It’s a cold day in the Bush of Quebec. I am very happy I added electric heated socks to my gear this year. We just landed in Lebel-sur-Quevillon at the Motel Du Lac. It’s the kinda place I love on the trail, a drive up facility, where the door opens right into the parking lot, and your sled is right there. Truck Driver Brian will not be as thrilled as I am, but at least he has his own bathroom and shower in his room!
Last night, at the Nordic Hotel/Motel, we had to order pizza’s and lasagna from the local pizza joint, to be delivered to us in the Mid Evil Bar. It was actually pretty good, and I had a lasagna with a cesar salad. I was content.
Wish I could tell you more about last night, but the bartender kinda upset us with her antics, and we didn’t socialize very long into the evening. She acted like she didn’t understand ANY English, but was quick enough to charge us $6.00 for a Coors Light, but not give us the change for $10, just keep it as a tip, or just raise the price from $6 to $6.50 on a whim, or take $20 for 2 beers but not bring any change. And don’t get me wrong, NO ONE here has a problem with being generous with tips and payments for services, it would just be nice if we were given the opportunity, and not just feel taken advantage of. Enough of that, moving on.
Breakfast was the continental special, with bagels, toast, yogurt, and your choice of 2 cereals. I had a toasted peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
Call time for ski’s up this morning was 9am. The overachieving Darkside Team was loaded for bear, and on the trail by 8:40am. It was cold, but not as cold as it got during the day, on the ride, but about 9 degrees at it’s lowest. While we have rode in colder temps, today’s ride was on mostly straight trails, that were well groomed. It’s hard to stay warm when you are not twisting and turning thru trails. Electric heated socks, gentlemen, it’s the new fad.
We made the obligatory stop at the gas station 8 miles from the hotel to top off our tanks, as we are not exactly positive what the mileage is, or where, the first on trail gas stop may be. Top off those auxiliary gas cans we carry on the sleds, boys.
While the trails were straight, with soft curves, the scenery was quite beautiful. Mostly tree lined trails, with snow hanging on the drooping branches. These riders are not giving me much to write about lately. The Wanderer Dylan isn’t wandering as much, and Robere’ isn’t acting like a college freshman on his first spring break this year. I try to meander thru the pack at each break, to gleen some conversation, but everyone is pretty well behaved.
So, I guess we will have another In The Helmet With Stick conversation. The rabbit hole I went down today, as we were passing the beautiful scenery, was “I wonder, in the last 15 years of riding thru Quebec, how many trees’ have I passed on the trail?”
At the next on trail rest stop, I wandered back to the Wanderer, and posed that question to him. He replied, “Huh, what do you think…” I replied, maybe a billion? He replied, I don’t know, a billion? That’s a wicked big number. Then we went down his rabbit hole, that the Moon is not really made of Moon rock and such, but it is actually a large plasma particle that the earth is reflecting off. It’s time to get back on the trail.
So now, I’m trying to grasp his alternative reality, and I decide to try and do my own math. I start trying to count the trees on one side of the trail in a 1/10 mile span, then I will multiply it by 2, and then do an approximate mileage count, and see what I come up with. As I start counting trees’, and starting over again several times, cus, you know I’ve got to still pay attention to the Orange Helmet in front of me because he gets REAL upset when the snow flap on the back of his Yamaha gets pushed in, I finally abandon my math project after about 3 miles, and just settle on a billion trees have been passed.
We finally found the fuel on the trail around the 105 mile mark. It was a one man shop with a 500 gallon fuel tank. It took about 40 minutes for him to fill all 16 sleds, and he made us wait outside his small market, until he finished our fueling and let us in the warmth of his little market. We lingered around inside, taking our turns paying for fuel, buying chips and candy bars to snack on while we loitered in the warmth of his store. Once we were sufficiently warmed for the final 60 miles in to our accommodations for the evening, we were back on the trail
Again, the trails were flat, straight and smooth. We carried the mail pretty good with only one stop. We arrived around 2:30 pm, fueled our sleds for the next morning’s departure, and checked into our rooms for hot showers and refreshments. I will give the showers here a solid 2.5. That’s not bad, I mean you get 2 stars on the trail just for having hot water and good pressure. This shower even had the mounted on the wall, push the button dispensers for Body Wash, Shampoo AND conditioner!
We are now gathered in the un-attached office, bar/restaurant watching NASCAR on the TV, while the kind lady proprietor is doing some of the rider’s laundry for $5 per load, but I see every one giving her a twenty. We have to order dinner in again this evening. Apparently, if you let them know at the time of reservation you would like to have dinner with your overnight, they will prepare it for you. Another group of snowmobilers, from Wisconsin, that we passed and chatted with a couple times on the way here got the memo and is having Fondu for dinner. We will chalk this up to “Lost In Translation”. Wink wink.
Rumor is, tomorrow may be another “Closed Trail” situation. We shall see.
Bye for now
Cheers,
Stick