A long drive from Montreal to Toronto took us to the home of our good friends from Prague, the Meech-Tatics, and the wonderful extended Meech family. Alisha and Lucy were thrilled to catch up with Rade and made great friends with his cousins. Nan and I enjoyed resuming our walks with lots of gossip thrown in. We had a great couple of days with them and seeing their "other" (non-Prague) life and lovely family was a lot of fun. Steve also went to visit one of his partners from work who has a home in Toronto and was on holiday there at the time.











Sadly waving goodbye, we headed south-east to see Niagara Falls. The town was far less tacky than we remembered from our separate visits 20 plus years ago. But the Falls themselves were no less awesome. We decided to get a real soaking on the classic Maid of the Mist boat trip, taking us right up to the bottom of the falls.

From Cape Breton National Park to Quebec City it is a 1200km drive, so we broke it up with a couple of overnight stops at campgrounds by lakes along the way. On arriving in Quebec City we stayed at a campsite just outside the city. On our first afternoon there we spent the time getting on top of truck jobs after a week on the road. This consisted of doing the laundry, filling and emptying the truck water and waste tanks and giving the truck a bit of a clean. The following day we headed into Quebec City. Whilst we were only 17kms from the centre this involved a 20 minute walk and taking 2 buses so it took us an hour and a half to get in. Once we were there we toured the sights, walking on the city walls, seeing the most photographed (supposedly) hotel in the world and generally wandering the quaint streets.





We also had a fantastic lunch at a restaurant that specialised in rabbit. The following day was Alisha's birthday so we had a slow start. We went to hear how Maple syrup was made but it was all in French so the kids were a little bored although they did enjoy the tasting! We also found time to bake birthday cup cakes.

After lunch we drove to Montreal. As we needed to do some grocery shopping the plan was to stay the night in Walmarts car park (a common practice). However this was not possible at the first one we arrived at in Montreal. As we were driving to the next one we spotted a load of RVs parked by the river and headed down there to find we could camp for the night. As a treat for Alisha's birthday the girls stayed up for movie night.

Where we had parked was great as there was a ferry directly from the campsite to downtown Montreal which was really convenient. We spent the day walking around the old part of Montreal. Montreal is a much bigger city than Quebec and is less quaint. In some ways more grungy and a big city but it was still attractive and had a nice feel to it.



On our return to the campsite we found out why there were so many RVs parked by the river. It was the final night of a firework competition that night in Montreal and the riverfront would give a spectacular view.

After the 3 days we spent in Halifax we were chomping at the bit to go once we had collected the truck. For the first day we decided not to overstretch ourselves and set off to Maitland just 1 1/2 hours away. Maitland is famous for its tidal bore. As the Bay of Fundy has such high tides you can see the water flow in the opposite direction in the river at high tide. We weren't sure what it was going to look like but we'd been ready to get out into the beautiful wild woods of Nova Scotia since we'd seen them from the plane and this was slap bang in the wilds. As the truck does not need any electrical plug in, toilet, showers or water when we are at a campsite, we do not need to park in the busy RV section but at the first campsite we found we could park in a wilderness area. We were thrilled to see a deer making a swift exit as we entered the large empty clearing in the middle of the woods.

The tidal bore was in fact far more impressive than we had expected. We could hear the waves approaching the virtually empty river from the direction of the sea before we could see them. Not sure the photo below does it justice.

The girls soon got tired of waiting for the high tide so made themselves busy building fairy houses out of sticks and ferns.

Finally we were where we wanted to be, cooking dinner on the Cobb oven, nice bottle of red wine and out in the wilderness. Although in our dreams we imagined a beautiful sunset. Well, we did not get the sunset but at least it had stopped raining long enough for us to eat outside. The girls even went straight off to sleep without the usual nightmare battle ...wonderful. The next morning we set off to Cape Breton National Park and drove along the Cabot Trail. We were also starting to realise that the truck was becoming a bit of a "film star". It is very different to what people have in North America and a number of people stopped to ask us about it and to take photos of it. At the National Park we camped in a delightful little spot.

Over the next few days we went on a number of nice walks with some great scenery along the way.





We even saw a moose while we were driving.

At our second campsite in the National Park there was even a small beach by the river inlet near the sea which the kids thoroughly enjoyed.

Mind you the weather was a bit hit and miss and unfortunately our whale watching trip was cancelled due to bad weather.

Cape Breton National Park was really beautiful but it was time to start heading west. We are heading to Quebec but as it is over 1250kms away (distances are big in Canada) it will take a few days to get there. Still there are some pleasant spots next to lakes to camp at along the way.