Day 60
July 12, 2018
The day is once again sunny and the temperature is in the upper 70’s when we leave Grande Anse. We ride through very small towns and past farms and homes. We even see two moose on the side of the road.
Near Caraquet there is a paved bike trail which follows the same railroad bed that had the rough and rocky trail yesterday. We take that for awhile and it’s a nice change and easy riding.
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| MORE NEW BRUNSWICK FRIENDS |
There are rest stop pavillons built along the trail and plenty of scenic overlooks. While we are admiring the views and eating our umteenth Clif Bar, a man abruptly interrupts the conversation he is having in French with his friend and turns to us to say, “Hey, are you the couple from Ohio?” What?!! His wife recognizes us from the Chaleur Region tourism facebook post and they’ve been reading about the trip from the blog post link. It feels surreal to have anyone recognize us this far from home.
I passed 2000 miles today! My odometer turns over every 1000 miles, so you'll have to take my word for it.
Shippagan has a beautiful boardwalk perfect for walking or cycling. The nicely built wooden boardwalk has lots of little shelters and gazebos and there is a perfect one for our typical picnic lunch. There are great views of the water and the town.
Shippagan is named New Brunswick's capital of the commercial fishing industry. The main shipyard in town has quite a few boats in dry dock since lobster fishing season is over. They are brightly colored and most are named for women. but, some have creative names like "Me and my bro" or "Best Chance".
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Shippagan boatyard
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The “painted church” is a must-see stop that Andre has given us for the Acadian Peninsula and we find it at the very end of our day. St. Cecile is a wooden Catholic Church which looks humble and ordinary from the outside.
The inside is another story. The church is dedicated to St. Cecile, the patron saint of musicians and there is 1970's liturgical folk music softly playing on speakers while we tour the church. Every year there is a Baroque music festival held here because the acoustics in the church are unmatched. The interior painting of the church was begun in November 1968 and finished in December of 1969. Additional painting and decorating is ongoing.
My patron saint is here:
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| St. Therese, the little flower |
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| And, this is the altar to St. Joseph - cowboys and all |
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| Trees are painted on the lower walls representing the earth, the blue on the ceiling represents the sea |
After leaving the church its a short and easy ride to the only campground out this far on Lemeque Island. Ours is the only tent and there are about seven or eight seasonal campers here. I am not sure this is a profitable business, but it's a nice quiet place to stay and only $20 CAD for a full service site and a clean showerhouse.
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| The sauteed mushrooms are the best part of this dinner |
From our campsite we can see the bridge to Miscou Island where we will ride tomorrow to the point with Miscou lighthouse. The bridge hasn't always been there and hardier folks in the past years have either taken a small ferry or driven across the ice to get to Miscou.
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| There was a technical difficulty with the mapping software so we don't have graphical data for the elevation. It was pretty flat. |
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