Marshes along the Ottawa River, Plaisance

I was determined to paint along the Ottawa River somewhere, having missed the opportunity in Ottawa. East of Ottawa, the river becomes a migratory bird sanctuary, low and marshy.

Signs for Le parc national de Plaisance took us deep into farm country. We stopped and asked directions of a very handsome young public safety officer. He didn’t speak English. At that moment, a determination to learn French blossomed in my daughter Mary’s heart.

While I painted, she practiced with Duolingo. The first useful phrase she mastered was “Ces vaches-la sont mes vaches.” From now on, we are going to play “Those cows are my cows” in French.

And cows there were. From Ottawa east, we traveled through farm country. We have seen precious few family farms on this trip. It was lovely to be back among them again, even if the odeur de merde followed us all the way to Plessisville.

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In 2016, my daughter Mary and I set off across Alaska and Canada on a Great White North Adventure, which you can read about starting here. We arrived in Anchorage at the beginning of September and got home in mid-October. In between, we visited every province but PEI (been there, done that), and Yukon Territory. In retrospect, it might have made more sense to do this during the summer, since Alaska and Canada threw a mess of strange weather at us.