Tuesday, June 11, 2024, Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada

It was a short drive to Sherbrooke, Quebec, from our campsite in Magog. We explored Sherbrooke's highly-rated murals. A stop at the information center gave us all we needed for a walking tour and a more extended driving tour of more than 20 murals around the city. 

The Information Center Building was covered with murals, the one below is the most appropriate.

It was overcast but we thought the chances of rain were slight so with our car parked in an approved space we set out following our map to the murals. The first large mural covered the side of a three-story building. You can see me at the lower left for the scale. The detail was amazing.

In general, the people in each mural were painted life-sized so even if I'm not in the picture you can get an idea of the scale.

The mural below was one of my favorites with so much going on and it wrapped around the back (although a tree obscured that detail from this angle).

The sky started to clear a bit. A little more blue and it could have matched the mural.

Below the power pole on the third story of the building blends right into the mural. Again, so much detail and activity you could spend quite a bit of time studying and still miss some of the subtle humor.

We were pleasantly surprised at the beautiful architecture we found in Sherbrooke. The 120-year-old Hotel de Ville de Sherbrooke (below) now serves as City Hall.

In French, "ARRET" means "STOP" and below the stop sign you can see their pictorial to let you know it is a 4-way stop. Not everything in French was so easily understood.

All of the walking around worked up an appetite. We found a Mexican restaurant that perfectly hit the spot. Our server spoke French, Spanish, and a little English so she had trouble describing the menu as she mixed words from all three languages.

These last two murals were towards the end of the driving tour so I had to find a quick place to pull over while Joani jumped out to get her pictures.

We found Sherbrooke to be a pleasant and safe city. There was plenty to see and do so I suspect it might make the visit again list.

June 7 thru 11, 2024, Michigan into Canada

We elected to travel on the Canadian side of the Great Lakes to Maine before ultimately starting our RV tour in New Brunswick, Canada. Our 226-mile trip included one last fill-up in the states in Port Huron where Kroger fuel points made our cost $2.75/gallon. I know we will not see that again for a while. The border crossing might have been smoother if the Blue Water Bridge had not been under repair.

I would estimate there were 20 semi-trucks for each car crossing into Canada. Not knowing exactly what to do or where to be we followed the line of trucks for 30 minutes before realizing we could have been in a different line with no waiting. We were asked if we were traveling with any firearms, liquor, or cannabis. We said no and were told to have a nice visit. It could not have been smoother after visualizing a full vehicle search 

We spent our first night in Canada at Milton Heights Campground, in Milton, Ontario. The park was nice but had so many rules and regulations. Many made no sense and made me happy we were not staying more than one night. We could not use our power monitor unless it was lying on the ground. We could not use a mat larger than 2 by 2 feet and we could not use jacks without jack pads. We did not even take the car off of the dolly.

The next morning we got an early start. Before we could get to the highway we had to wait at the geese crossing. This trip was 309 miles to a Walmart in Cornwall, Ontario.

The Walmart was smaller than most but had a nice level spot for us. We struggled with the refrigerator cooling again. At least we were near a source for bagged ice. It rained most of the night and we woke early to get on the road before shoppers created an obstacle to our leaving.

Our drive to Magog, Quebec, went smoothly. It was 152 miles of the Canadian equivalent of the Interstate highway they dubbed Autoroute. We chose the toll road option around Montreal after Joani discovered the mapped route through the city was not all limited access.

Domaine Parc Estrie was a nice campground with only one oddity - despite having plenty of room at our site and no neighbors they insisted our tow dolly had to be stored offsite for an additional six dollar per night storage fee.

Magog (pronounced like you would think), being in Quebec meant everyone spoke French. It was very different seeing all the signage in a foreign language. Sometimes, it was fun trying to guess what was written. 

Downtown was nice for a stroll and we had pleasant weather. We chose a pizza place for a late lunch and, with the help of a bilingual waitress, we ordered pizza and lasagna. 

Even deciphering store signs was a challenge but we finally saw an Hours of Operation sign with the days of the week spelled out so I took a picture for reference.

This park had more permanent and seasonal tenants than most with many nice park models. It was a convenient base for further exploration.