borale soap shop – Trums Travels

We are on our way to Baie Comeau and stayed at Camping Boreal campground. It was a long drive through the mountains to get there but it was a nice campground, $50 a night and we stayed 3 nights. As I read my journal, I noticed some notes that may be of interest, if you are planning a trip here. No right turns on red lights in Quebec and you have to wear a helmet, regardless of age, on an electric bike. Ontario you wear a helmet if you are 16 or younger. Below photo is on our way to Baie Comeau.

We did a tour of Manic 2 hydroelectric plant. It is huge and we did a 95 minute tour as well as watching a movie, which was all in French. Thankfully, I do not do too bad in French so I could get the gist of it. Manic 2 is the smaller of the plants, Manic 5 is bigger and about a 2 1/2 hour drive from here.

On the way to Manic 2

Baie Comeau is a really nice town with a population of approximately 20,000. It is also home to a past Canadian Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney. He was the 18th Prime Minister (1984-1993) Conservative and was also a lawyer and businessman. He was disliked for introducing the GST tax, the Airbus scandal but he also signed a landmark free trade deal with USA and Mexico (NAFTA) so as any politician, some good things, some not so good.

We really enjoyed our time here. We did some biking, starting from Pionniers Park and when we got to the end of the bike trail, by the water, we saw 2 Minke whales hanging around, pretty exciting! We stopped at St Pancrace brewery, of course! Vent Du Nord distillery, Borale soap shop and wandered the downtown area where we stopped for a coffee and went into a cute antique store. We were going to go to Parc Nature de Pointe-aux-Outards but we had to pay to go and we didn’t have an app and there was nowhere to pay or leave money so we didn’t bother. There was nice statue of a man in a canoe and I had never heard of him but Colonel Robert Rutherford McCormick was owner of the Chicago Tribune and he visited the region regularly and eventually founded a paper mill. This was in approximately 1915, so he is considered the founder of Baie Comeau.