Quebec

Its my last night until I hit the maritime provinces. My last day of butchering French and speaking my continuous phrase, "Je ne sais pas." I should've made a t-shirt and saved some time. Fortunately most people have been able to parle Anglais avec moi. It is strange to me to meet people that don't know English in Canada! And have got a few similar reactions from Quebecois who feel aghast that I only know enough French to introduce myself and know where to take a leak.

Pulling into Quebec city I was fortunate to meet up with a cyclist who asked where I was from and what I was doing. This conversation turned into an invitation to stay the night at his house with a good dinner and warm shower. We biked into Quebec City, passing the house of Louis Garneau (the bike maker), whose helmet I was wearing. This evening was one of the more pleasant memories on my trip. He was an environmental research scientist who had taken up biking 4 years prior with a fierce passion. He was quite impressed by my powering up the 100 meter, 18% grade hill with all my gear on the way to his house (he told the story twice!).  We talked music, travel, language, cycling. His sibling in-laws came over and we shared wine and I sat back enjoying the French and English interchange. His wife spoke little English, so we defaced each others' languages and attempted to figure each other out. I left the next morning with fresh pastries his wife bought me from down the street and a warm invitation to return, such great hospitality.

Yesterday I had another lovely encounter with a man who also spoke little English. I reached a small city and found a park where I could have a snack and enjoy a view of the canal. A man came over and sat with me and we started talking. He shared with me some prayers he had written on pieces of paper. We understood little of what each other said, I could make out about half of what was written on the pieces of paper. After 10 minutes or so he left me with a prayer in broken English and a thick french accent. "Remember, what you do, work or eating or sleeping or travel, do it for love of God." His broken rendition of the verse and earnest prayer touched me quite a lot.

The St. Lawrence is now oceanic. I stopped in an amazingly beautiful little seaside town this morning called Kamouraska. You can look across to the North Shore east of Quebec and it looks very much like the gulf islands in BC. Rolling hills, seagulls, salty breeze. The Atlantic is close. For the first time today I also joined up with part of the trans-Canada trail. An endeavour to make a trail all the way across Canada fit for walks and bikers, packed gravel trails. It has been gorgeous. Fall colors, rest stops and campgrounds along various creeks, looking out over the rolling Quebec countryside. It was a treat to bike today. And tomorrow is more of the same, but mostly downhill!

It is striking me I am getting closer and closer to home. And despite all my thinking I am no closer to having life figured out. However, being OK with that is what I think I needed to figure out. Allowing none of my plans or desires to control me, living selflessly, and as the man prayed, honoring God in everything I do, are perhaps the only thing one needs to live an exciting, thankful, surrendered life.

Au revoir mon amis!