Mon. 5th October ‘26
It’s raining as we wake, but the sky looks like it is going to clear. That sets the tone for the day as we drive down the north shore of the Saguenay River fjord captivated by the astonishing autumn colours in the trees. As it is only 120km and a couple of hours driving, our resident slave driver wants us to get the drive – including a couple of stops – done in the morning and then go out on a whale watching boat in the afternoon. Apparently, the St Lawrence has an endangered population of Beluga whales, and this is our best chance to see them. We aren’t keen on going out on a boat and it quickly becomes obvious that we are going to fill the time on our drive to Tadoussac. And we do still get a glimpse of belugas (I think, maybe, perhaps!)
We have been to any number of villages designated “(one of) the most beautiful in Québec” and our first stop, Sante-Rose-du-Nord, is another of those. A tiny settlement on a bay ringed by cliffs, with a wharf that gives views along the length of the fjord. Whilst, walking on past the jetty along the path to the belvedere at the end of the promontory, I discover a couple of things. Firstly, that AllTrails shows a 2km trail in the hills above the village that leads to a couple of viewpoints. Even more impressively, a noticeboard, in the lookout platform talks about a historic, picturesque small church nearby – that Claude omitted to mention. There goes the rest of the morning then!
Fortunately, we could drive the car up to the trailhead in the hills and then the walk is mostly on the level, though as ever there are rocks and tree roots to be navigated so the “don’t walk and gawp” rule is fully in force. As we reached successive viewpoint, each gave a better view down the fjord than the last. From up high we get to better see the colours of the forest stretching out along the river coastline. It’s hard to bear in mind that the Saguenay is only a tributary of the St Lawrence and that is a mighty beast indeed. It’s at one of the viewpoints that we can see disturbance in the water that is too irregular to be waves. Foolishly, the binoculars have been left behind in the car. Even so, we convince ourselves that we can see white shapes in the water and that these must be Belugas.
The sunshine is still with us and so flush with success we head further along the road to Saguenay before diving off once again to the tiny, riverside hamlet of St Basile de Tableau (named after the cliff face on the riverbank opposite). We’re hoping to capture the church surrounded by trees in their full autumn display. Whilst the church is glorious in freshly painted white and red, it doesn’t quite work out for us as we struggle to get a vantage point that shows both off to their best. Looking at the pictures, it is astonishing how blue the sky was whilst we were there – not representative of the rest of the day at all.
After that, Anse-de-Roche, another small marina with fjord views, was always going to be a disappointment. Yes, the fjord views were fine but couldn’t compete with those from the high viewpoints. The best I could manage was to incorporate these vivid pink flowers. By now, it’s late afternoon. My debit card records don’t show a lunch transaction, so maybe lunch didn’t happen – sacre bleu as they say around these parts. In any case, we have been surviving on coffee from our travel flask and muffins or pastries smuggled out of breakfast. All part of our balanced and nutritious diet (not!)
By the time we get to Tadoussac, the weather is closing in again and the wind is getting up. Surely there won’t be a problem with our ferry across the St Lawrence tomorrow??? (Spoiler alert!) Tadoussac is another stop on my ‘history of Canada – according to the French’ itinerary. It was a fur-trading post from 1600 (though only 5 of 16 men survived the first winter) and then in 1603 (5 years before the founding of Québec) it really got going with a formal alliance with the indigenous tribes. For the next two hundred years Tadoussac was the hinge of the Saguenay fur trade, and the little Chapelle des Indiens, built in 1747 and still standing, is the oldest surviving wooden church in North America.
As this is our only opportunity to explore and photo Tadoussac we head out just before sunset armed with our cameras and a list of locations and possibilities provided by Claude. Of course, this includes the Chapelle as well as the Hotel Tadoussac just across the road. The original hotel was built in the 1860s and this later version is very distinctive with its red roof – as well as being very wide! We wander on to the end of the harbour wall and have a quick glance at the whale watching boats all tied up. Definitely no regrets. We packed enough into today and now, surprise surprise, the Microbrasserie is calling to us.