Mactaquac, NB, to Woodstock, NB
We woke up to the sound of a squirrel attempting to get into our food stash that we had hung from a tree. Luckily we used our slippery water proof bag, so he kept sliding off of it. We watched him do the jump, land, attempt to open, slip, slide, fall routine about 30 times from our tent before we decided to get out of the tent and end the madness. He attempted about 15 different styles of getting on the bag and it was so funny we filmed a movie of it. It doesn’t take much to entertain us! His sheer determination was really impressive.
Katherine cooked an amazing fried granola for breakfast, and then we went for a little hike in one of the trails in Mactaquac Provincial Park. We ended up in the midst of a TreeGo circuit. No one was actually using it at the time but it looked like it would be a lot of fun.
After our late morning departure, we crossed the river to get on the old Trans-Canada highway. Our plan is to now follow the scenic “River Valley Route” all the way to Edmunston, NB. This road was a huge improvement compared to what we were on the day before. Little to no traffic, great pavement, reasonable hill grades and an awesome shoulder. It was like our personal highway. Basically it is over designed for the traffic it now sees since New Brunswick has a new separate twined highway pretty much all the way to Quebec. No complaints from us though!
Despite the advice from the guy we had met at the farmer’s market the day before, we decided to continue on the old highway. He said there was a couple stretches where you had to go on the divided trans-canada highway, but when we compared our old NB map with the new NB map from the tourist office it looked like the new highway had fixed those issues for cyclists and other slow moving traffic.
On the empty highway we then came across a baby beaver just hanging out on the side of the road. It just stood there and seemed like it hadn’t learnt to hide from strangers yet.
We then saw a sign telling us that the road we were on was ending in 4km, but with our trusty new NB map and GPS we decided the NB government must have forgot to move that old sign. At the end of the road, we found the side road we were looking for which we took. It was an old abandoned road that seemed like it was meant to be biked on. A little overgrown but great pavement and a great scenery. It seemed like it was too good to be true.
And sure enough at the end of the long downhill we came to an old bridge that was submerged in the river. There was then the “Government Action Plan” sign there with what looked like the beginning of a new bridge that was nowhere near completion. It seemed like an incredible waste of tax payers money with so called “stimulus” spending in the middle of what seemed like absolutely nowhere. We later learned from a friendly gas station owner that they are building a new suspension bridge for pedestrians and cyclists and that it should be done next year. Now if only the bridge was done this year we would have said it was money well spent 🙂 Anyway, we ended up having to back track a little bit to keep going towards Woodstock NB.
An hour or so later we stopped at this gas station. It seemed weird that he was still in business since the traffic on the old highway was next to nil, but the owner and his friends he was hanging out with were really friendly and they even had a little sit down area inside that was air conditioned that was fantastic. It really doesn’t take much to please us! We really enjoy chatting with people when we are travelling on our bikes. People are always friendly and love to have a chat with us. Biking is really the way to get to know people across the country, which I think is a big part of travelling.
Speaking of businesses on the old highway, seeing motels with empty parking lots, or completely abandoned buildings, really tell a story of the past when the road was the main highway. It’s only been a few years since the new highway was put in but you can tell it’s having a devastating impact on the businesses that survived on the high volume traffic. It makes us wonder for how much longer the road will be in such great shape since it sees basically no traffic now.
After another record distance day, we arrived in Woodstock and quickly found our campground. It was by the local high school, which was having prom night, so it was neat to see the whole town there and the kids arriving in all sorts of different cars.
After dinner we quickly called it a night.
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Trip Around The World 
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