Unique Cities and Pristine Wilderness - Exploring Quebec

Our journey began in the vibrant city of Montreal, a multicultural hub for Quebec and Canada as a whole. We spent four days cycling around to discover everything this cosmopolitan city has to offer. We wandered through the Old Montréal, explored the Old Port, discovered the amazing Botanical Garden and enjoyed the view from Mont-Royal, with the sun setting on the city. We also visited the various reputated museums (among which Museum McCord and the Museum of Fine Arts) to impregnated ourselves with this impressive culture. Last but not least, we seized a unique opportunity in our trip to discover a world of nightlife, in countless pubs and open air events, and to benefit from the city's most finest gastronomy (eating more poutine than one can imagine!). 

After having enjoyed every bit of this first escale, we started road tripping north. Driving up the St Lawrence River, we discovered a new side of the region, with its colorful countryside and charmant villages. We camped along the way, to finally reach our second destination : Québec Ville. The contrast between the dynamism and modernity of Montréal and the authenticity and peacefulness of Québec Ville marked us. The skyscrapers had left the way to fortifications of european influence - unique in all North-America -, and we were quickly confronted to the rich architecture and history of this city. As we were gathering energy in our last urban stop before the wilderness, we enjoyed wandering around in the streets of the Old City with no particular destination, simply enjoying the sun and the atmosphere of this unique place. 

Ready to finally explore the Canadian wilderness, we decided to hitchhike to the Parc National de la Mauricie. The aventure was however starting sooner than expected, as we kept failing to find a ride. What was suppose to take hours eventually took two days, but we eventually reached our destination. From then, the immersion in the wild was brutal : we directly rented a Kayak and took on the parc's immense lacs. In total autonomy for seven days, we lived on our food resources, picked up mushrooms, fished and drank filtred water. Small and insignifiant in the immensity of the outdoors, we experienced a communion with nature like we had never before. We soon became accustomed to this nomad lifestyle, kayaking all day and camping every nights, making it particularly difficult to eventually end our journey and return to civilization!