After we said our goodbyes to sarah, we rode straight into a headwind. That plus the cold and rain drove us to shiver in the shelter of the first tim hortons we could find. I,ve never been happier to see a chain food restaurant. As we ate donuts and attempted to translate the newspapers we plotted our evening and decided to find a motel. We spent the night at the le beach watching bad crime drama tv and trying to dry out our socks. We quickly went from mouillex to sec. The weather improved the next day except when greg broke a spoke as it began to pour. We hunkered down under one of canada’s many lovely covered picnics tables to install the kevlar spoke that has saved us so many times. We camped at la martre that night where we saw the first of many phare. The next day started off with an awesome tailwind and lots of flat riding next to the picturesque seaside. The second half of the day included some of the steepest hills i’ve ever ridden my bike up. The grades ranged from 8 to 15 percent. all the people who told us that gaspe is ‘illy were not kidding. After the second day of short but gnarly hills we decided to rest our muscles at the gite blanchette. This mignon b and b had knit cozies for everything: our feet, the kleenix, the extra tp. After yummy whole wheat pancakes and way too much coffee we rode into gaspe so greg could get his wheel fixed. We put in a few miles for a short day until we again got caught in cold cold rain. We are now holed up in the dinner hall of an rv park, surrounded by other people,s pictures of xmas in august. When we said we,d pitch the tent wherever the drunk proprieter told us, you sleep inside, no problem. He then lit the wood stove and wandered out into the night. One last note before i go to bed: don’t buy cheese on special at the marche, even if it’s greatly reduced. That’s probably becuase it tastes like socks.