July 22 - Second day on the Nordic Express Ferry

Sometime during the last night, our ship apparently stopped in the fourth village on its route, Harrington Harbor.  We didn't wake up for that one, but we did have some fairly heavy rolling seas sometime during the night.

We had a continuation of the excellent meals aboard, with breakfast - excellent croissants.  Everyone we met were surprised and pleased with the food on the ship, and placed it in the near-gourmet class, as we did.

We spent quite a while discussing what to do and what to see with a Montreal man, Pierre Lauze, who is also a motorcycle rider, preferring BMW's.  He not only told us of areas to see, but after some consideration gave us a written set of instructions of how to get around and what to see.  We enjoyed Pierre's company.

Today's first stop was at La Romaine, another small village of native people.  There we saw the ubiquitous 4-wheeler ATV's again.  They are very popular where people have limited roads, and they included Hondas, Kawasakis, and Yamahas at least.

More and more people got on the ship as we have stopped at various villages, and we found out that there was a big "Saint's Day" celebration near Montreal in the next couple of days.  Most of the people going to this were from the native populations of this area.

Kegaska was the next stop.  It was interesting how much merchandise goes off and on at these ports.  Our ship is quite slow in off-loading and on-loading containers, but apparently this system works reasonably well overall.

Finally, we made a stop at Natashquan, a relatively large town, and one at the very east end of the road on the Northern Shore.  Here, apparently because they can take a road, all of our recently acquired passengers got off to go with friends and family to the Saint's Day celebration.  Cars and pickups were lined up all the way up and down the pier to pick up people and their luggage.  Then we were down to a more manageable number of people on board, as it had gotten quite crowded.

Also at Natashquan, two more motorcyclists came to the ferry, had their motorcycles tied down in a container, and came aboard.  We found that they were from Montreal, and were taking a loop trip which included the ferry.

All of the harbors we visited had very rocky beaches, rocky areas leading into the harbor, and very little soil on top of any rocks.  We came to the conclusion that the whole North Shore must be this way. 

For breakfast and lunch, we shared a table in the dining room with a very nice couple from Montreal, and enjoyed their company.  While they were seasoned travelers too, this was their first trip on the Nordic Express also.  

The weather and seas were both very good today, with sunny and blue skies and calm seas.  An afternoon nap was in order for the day, as we caught up on our rest from going hard for many days.

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