Days 33 to 35 Carlton Sur-Mer, to Kouchibouguac National Park

Thursday, July 26, 2012

One of the first things we noticed about New Brunswick was that the road signs were suddenly in English.  What a welcome relief not to have to “guess” what they mean (and the scary thing is other people are probably “guessing” too)!

We found our destination for the next two days:  Kouchibouguac National Park.   The park name is a Mi’kmaq Indian name for “river of long tides”.  (In case you wanted to know for your next Trivia game).

Nice, easy site!

After we filled our holding tanks with water we set out to find our site in this HUGE park. We were quite excited when we saw all the lovely wooded sites, but ours was in a large, open field. I can see why the majority of people with larger motorhomes prefer the wide open sites because it only took us minutes to set up due to the lack of those worrisome trees and other obstacles.   The site was also very level so it took us only minutes to be all set up and ready for Norm’s “happy hour”.  I still am not drinking these days, (more about avoiding sugars and sulfites than alcohol) so it takes a little longer for me to relax with my large, frosty glass of water. 

Norm riding on wooden bridge

Friday, July 27th

The next day, armed with lunches, bathing suits, towels, sunscreen, water and bug spray we headed out on our bicycles to enjoy the lovely groomed bike trails and then onto the mountain bike trails that had us a little nervous when we hit the trailhead.  We took pause when we read a big sign that warned of steep trails, dangerous stumps and rocks, narrow footbridges, etc.  Only experienced riders allowed on this trail!  We grinned at each other, then headed off down the trail noting that for a “dangerous” trail, it was really one of our easiest!  The only parts that were a little nerve-racking were the footbridges that were a very comfortable 2 ½ feet wide, but went on for sometimes a couple of hundred feet, taking some pretty sharp turns.  You really had to keep your eyes on the trail and your speed up to keep the bike going straight down the middle! 

Do to the distance, and the incredible weight of my backpack, I was really tired when we hit the beach to have lunch and rest awhile.  Neither Norm nor I are really into beaches but it did remind me of the greater part of my life where I grew up in Gloucester and would often frequent the beach.   We watched the small toddlers make sandcastles and imagined someday we might be at the beach with grandchildren. With four daughters between us, the probability is pretty good.

Alison sunbathing. You can never be too careful of the sun's
damaging rays!  Opps! Forgot my feet!

 The water was purported to be the warmest north of Virginia, so I happily went to the water’s edge,  got my ankles wet, but brrrrr it was colder than I prefer (by about 15 degrees)!  If it was a really hot day I may have gone in, but due to the stiff, chilly wind, I wimped out.  Norman later checked it out - he evidently is a wimp too!  We had an ice cream as a reward for our biking and headed back.

The facilities at Kouchibouguac National Park (I love that name ) are the best we have seen to date. It has groomed walking and biking trails, an area to rent canoes/kayaks, a restaurant of sorts, all kinds of adventure activities for kids and adults.  There was entertainment like puppet shows and campfires, and educational nature activities. Great showers and kitchen areas were beautiful for those folks that are not fortunate enough to have a “rolling house”.

We both were pretty tired but decided to tackle the mountain of laundry. We gathered 3 bags of laundry , our laptops, water and laundry soaps and drove a few miles to the brand new laundry center that just opened that day. I had been saving the whites for a newer machine so as not to ruin our better clothes, which happen to be white.  Can you guess where this is going?  Yep! You guessed it!  Somehow most of the white load came out rust colored!  AHHHHHHG!  At least the manager there was very upset about it.  He took pictures, and took our email info and was going to contact Canada Parks and see what they could do to replace our clothes. 

I took the rusty clothes back, and over the next several days soaked them in Oxy-Clean then hung them to dry.  My new blouses and Norm’s good golf shirt came out fine.  Some clothes are now relegated to “hiking wear” and some we threw out.  So after all that, 3 hours, and about $15 later, I have a full basket of the soapy but dried white wash that I really wasn’t able to rinse out enough to wear.  Next week I will try again.