Quebec

The Price of Paradise ~ My travel plans for Allume

Last Friday I shared the view from our backyard. It looks like paradise and in many ways it is. I have a "pinch me, I actually get to live here" outlook most days.

When we decided to leave Maine to move back to Canada we had two criteria in looking for a place to live. We wanted to live within driving distance from my parent's place in NS, and we wanted to live close to mountains. A search to meet those two criteria landed us here, on the Gaspé peninsula of Québec.

There were other factors that contributed to our decision to live where we do - the opportunity to live in a different culture and learn another language, the fact there are no Walmarts or McDonalds, and without a doubt the natural beauty of the peninsula (beauty speaks to me on a very spiritual and inspirational level). We felt we could have a high quality of life here and our experience so far has proven that to be true.

We believe also that God brought us here for His purposes in our lives and lives of people around us (something I don't write about a lot but is very important in our decision making).

We did not move here for the easy access to large cities and centers of commerce. There is no easy access to either of these.

That is the price we pay for living in paradise. And affording it.

There are many beautiful places to live in Canada. The west coast, interior BC and the BC and Alberta Rockies call to us especially but those locations are decidedly way beyond a day's drive from my parents. I am currently swooning as my friend Catherine shares her travels through those very places. But those beautiful places are also more expensive than the peninsula where we live because they are all relatively close to major centers.

Whenever a beautiful place is close to a major center - people come, lots of people, and prices go up and eventually Walmart comes to town and well, you get the idea.

There are great advantages to living closer to big centers. That has been my reality for my whole life up until one year ago. Access to shopping, world-class arts and culture, and easy travel are a big draw, to be sure.

But for us, right now, an affordable life in the woods - where we connect with people all over the world and have access to amazing resources from shopping to school via the internet - is a bigger draw. Not to mention our local community has enough "culture" to meet our needs - good coffee shops, theatre, music and art exhibitions. Arts and culture are alive and well in the Gaspé. (Now if only there were some homeschoolers and Amazon prime shipping.)

To illustrate one of the challenges of living in paradise I thought I'd share my travel plans with you for going to Allume next month.

Allume is my first blogging conference and with travel arrangements like this, it may just be my last. After researching all the options - planes, trains and buses to and from where we live, I made the following travel arrangements.

Wednesday afternoon - Board a bus for Québec city (make a midnight transfer in Rimouski). After driving all night, arrive in Québec city in the wee hours of the morning.
Early, early Thursday morning - Catch a cab to the airport. Board a plane to Toronto. Transfer planes in Toronto.
Thursday mid-morning - Arrive in Harrisburg, PA. Catch a shuttle to the airport.
Thursday through Sunday - Connect and meet with amazing bloggers and online friends. I can't wait for this part. So looking forward to seeing my close friend Emily, rooming with Jamie and meeting Tsh and others.
Sunday morning - Catch an airport shuttle and board a plane out of Harrisburg. Fly to Toronto, then Montréal, then Québec city.
Sunday evening - Hang out in Québec city. Any recommends?
Sunday midnight - Board a bus for Rimouski. Make a transfer for home. Another all-nighter.
Monday, around noon - Arrive home. Tired and travel weary but full of friendship and creative and spiritual encouragement.

A total of five flights, four bus routes and a couple cab rides and shuttles in between. You'd think I was going to Europe or something!

I googled it. "Flying" to Allume will take me as long as driving there. I'm not sure which is cheaper, when taking into account the cost of gas for a seventeen hour drive. Driving wasn't an option anyway. We're a one car family and Damien needs a vehicle while I'm gone. And I have no desire to make a seventeen hour drive on my own.

Alternatively, I could have avoided the bus by flying first out a regional airport across the border in New Brunswick but the flight times were not good and it would take Damien and the kids nearly five hours driving to get me there and get back home again. They'd have to make this journey twice and that is a real cost in terms of gas and working time lost for Damien. Not to mention this option was twice the cost of the bus-plane travel arrangements.

So there you have it. The travel realities of living in paradise.

What is it like where you live? Can you at all identify with my travel woes?

Gone Camping

We just got home from camping. I'll share more details later this week and probably something of our trip will show up on Outsideways (Facebook here) but until then here's a little taste of the last couple days.

I'm so glad we don't do "school". I ~~like~~ love living life on our own schedule and this week is definitely not a school week. Nor is it even a "get all organized" week. It's a go camping with my parents, do a bit more school planning, host my parents again later this week kind of week.

Hoping your first week of September is beautiful (and full of freedom) also.

Farm Share on The Bay

In yesterday's post I promised more photos of our farm pick up on the bay.

We live on a big peninsula, a fat thumb that sticks out into the Gulf of St. Lawrence. On one side of the peninsula is the St. Lawrence River (Fleuve Saint-Laurent) and on the other is the much smaller (and warmer) Baie des Chaleurs (I only know it by it's French name). We're on the bay side. Where the water is warm enough to swim in the summer, or so I'm told. I'm not much of an ocean swimmer.

There are many beautiful municipal beaches along the bay. Though they are visited by tourists and locals during the summer, they are never over populated. At least, not the ones around here.

It is at one of these municipal parks where our farm pick up is each week. I haven't actually been to the farm, I hope to go someday. The vegetables this family grows are beautiful. I would love to see the soil and surroundings where the food comes from.

For now, I'm content with getting to know the farmers. Thank goodness their English is good because my French is still at the less-than-basic level. (I had high hopes for starting language instruction this summer but moving and living in renos and releasing this e-book has thrown that off.)

I pick up our weekly veggies and the kids run down to the water. They play around in the driftwood till I'm done chatting. When I get down to the beach they go for a swim, goggles and all. They play with the boats they made last summer while we lived with my parents in Nova Scotia.

Laurent tells us he misses the surf in Nova Scotia, though I think the water is colder there (my kids are oblivious to cold ocean water it seems). There aren't many waves here in the bay. But an ocean beach without waves is better than no ocean beach at all.

And an ocean beach paired with farm vegetables - it doesn't get much better than that.

This was our share from this past week, pictured at home on our deck. I can't believe all that beautiful broccoli. The bagels, pitas and organic, local, greenhouse tomatoes were purchased separately. The farm is also a bakery and they supply us with the few baked goods (I don't bake anymore) we eat during the week. We've since started a new food tradition - Friday morning bagels.

I still miss our farm in Maine. I think it's ok to miss things you've loved and lost, like our beloved farm share. But even in that loss, there are new things to love and appreciate, like farm pick up on the bay.