Friday, July 21

We began the day at 5 am with my truck alarm shattering the deathly quiet morning in our little camper hood. I scrambled for the key fob, turned it off, then rolled over to go back to sleep. Fifteen minutes later it went off again. Then again. Then again. Let's just say we didn't win the camper of the week award...

Later I did a little research on what might be causing our problem. My worst nightmare, it was the flies... The truck has an internal motion sensor so you can leave it locked with the windows open. If someone reaches inside it goes off. We had so many flies inside they were setting the damn thing off. The battle of the flies had officially escalated. 

Just to piss me off one more time, as I lay peacefully in bed, finally falling to sleep after silencing the truck, a fly landed on my ear. I immediately had nightmares of the Mike Pence fly moment in his debate, I was horrified. F...!

Or was it the Beck Bennett version from his SNL sketch?

After I calmed down, we started breakfast with Shirley. Poached eggs, Amelia's toast, and corn fritters with Indiana corn topped with a little maple syrup. Apparently Quebec produces nearly 80% of the world's maple syrup. 

We often cook on induction cooktops outside. But of course when we did so this morning, we were swarmed by the flies. A. Lot. Of. Flies. I needed a plan.

Later we headed into the city for dinner. We had a drink at the Le Capitole Hotel, a cool spot in the old city. 

While walking to the restaurant I had a eureka moment as we passed a hardware. Any chance they would have a fly swatter? Well, yes, they did! The battle was about to take a decisive turn in our direction. The problem was how to hide it before we went into the restaurant. Here's the best we could do:) 

Yes, we took it in. 

Most of you know we're food snobs. More accurately perhaps, I'M a restaurant snob. Kari is a fantastic cook and restaurants rarely measure up. We rarely have a meal out that I think is worth the money (hey, I'm a skinflint as well). This was a rare exception. This place was fantastic. Ten or so tables with a staff of four doing everything, they were a well oiled machine. And, they played vinyl, so they were after my heart. We sat at the small bar and had a good view of their two turntables and the kitchen. We even managed to get the folks next to us to buy us a couple drinks:) 

After dinner we headed to the Fairmont Le Chateau Frontenac for a drink and dessert. This is the iconic hotel that you'll see in every photo of the city. There are a series of these across the country, we were in the Banff version years ago. They were built by the Canadian railroads as a way to entice people to use the expanding rail system. They're all spectacular, and this one didn't disappoint. 

Afterward, we headed back to Shirley with my new weapon…