not know if we were going west to Montreal or east to Gaspe.  He guessed and guessed right.  It was a great moment when we were all smiling at each other and shaking hands, people from different cultures and different homelands, but really all one.

August 6, 2004

 

Today we left Matane for the final 5 hours drive to Perce and Camping Tete D Indien where our home for the next 25 days will be.  Across the street from our campground in Matane, we could walk the beach of the Sea of St. Lawrence.  It was so interesting.  It looks, smells, and acts like the ocean, and from this point, it is so wide that you cannot see the other shore which is 90 or so miles away.  The beach has black and white fine sand and the mixture makes it look dark charcoal.  There are very few shells, but many river rocks from about a few ounces to a few pounds in size.  The interesting thing is that they were many colors like mauve, green, gray, white, etc, but they were all smooth from the pounding of the surf.  When the surf pulled away from the shore, you hear a clack, clack, clacking sound of the rocks hitting against each other. 

 

Leaving Matane, we are really in the Gaspe Peninsula and this is one wild and beautiful place.  The road we are on follows the St. Lawrence shoreline on our left and on our right is the end of the Appalachian Mountains.  What you see are high, steep mountains coming down to the sea, the mountains meet the road.

and then there is a final cliff drop to the sea.  It is spectacular.  The road becomes very hilly with road grades as steep as 11% to 15%.  The effect is, you go up a steep hill and as you get to the top you see sky or just sea.  It looks like the road ends and you just drop off to the sea, but then you descend such steep grades that it gives your stomach a little jolt.  It is the same feeling as getting to the top of a roller coaster and then the sudden decent.

 

We passed many beautiful villages and small towns.  Looks like people farm and fish basically.  We also crossed over many salmon streams, and we saw ridge after ridge with windmills generating electricity from the wind.  Almost every town has a beautiful church in the old world tradition with outstanding steeples.  The landscape is large and sweeping.  Your eyes can almost not take it all in.

 

Mid afternoon we reach Tete D Indien.  This is a gorgeous place.  We have the greatest campsite.  We are on a cliff overlooking the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Out our living room windows, we see the Gulf of St. Lawrence and out the dining room side we see a ridge of pine trees and out our kitchen side windows we see cascades of flowers.

September 7,2004

Tete D Indien  -  Today it is raining.  The sea is wild with white caps and high winds.  Temperature in the low 60s.  Before the rain began in earnest, we walk along the cliffs overlooking the sea.  It was so great.  The landscape is varied with cliffs with pine trees a top of them, and then abundant flowers right where the path drops down to the sea.  There are seagulls flying overhead and gannets which are sea birds much larger than seagulls with large wingspan.  They have an all white body with black edging along their wings, and they swoop down into the sea to catch their prey.

 

August 8, 2004

 

Tete D Indien - Today we went to Ferme Chimo (Goat Cheese Farm) a few miles from the campground.  It was a small farm with the homey kind of house, white with red trim and shutters.  It had a red metal roof.  Metal roofs are very common in Quebec.  They are in bright colors of red, green, blue, white, and sometimes black.  This farmhouse had the big front porch with roof over it that was somewhat in need of fresh paint.  The store was in a building next to the house.  A couple in their 50s owned the farm and ran the shop.  The women had graying hair and soft blue eyes.  She was so friendly as she explained the different cheeses to us and telling us they had 97 goats.  These people are so friendly asking where we were from and wishing us a very good stay in Gaspe.  The cheese was good.