Perth-Andover to Edmundston (105 km)

We had a strange morning. In the Inn we slept, (a very nice old castle like inn) we were the only guests. So when we came down to have breakfast, nobody was there, no staff, no breakfast ready. After waiting a while, we used our hotel know-how, went into the kitchen and made the breakfast ourselfs. So we had a nice breakfast! Then we discovered a sign, that the hotel was closed for holidays from the day we arrived, so we were the last guests there and probably the staff had forgotten us!

We had wonderful wind pushing us along the river, cloudless skies. After Grand Falls the river started to form the frontier between the US and Canada. Where there are bridges to cross over to the US, we could see huge border control stations, it looks very uninviting. All flag were on half mast, as it was the 10th year of 9/11.

All of a sudden, we saw black smoke rising from the US side. When we came closer to the place, we saw a few houses burning, flames going as high as 30 meters and even ca. 400 meters away we felt the heat and heard screaming and then the alarm from the firetrucks coming. It was sad to see and terrible, the wooden houses burn really quick once they catch fire. Later as we were going on, we saw the inevitable News TV helicopter passing.

Along the river up here, a lot of potatos for  Mc Donald´s are grow. We saw huge machinery digging them out and passed a factory where they are prefried, for kilometers the smell of french fries accompagnied us. It made Katrin so hungry, that we actually had lunch in a Mc. Donald`s.

Later the farmland disappeared, endless forests until the horizon were all we saw. From time to time we passed small villages or towns, saw very few people outside. Later we arrived in Edmundston, no place to stay, loud and smelling bad from some kind of industry. Even though it sound English, Edmundston is French speaking and along the way, the the signs had changed from English to French.