Tag Archives: new brunswick

Monday 12th October 2015 – IT’S THANKSGIVING.

And with Thanksgiving being a public holiday in Canada, everyone had a lie-in this morning and we ended up later having one of the legendary Taylor Breakfast Brunches, with plenty of toast and hot coffee.

I’ve spent all of the afternoon stripping Strider right out and I’ve disposed of enough rubbish that will surely make Strider go 5 mph faster. I’ve certainly filled both of the 40-gallon incinerator drums.

I’ve found a few things that I’d forgotten about, including the tin opener that I had bought at a charity shop in Moncton. No wonder my bed had an uncomfortable spot in it. And I’ve also pulled out everything that needs to go back with me, such as the Ryobi circular saw, the batteries, the CDs and a couple of books.

There’s a load more room in there now, which should be no surprise. All of the tins are now on the shelf above the bed and all of the loose clothes and papers, as well as the food that’s in packets, has gone into the green tote box that is under the bed. You can actually see the floor now.

Rachel did some washing for me too so that everything is now clean, and when it’s dry I’ll put it all away and that will be the lot.

Sunday 11th October 2015 – I THOUGHT THAT I HAD LEFT …

… the rain behind me yesterday but over the night it seems to have caught me up again and this morning we are all being drenched.

I had to be in Centreville at 11:00 and so I wasn’t in too much of a hurry to leave my comfortable motel, but eventually I was back on the road again, having stopped at Tim Horton’s for a coffee.

I was early at Centreville and so I hung around talking to Bob for a while,and then when Zoe was ready we drove off down to Woodstock and Zoe’s salon. By the time we got to Woodstock we were half a million strong, so we were rather crowded in the Ranger, but Zoe and I spent a good two hours or so down there tidying up, throwing out some rubbish and measuring up for some new furniture that she wants.

Back in Centreville and at Bob and Ellen’s, Rachel and Darren returned from their weekend away and Hannah and Amber came back from an afternoon out. A few other people turned up too and we all had a Thanksgiving meal together, even if Thanksgiving isn’t officially until tomorrow.

I’m back at Darren and Rachel’s now. My wanderings are over and I need to clean and tidy up Strider so that he’s ready to be put away for the winter. Darren is very kindly lending me the bottom end of his hangar now that the big caravan has been sold and that’s where Strider will be kept.

Anyway, I’m off for an early night. I need to acclimatise myself for being ready back in Europe.

Saturday 10th October 2015 – MY QUIET WEEKEND CONTINUES

I had a nice relaxing night last night in my motel room doing not very much at all. At least I had a really good sleep and a nice warm shower this morning.

And by the time that I was ready to leave, the rain was on the verge of stopping but we were having a really high wind and that was depressing.

First stop that I made after driving through the Appalachain mountains was at the small town of Matapedia.

Apart from the town itself and its position on the junction off across the river and into New Brunswick, the interesting thing about the town itself is the railway station. The railway line that runs from Halifax to Montreal along the coast passes through here and, much to everyone’s surprise, there’s a passenger service

But as you can see, the passenger service, run by VIARAIL, runs just once per day (and then not on Tuesdays).

And the station looks like it too. The building is almost derelict, the woodwork is rotting away, it’s overgrown with dust and weeds, and the rails are rusted. It’s really in quite a deplorable state but at least it’s here. Any complaints and a demand for an overhaul, and VIARAIL will probably just pull the service.

And it seems that I’m not the only one to be concerned by the lack of attention that VIARAIL is paying to the Atlantic provinces, and that’s good news.

There’s an organisation called Transport Action Atlantic which seems to be involved in revitalising rail transport in New Brunswick and this organisation seems to be doing something here at Matapedia as you can see here.

It’s not that the aims of this group are utopic – far from it – it’s just that the organisations with which it is dealing is so intransigent that any form of negotiated agreement is impossible. But nevertheless, I wish them luck.

I found a road that led down to the head of the Baie des Chaleurs too, so that I could take a photo of it.

There’s a good view of the Sugar Loaf mountain over there to the right, and the huge pulp mill at Atholville in front of it.

I stopped at Campbelltown to use the internet at Tim Horton’s and then to do some shopping at Sobey’s. And then I was off into the mountains to the western side of New Brunswick

And what do you think about this then?

I can’t remember when was the last time that I saw one of these in the UK, never mind North America. It’s a Hillman Minx, badge-engineered as a “Sunbeam” and dates from the late 50s or very early 1960s and it’s as rare as hens teeth.

But I’ve been saying quite a lot that in the space of 20 years Britain went from selling its cars all over the world to not even being able to sell its own cars in its own country. It’s probably the most dramatic collapse of industry in the whole of the history of the world and has contributed to the decline of the UK from a major world power to an insignificant offshore island.

Seeing vehicles like this in isolated corners of the world just goes to underline it.

I ended up in Perth Andover at a little motel. I always spend my last night on the road in a motel so I can clean and tidy everything. This one is nicely-situated just off the highway near a pizza place (so I can use up my vegan cheese) and I can wash all of my pots, pans and crockery in perfect peace.

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Friday 9th October 2015 – I HAD A QUIET …

… day today, just leisurely meandering back towards New Brunswick and winding up my marathon journey.

I was up at the usual time, as usual, but I had quite a few things to organise and sort out. And as a result it was about 11:00 when I finally hit the road.

There’s a huge wind farm just down the road at Cap Chat. It was impressive back in 2010 and it’s even more impressive now.

Highlight of the park has to be this. It’s claimed to be the world’s biggest vertical-axis wind turbine, reaching a height of 100 metres. It’s quite possible to go up to the top of it for a good look around but, of course, there was no-one here today

It’s a monster of a machine and won’t half pump out the power, but I can’t help thinking about all of the strain that’s being placed on the bottom bearing. It won’t last long and it will be a swine to change, I reckon.

New stop was the Verreault company’s dry dock down the road at Les Mechins to see what was going on in there.

This year we have the CTMA Vacancier in here receiving an overhaul. And here’s an enigma if ever I saw one. In Europe, ferries have a strictly limited working life, rather like school buses in the USA. Greece however has an exemption due to the thousands of islands and hundreds of Greek ferry services, so many time expired ferries end up in Greece.

But what happens when the Greek ferries are exhausted? Most of them go across the Mediterranean to Izmir in Turkey where they are cut up for scrap because that is all that most would have been fit for.

But not Egnatia II.

She was built in 1973 and sailed as the Aurelia across the Baltic. Later, she became the St Patrick II and sailed on many Irish routes as a duplicate summer service, as well as being the relief ship on many other routes in the winter when other ferries needed service or overhaul.

In 1998, when her 25 years was up, a Greek exemption was obtained and she sailed as Egnatia II on the route between Brindisi and Patras.

When her time was up there, she was on charter in Spain for a while and then ran an emergency ferry service back in the Irish Sea.

By 2002 she was thoroughly worn out and was laid up ready for breaking, but instead was sold to Coopérative de Transport Maritime et Aérien (the CTMA). That company named her Vacancier and she underwent a refit here at Les Mechins later that year to prepare her for her new life as a cruise ship running between Montreal and the Iles de la Madeleine.

And so Happy Birthday to the CTMA Vacancier – 42 years old this year.

I had a drive around Matane afterwards. I’d never been for a good look around the town. I’d have preferred a good walk around but by now the weather had broken and it was pelting down – a proper autumn rainstorm we were having.

This about finished me off for the day, even though it was fairly early. I headed up the River Matane valley into the Appalachians but the weather became worse and worse. By the time I reached Amqui I couldn’t see a thing and so there was no hope of finding a place to doss. And even if it did, I’d be soaked in humidity and condensation because the insulation would be soaked.

But a cheap motel came to the rescue. It had a microwave and I had a tin of baked beans. And even better, just across the road was a chippy, so chips and beans was the order of the day for supper.

And I really enjoyed that too!

And, as an aside, this time next week I’ll be back home.

-3

Tuesday 6th October 2015 – WHAT A NICE NIGHT!

Flat out last night quite early on, sung to sleep by a huge flock of geese across the river from here. And I remember absolutely nothing at all until the alarm went off. Definitely one of the best night’s sleeps that I’ve had far quite a while.

a trace of condensation n the ceiling, but considering that I cooked a meal inside here last night, that’s no big deal at all

And so I was up and about quite early and I was able to catch up with a huge pile of paperwork that had been building up.

And do you know what I did after that?

I made myself a coffee, found my breakfast biscuits, and then sat sat down for a whole three hours in the beautiful morning sunshine and read a book. And I didn’t move from my seat at all.

Mind you, I did have company. There’s one in every village and the one in Bonaventure was on the quayside looking in the bins for the cans and bottles that have a deposit (that’s a bit thing in Canada). He came over for a chat, which annoyed me because I really just wanted to sit quietly and read.

after a very relaxed morning I set off, and a little further down the road I came into the town of New Carlisle. There was a sign there for the railway station and so I went down there to have a look around.

I didn’t think that I was going to be in luck though and see a train, I reckoned. Last time I was around here, which was back in 2010, there was some kind of VIARAIL passenger service – once a week to and from Montreal and the town of Gaspe if I remember correctly. But having had a good look around here, there’s been nothing moving on this line for quite a while.

That’s despite the fact that in the station building there’s still some kind of daily train service advertised to and from Montreal. But I’m not taking this sign seriously. There was a sign on the side of the building advertising “bureau à louer – working space for rent – contact VIARAIL” and I imagine that they are referring to the station building. That looks rather terminal to me.

All in all, this paints a rather sad picture of life out here on the Gaspé as far as public tranasport is concerned.

While I was in the area I went into the town of Paspebiac and did a load of food shopping because I was running low on food. I also finally discovered a Tim Horton’s and so I was able to upload a pile of stuff up to the internet.

Having stocked up with food I went off to look for a nice place to have a late lunch. And I didn’t travel very far before I encountered this beautiful sandspit down at the harbour in Paspebiac.

There’s camp site right down there at the end of the sandspit – closed for the season of course – and also a port and some marine installations. And so I went down to the port and sat watching the sea for a good while, ate my butties and read a good book. I’ve certainly caught up with my reading on this trip around Eastern Canada this year.

The road further out along the Gaspé really is beautiful and I could have taken a thousand photos along here – except that I had taken them all when I passed by here in 2010.

But this area is quite busy as far as people go and I ended up being overtaken by the dark before I had found a place to sleep for the night. You have no idea just how quickly – or how early – it goes dark around here. Even though we are farther east than almost any point in New Brunswick, we are still on Quebec time which is an hour behind. Consequently by 18:00 the light has already gone.

In the end, I abandoned the search and ended up in Grande Riviere at an overpriced dosshouse that called itself a motel. This would have been a splendid place to stay 20 years ago, but it’s not had a lick of paint or a new carpet on the floor in all that time and it’s definitely tired.

But at least there’s a microwave, a fridge and a coffee machine so once more I can get some money back by not having to pay for a meal out.

-3

Monday 5th October 2015 – AND THAT WAS ANOTHER NIGHT TOO

We started off with the smoke alarm. The battery was going flat and so after about an hour or so of crashing out, the alarm gave its warning beep.

And then an hour later, after I’d managed to go back to sleep, it bleeped again.

Eventually, once I realised what was going on, I ended up taking out the battery.

And then, after I’d gone back to sleep, Rhys texted me to tell me that all of South Carolina had been washed away in a biblical flood.

And not only that, I had forgotten once again to check the surrounding area for railway lines. And so we had the inevitable.

he net result of all of this was that by midnight I was totally wide awake and it took hours for me to go back to sleep. By the time 06:00 came round and the alarm went off, I was thoroughly wasted,

A coffee and a shower helped me on my way, but here’s a remarkable fact – I’ve driven over 250 kilometres today along Highway 132, one of the principal routes along southern Quebec and through several holiday resorts along the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, and in all of that distance along all of that highway through all of these places I’ve not encountered a single Tim Horton’s.

We’re in the gorge of the Matapedia River now, on the southern slopes of the Appalachian Mountains and this is another really beautiful place to be. Once more, I could take a thousand photos of the area around here and I would never be able to do it justice.

And you can see down there the railway line that runs past the motel where I stayed last night. It’s the Canadian National railway line that links Halifax and Montreal and runs along the New Brunswick coast. The VIARAIL passenger expresses run along there, at least it did when I encountered one of them in 2010. Who knows what happens now.

Further on southwards, we pass the town of Matapedia and round about here the land starts to flatten out as it approaches the Baie des Chaleurs.

There are some interesting hills along here and depending upon the viewpoint that you adopt, you can conjure up some bizarre shapes. And not only that, the light is much better for photography too so the photos come out much better.

And despite the important road junctions around here for the roads that bifurcate off to New Brunswick across the river, still no Tim Horton’s.

The Baie des Chaleurs is famous for being the site of a naval battle that effectively sealed the fate of the French in North America. Once the city of Quebec had fallen to the British, two fleets set out from Europe. One was British, to deliver arms and supplies, and the other was French, with supplies and soldiers to reinforce the French forces.

The British fleet arrived first at the city of Quebec and so the French fleet, following closely behind, put into the bay here to regroup and to think of a Plan B. But here, they were cornered by the British and the French fleet was destroyed. And that was that for the French.

A few years ago, an archaeological expedition in the bay had uncovered many relics of the naval battle, including the remains of some of the sunken ships, and a museum has been created to display the artefacts. This was my port of call for today.

However, you don’t need me to tell you what has happened, do you? The museum is “closed for the season” as you might expect and for once, I’m not able to blag my way in.

I just don’t understand why they have such a short tourist season in Canada. There’s a 10-week spell and that’s that. But nowadays with these huge mobile homes that they have, with all mod cons and central heating, and a rapidly-increasing population or early-retired people with a huge disposable income, they could run the tourist season 12 months of the year. It would bring much more income into the area spread out over a longer period, and so create much more permanent employment, but Governments and Civil Servants can’t think beyond the ends of their fingers. They have no long-term vision.

There’s a huge bridge across the river here into New Brunswick but we’ve been on that before, and my old map indicates that there’s a ferry further up the river.

But the ferry is a disappointment as you can see. According to the guy working here with his tractor, the ferry has been closed down for 10 years and the only way across to New Brunswick now is the bridge. But we spent a good half hour putting the world to rights too. Canada is just like everywhere else in the world where people are fed up with the Government, big business, and the whole of modern society.

And so I went off to find a place to eat my butties.

Here I am on the shore of the Baie des Chaleurs overlooking the town of Dalhousie in New Brunswick. In the peace and quiet I enjoyed my butties, and the next thing that I remember was that it was about 15:35. I’d crashed out good and proper yet again due to my difficulties during the last couple of nights and this at least is one way of catching up with my missed sleep.

Now how about this?

This is La Grande Hermine – or, at least, a half-size replica of it. She – the original at least – was the ship in which Jacques Cartier sailed to Canada on his 1534 expedition, and a guy who runs a holiday chalet complex had traced the plans, sent off to France for a copy and then built this half-size replica.

It took about 7 months work over a period of a year and a half to build it, and he’s made a magnificent job of it too.

It’s now a two-bedroomed holiday chalet and I was lucky enough to be given a guided tour of it. And it really is magnificent.

I asked the owner if he had much trouble having the plans passed by the local authority and he said none at all because they haven’t even seen them, never mind passed them.

And so how has he managed it? The answer is that someone from the maritime department has inspected it because it is officially classed as a boat. And it does indeed float too, so he’s okay for whenever global warming overwhelms the bay – provided that he manages to find a pair of every known species of animal to go with him.

And how about this too?

At one time in North America there used to be timber trestle viaducts everywhere but you’ll be hard-pushed today to find one. We did discover one a couple of years ago but that was on an abandoned line, but here is a timber trestle viaduct on a railway line that is still(as far as I am aware) functioning. It’s a thoroughly magnificent beast as you can see and I wouldn’t mind taking this home with me.

Something else that I wouldn’t mind taking home with me is this tracked snowplough. It’s a Bombardier, of course, like the snow cat that we saw in Goose Bay a few years ago, and this would be fun for me to play with on the fatm back home.

It’s for sale too and the price is not unreasonable, but I’d have no idea how I could go about getting it to fit in my hand luggage on the aeroplane and the airline would probably have a fit.

And so here I am tonight on my spec at the old quayside on the River Bonaventure at the town of the same name, watching the sun set over the old lighthouse.

I’ve cooked myself a meal and now I’m going to be settling down for a nice night in Strider to see if I wan catchup on some of my beauty sleep.

Having seen my face in a mirror this morning, I reckon that I need it.

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Sunday 4th October 2015 – I DUNNO …

… what I had eaten last night, but I had an appalling night where I didn’t sleep a wink due to the most violent indigestion. I can now tell you all about my digestive tract such as where it is and how long it takes for something to work its way through it, because I could feel it on its travels for every inch of the way.

And so feeling like death warmed up, I eventually hit the road and headed east

After a brief drive I ended up in the town of Matane and went for a good prowl around the harbour.

I was very impressed, and also very lucky to see this ship in the harbour. She’s the Camilla Desgagnés, a heavy-icebreaking cargo ship and she has several claims to fame. Perhaps the most important is that, depending upon which book you read or who you talk to, she was either the first or the second modern commercial ship to navigate the North-West Passage and holds the rather unique honour of being the only “eastern” supply ship to service and provision communities on the “western” side of the Passage.

Secondly, she’s an unlucky ship and has suffered a couple of major incidents. In 1993, she was abandoned in mid-Atlantic after her engines failed, right in the path of an approaching hurricane. Furthermore, a couple of years later, she was abandoned once more after her engines caught fire

Also in the harbour, and I was very tempted to go over and see about negotiating my way on board her, was the CTMA Voyageur.

She’s the ship that provides the supply and provisioning service to the Iles de la Madeleine, off the coast of Prince Edward Island, and there’s room on board for a few motor vehicles. However, she was all loaded up and they were just shunting a couple of trailers on, ready to depart. And not only that, it’s a good way out to the Madeleines and I didn’t know when I would be likely to be able to make my way back.

Also in the harbour moored next to the CTMA Voyageur was the Camille Marcoux. However, we all know about her because we have sailed upon her a couple of times – once in November 2010 and again in September 2014. She’s the ship that runs the ferry route between Matane and Godbout on the northern shore of the St Lawrence.

Our trip in 2010 was quite noteworthy, as I’m sure you remember, because we had tickets for the ferry to Baie Comeau from here but Bane of Britain somehow contrived to park himself in the wrong ferry queue.

I was feeling a little better by now and so I went for a coffee and something to eat at Tim Horton’s and to use the internet there. I managed to pick up my order without throwing it all over the floor this time, and I was there for about three hours because I was really finding it difficult to move.

Matane is effectively the gateway over to the southern shore of the Gaspé Peninsula and there is a pass through the Appalachian Mountains at the headwaters of the Matane and Matapedia Rivers.

Out of Matane, you follow Highway 195 up along the valley of the Matane River and the scenery here is really beautiful even if the light is quite depressing for photography purposes. You could take hundreds of photos of the scenery here and still not do the area any justice.

The higher up into the mountains we go, the more impressive the scenery becomes.

And it’s not just the natural scenery either but the man-made scenery too because we encounter several covered bridges across the river. The longest covered bridge in the world is in Hartland, New Brunswick, but Quebec has very much more than its fair share of them, as far as pure numbers are concerned. And those that are left (because hundreds have disappeared) are very-well maintained.

At the headwaters of the River Matane we start to climb up and over the watershed into the drainage basin of the Matapedia River.

This road is another thoroughly impressive road with some really impressive scenery, and it bounces you up and down everywhere as you climb steeply into the Appalachians. And then, just as steeply, it drops you down into the valley of the Matapedia River, where we rejoin Highway 132 at Amqui.

And it was along here that I decided that I couldn’t go on any more. Around the bend, a motel appeared offering rooms with cuisinettes for just $49:95 plus taxes. Furnished like something out of the 1950s, nevertheless I’ve stayed in far worse places than this for far more money too.

I booked myself in, found my room, went inside and, still feeling like death warmed up and with it only being 16:45, I promptly crashed out and that was that.

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Tuesday 22nd September 2015 – HERE IN THE NICE AND QUIET …

… isolation of my litle spec on the edge of the marshes I was having the best night’s sleep that I had had for quite some time.

However, as I have said before, one of the things that you need to do when you arrive somewhere to stay for the night in North America is to check the immediate area for railway lines, and I forgot to do that yesterday, didn’t I?

This isn’t the train that woke me up of course, but it is one that is very much like it, shuddering, clanking and blowing just about 100 yards away from my quiet little spec

When I did finally heave myself out of my stinking pit this morning, this is the beautiful view that greeted me. I’m shrouded in a fog rolling in off the head of the Bay of Fundy, something that many Ancient Mariners would tell you all about.

I’m shrouded in condensation too inside the truck cap – or at least, the truck cap is. I’m going to have to do something about this in the long term because as the weather cools down even more, the condensation will become worse and worse

I’ve had a little play around inside the back of Strider too and I’ve made piles of extra room. I can actually move around in there now, as well as unfold my chair and sit down. What with that and my little fold-up table, I’m really comfortable in there now. Next trick is going to be a solar panel on the roof and a battery inside so that I can run some lights in there and a little inverter to power a couple of things like my slow cooker.

I still have a couple of plans about the bed too and I shall put them into practice given a nice afternoon and a quiet spot in which to work.

That’s Strider way down there, in the spot where I parked for the night. And beyond it is the head of the Bay of Fundy. I’m actually standing on the ramparts of Fort Beausejour and you can see why the French chose this site for the building of their fort.

We’re on the southern shore of the narrowest part of the isthmus of Chignecto, on the edge of the Tantramar Marshes – and you may remember if you were with us on our voyage in October 2010 we went to Fort Gaspereaux, on the northern shore of the isthmus.

Fort Beausejour was built in 1750 under the orders of the French Governor the Marquis de la Jonquière, and with these two forts, the French could bottle up the isthmus.

Nothing could pass by here without the French knowing about it and so quite naturally they became prime targets for the British Army during the mid-18th Century. The British under Robert Monckton laid seige to Fort Beausejour in June 1755 and it fell after 13 days. Fort Gaspereaux fell a couple of days later and that was the end of French rule in Acadia.

The British had built a fort – Fort Lawrence – in Nova Scotia across the marshes from Fort Beausejour in order to put pressure on the French fort.

The fort didn’t last very long – the British preferred to occupy Fort Beausejour once they had captured it – and so there is nothing left of Fort Lawrence. But the site is well-known in the area and so I went for a wander over there for a look. And while there is nothing of the fort left to see, there’s a splendid view across the marshes to Fort Beausejour

But that’s not the best view of Fort Beausejour by any means. From the offices of the Nova Scotia Tourist Board’s information office, the view of the fort is even more spectacular. You can see its five-star pointed design and it earthen walls quite clearly from here with a good telephoto lens.

In fact, such is the dominance of the site where I am standing over the surrounding area that I’m surprised that the British hadn’t occupied and fortified this point instead. I know that this is the point that I would have chosen.

From up here on this eminence, there’s another good view – this time of an object that is just as spectacular as the fort, even though it’s much less well-known.

Right in the centre of the image, surrounded by cows, is the dock that was intended to the the entrance to the Chignecto Ship Railway and had this been built, it would have been a really impressive structure.

As I said, this is the narrowest part of the isthmus and if ships could find a way across it, they would save hundred of miles and several days, as well as avoid many of the risks of shipwreck, as they sailed between the Gulf of St Lawrence and the eastern seaboard of North America.

The plan was for the ships to sail into the dock, to be raised up by a hydraulic ramp and loaded onto railway wagons, and then transported by train across the isthmus to the other side – to the dock near Tidnish that we visited in October 2010.

Unfortunately the works on the southern side of the isthmus are on private property and not able to be visited, but what we are looking at here are the earthworks that would have carried the track bed of the railway, which were completed for several miles.

Why this all went wrong was that the same technology that enabled the construction of the engineering works of the railway also enabled shipbuilders to build bigger and bigger ships – and so the railway quickly became clear that the railway would be inadequate for the task, and funds could not be raised to rebuild it to larger dimensions.

After lunch I set off down the Trans-Canada Highway through the mountains towards Antigonish. Hannah is at St F-X University there and I hadn’t seen much of her while I’ve been over here so I went to visst her.

We went out for a meal and a chat for a couple of hours, and then I hit the road again. There’s a big Irvings truck stop down at the Canso Strait and while I’m not a big fan of truck stops these days for sleeping purposes, it’s the nest place that I can think of to settle down for the night.

At least all of the facilities are there.

Monday 21st September 2015 – IT WAS COLD …

… last night in Strider. Firstly, the temperature had dropped outside during the night, and secondly, the aluminium sheeting provides nothing in the way of insulation – in fact quite the reverse. I’ll have to do something about that because the condensation was terrific too despite the rear window being ajar.

But as for the bed, it was indeed comfortable enough and once I did manage to drop off I was fine except for the noise from the lorries that awoke me every now and again as they went moving about the lorry park.

This morning I fitted my shelf up in the roof. It took ages to do as it had to be cut really fine and so I took four or five goes to cut it precisely to size, and then I screwed a front batten to it to stop the tins and everything sliding off. I’ll put the saucepan and the tin opener up there too so that they are to hand.

After a coffee and an internet at Tim Horton’s, I hit the road and headed to Moncton. First stop was the Salvation Army thrift shop where I picked up a book, a CD and a tin opener, seeing as how the one that I have doesn’t seem to want to do anything.

Second stop was not the second stop at all. Princess Autos is just opposite the Salvation Army thrift shop, but not any longer. It’s all closed down and they had the builders in. However the builders directed me there and although they didn’t have what I wanted, I ended up with a 19mm spanner (at last), a set of offset ring spanners and a big set of torx and torx-E drive sockets.

Value Village was a disappointment. I ended up with just a (rather expensive) book although it did produce a decent old saw and a tenon saw. The saw that I have is rather flaky and I need to do better. God second-hand tools are much better value than cheap new stuff, that’s for sure.

At Home Depot I bought a pile of insulation as well as a couple of sets of screwdriver bits for back home, and then I went off to have a look at the new music shop that has just opened across the car park.

And then I set off.

You may remember a while ago that I wrote something about a railway line that crosses the big freeway at Dieppe (just outside Moncton) on the level and made a comment about the M25 in the UK.

So just so you know that I wasn’t pulling your leg about this, Strawberry Moose took a photo of the railway line as we passed over, so that you know that it’s there.

One of the things that I’ve been trying to do as I pass by here is to find a way across the Tantramar Marshes. There’s the freeway of course, but finding another road is not easy. This time however, with the aid of The Lady Who Lives In The Sat-Nav, whom I told to take the quickest way to Amherst without using the Freeway.

She found me some exciting roads, including passing over this delightful little covered bridge across one of the many drainage ditches that criss-cross the marshes.

The Tantramar Marshes have been described as “The Largest Hayfield In The World” and quite rightly so.

You can see from this photo that I took from the ridge on the northern edge of the marsh that it lives up to its name. Especially at this time of year when the “rolos” are everywhere.

The marshes were originally drained by the first Acadian settlers here so that the hayfield could be created, and you can see everywhere the traces of the old drainage ditches running through the fields. You can also see traces of the old Acadian dykes and I took you to visit the remains one of them a couple of years ago.

My route took me past the wind turbines across the border in Nova Scotia (there’s not a one in this area in New Brunswick) and down to the site of old Fort Beausejour. This is situated at the head of the Bay of Fundy where I would watch the sun set.

But as for this insulation, it’s no good. It’s far too thick, far too heavy and not flexible enough, so it would do for the roof. I’ll have a go at the sides tomorrow but I’m not hopeful and I can see all of this going in the bin even though it cost a lot of money.

I’ll have to think again about this.

Sunday 20th September 2015 – YOU MAY REMEMBER …

… the other day when I told you that I thought that it had rained during the night?

Well, there was absolutely no mistake this morning. There I was, busily taking down the tent, and the heavens opened. I was drenched.

I was intending to leave the tent out to dry out the condensation but I’ve had to forget that. It’ll be soaked even worse and so I just flung it into the back of Strider.

I had almost 200 photographs to edit too, and that wasn’t possible as I had nowhere to sit comfortably. I went off to the shower room and had a really good soak, changed my undies, and had a shave instead. No breakfast though – I heaved everything else into the back of Strider and headed off to Tim Horton’s for coffee and a comfortable seat.

All of these photos took hours to edit. My camera, which has been quite flaky since I dropped it in Quebec in May 2012, is now teetering on the edge of whatever it teeters on and the photos are getting worse and worse. A new camera is in order when I return home if I can’t find anything over here. I can’t go on like this. But I do need a really decent lens – something like a 28-85mm lens that drops down to f2.8 or beyond for this kind of work. I can’t keep going on the equipment that I have.

But the net result of this was that I had to move on. Not that I actually had to, but Tim Horton’s is very good to me when I’m on the road, what with washing facilities in the disabled loos and with the free internet, so I don’t want to abuse the facilities.

I found another Tim Hortons quite a way down the road and so I had another coffee and finished everything off, and that took me to 17:30, there was that much of it to do. And what I hadn’t realised was that when I finished, I was the only person in the place except for the staff who were hanging around waiting. It seems that the place was to close at 17:00 so that renovations could start, and I’d been holding up the work.

I hit the road after that, and Strider and I ended up on the big Irvings truckstop on the outskirts of Moncton. Tonight is the first night that I am to spend sleeping in Strider and so I needed to organise myself.

It took ages to clear everything out and I even cooked some simple food for tea. And that little table that I bought the other day is perfect for that. I did however spill all of my pasta all over the floor and that will need all cleaning out now.

The bed is just the right length and it’s reasonably comfortable too although I want to do better. But the truckstop is the wrong place for me to have spent the night – at least where I was. Lorries were coming and going throughout the night and it took me ages to get off to sleep.

I must do better tomorrow.

Saturday 19th September 2015 – SOMEONE IS ON A POWER TRIP …

… and, just for a change, I’m not talking about the farces of Law and Order either.
What we have here is a “suspicious package” in the middle of the festival, and everywhere is cordoned off by the police.

But what we do have is two of the Festival volunteers, pushing (and I DO mean pushing) people out of the way, yelling at everyone, and generally being on a major control freak exercise. I asked them what was going on and they told me that it’s “a police incident”. And so when I asked what kind of “incident” I was told that it was nothing to do with me.

And when I asked them how come, as festival employees, they were dealing with a “police incident”, they walked away. And so when I asked them if I could ask another question, one of them replied “yes, I DO mind. I’m not answering”, and carried on walking away.

And so I went 20 yards further on to a police officer, who made a full and complete statement without any inhibitions, even telling me that “no-one is taking it very seriously but we have to check it out just the same”.

But this kind of behaviour by festival employees, assaulting members of the public (because pushing someone is an assault of course and had it been me on the receiving end of it then the matter would not have rested there), being aggressive and abandoning their festival duties in order to go on a major power trip is something that is inevitably going to have repercussions as far as the festival is concerned.

And not only that, on the main street I counted at least two other “acts” that included backing tapes. Whatever is the festival coming to, that it is abandoning the principles under which it was founded?

If you are a solo performer and need more than just a guitar, then this is exactly how you do it.

This is a guy from Montreal called Steve Hill and he’s playing guitar and singing. And not only that, if you have a closer look at the photo you’ll see that he has a bass drum, another drum, a hi-hat, a tambourine and a set of cymbals, that he plays by hitting them with some kind of extension fastened to his guitar.

He had another guitar too, and that had a maracca attached to the end as well so he could shake his maraccas during the performance.

I was amazed to see that he didn’t have a mouth-truss and a gob-iron, which was what I would have expected to see in a solo performer, and I did have a little muse to myself that had he had a really good plate of baked beans for lunch he could have played the trumpet too.

But I’m a big fan of one-man shows and I have appeared in several, but these were usually named after the size of the audience.

But joking apart, I do have to say that I really enjoyed his performance. He was certainly a very competent performer and he had quite a good voice too.

This is what being a solo performer is all about. Using backing tapes and the like is selling the public, and the festival, short.

Talking of mouth trusses and gob-irons, this is what I mean.

This is a guy called Oland Monteith and he comes from up the road in Nackawic, and he is an excellent representation of what the festival is all about – the old man sitting on the porch with the guitar and mouth organ singing the blues – in this case the Folsom Prison Blues.

You might – or might not – have realised this, but this is the FIRST real old-man blues act that we have seen at the festival. And by the time that the festival had finished, this was the only one that I had encountered.

What a let-down from the days when I first came to the festival and we had raft after raft of old men singing the blues. Of course, I’ve not had the blues for years – ever since I started on the Prozac of course.

As for other unusual acts, how about this one?

This is the North Mississippi Allstars and if you look very carefully at the stage and the musicians, you will notice that they have one singer-guitarist and two drummers.

And that’s your lot.

You might think that the sound that they would be able to create would be rather limited, but nothing could be further from the truth.

They managed to put in a “complete” performance that certainly sounded as if there was nothing missing from the show, and it all went down rather well. Much better than I had expected.

And with all of the above, just WHY do you need backing tapes? And just WHY are you allowed to get away with it at the festival?

And so this morning I was up quite nice and early and had plenty of time to have breakfast and do the paperwork from yesterday without any interruptions.

But I did have an interruption while I was driving into town. However, this was something of a quite welcome interruption. You may remember that I’d sent a note backstage to Ross Neilsen during his performance yesterday, And this was him, ringing me back.

We had quite a lengthy chat, and the result of this is that he will indeed do something for Radio Anglais and that can only be good news. If what he sends me is as powerful as what he performed yesterday then our listeners really will enjoy themselves.

That’s not all either. At a Charity Shop, Strawberry Moose made a few new friends – a couple of girls aged about 8 or 9 were very keen to make his acquaintance while I was having a long chat with their mother.

And so to the music.

We’ve already seen a couple of acts, right out of running order. The first band that we actually encountered, in strict running order, was Greensky Bluegrass. They come from that well-known haunt of legendary bluegrass music … errr … Minnesota.

Bluegrass is a long way from being my favourite style of music as you all very well know, but good music is good music, no matter what it is and where it comes from.

But this bluegrass music was so astonishingly good that I doubt if I’ve ever in all my life had a better time at this kind of concert

We media-types are only allowed to be there for the first three numbers but I was there for probably three quarters of an hour because one of their numbers seemed to go on for ever.

Not that I minded, of course. I could have stayed there all night and listened to them, if I hadn’t had so many other things to be dealing with.

There were five musicians on stage – and no drummer, which they didn’t need anyway because the guy on the upright bass was a stunning performer who kept perfect time.

They aren’t really suitable for a performance on Radio Anglais unfortunately, but I’ll be checking them out when I return home to see what else they can come up with.

On my way to my next venue I passed by the Barracks Tent. There was no performance scheduled for there, but there was certainly something going on.

One of the benefits of my media pass is to be able to enter venues when they are officially closed, and so I went in to investigate, and found myself face-to-face with Yukon Blonde doing a sound check.

Yukon blonde’s bassist, as well as being a left-hooker, comes from the UK, which was evident when he shouted across the stage “there’s something the ma”er with your speaker” – not a trace of a ‘t’ between two vowels. I hope that he doesn’t sing like this.

But that apart, they were quite a good group too.

I doubted very much that I would be around for their act, seeing as it was timed for 23:00, long after my bed-time, and so I stayed around for the entire sound check.

And it wasn’t a wasted experience either because, as I said, they put out quite a good performance even if it was only a simple sound-check. A shame that their set wasn’t timed for earlier.

Down at the Mojo Tent, Raoul and the Big Time were due to come on stage and so I needed to get a move on if I wanted to catch the act.

This looked like something out of the 1950s, what with the shiny grey suit and pork-pie hat, and this was indeed what we got. Appearances were certainly not deceptive in this case.

Despite the presence of the mouth organ, this was another very good, competent performance.

It seems that Raoul, whoever he is, is something of a well-known performer on the music stage although I have to admit to never having heard him before. And to be honest, it wasn’t my cup of tea and so I wandered off elsewhere.

“Elsewhere” turned out to be tea. There was quite a big gap between the next performances and so I went off to find some food.

We’re overwhelmed by food stalls this year and vegan food is quite popular. Tonight I had 6 hot-vegetable samosas, for $7:00 – and they were totally delicious – and very filling too. I’m doing well for food at the festival and, to my surprise, it’s not as expensive as it might have been.

My wanderings took me back at the Mojo Tent (we’ve seen the photos of Steve Hill in the Blues Tent earlier) where Amy Helm and the Handsome Strangers was the next act.

Now let’s forget the music for a moment – let’s talk about Amy Helm, because she was well-worth talking about. She’s someone else of whom I hadn’t heard before, and so I went off to make enquiries.

It turns out that she’s the daughter of Levon Helm who for many years was a member of the band “The Hawks”, which later became “The Band” and backed Bob Dylan during his “rock” phases and went on to have successes of their own.

This was another act that wasn’t really up my street as far as the music went, but there was no doubting the quality of the music, and no doubting the quality of the performance either, because Amy Helm really knew how to put on a show.

She was an entertainer from start to finish and not only that, she clearly had the air of thoroughly enjoying herself on stage.

At the Barracks Tent, I went to see a band called Rah Rah, who come from Saskatchewan apparently.

They were a five-piece band featuring a guitarist-vocalist, a bassist, a violinist, a drummer and a keyboard player who doubled on guitar too, and they produced quite a powerful act that I enjoyed very much.

The sound mix was all wrong however and I couldn’t hear half of the instruments, although that’s not surprising for us in the media pit at the front of the stage.

I was disappointed not to be able to hear the violin though, and I shall have to go around for a fiddle with the violinist later.

Final act that I caught was back at the Mojo Tent where Waylon Thibodeaux took to the stage.

He’s a ‘cajun from down Louisiana way, and he and his back-up band played just like it too. It didn’t bother me too much because this kind of music is the kind that you can listen to anywhere on any occasion

And if it’s played in the right kind of spirit with performers who enjoy what they are doing and are able to communicate with the audience, it’s usually a rip-roaring night.

And so this was what we got – a thoroughly enjoyable evening with a good bunch of performers and a lively crowd.

But I didn’t hang around too long. It’s my last night and I want to have an early night as I’m back on the road tomorrow. But today, I had a pile of interesting chats, including one with a cameraman from CBC and another with a young guy at the Rah Rah concert, to name but two.

It makes the time pass so much quicker and make things so much more interesting.

But I’m disappointed to see that the traditional “old-man blues” is no longer popular at the festival. For me, that’s what blues is all about and to legislate it out of the festival is a very sad thing as far as I am concerned.

And by the way …

… the photos that I’ve posted for tonight’s acts at the Harvest Jazz and Blues Festival are only a small sample of the hundreds that I took during the evening. If you want to see any more of those that I took, you’ll need to contact me. Leave a comment and I’ll be in touch.

-2

Friday 18th September 2015 – I KNEW THAT …

… I couldn’t keep it up.

We had twice the amount of usual interruptions today, to make up for the smooth day that we had yesterday.

I’m not counting the rain in this because although this morning there was no sign of any precipitation whatsoever, I’m convinced that I heard some rain during the night.

Mind you, that’s all that I heard. I had another Sleep Of The Dead and didn’t feel a thing.

And so next morning I started on the building of my bed for Strider. This meant that I had to completely unload him so that I could measure up. and with stuff all over my camping pitch, another camper pulled up on the pitch beside mine. He came over to see what he was doing, and his dog promptly went to urinate on my camping pitch. And so the dog had my boot up its backside and his owner would have received one too had he not beaten a hasty retreat, with my opinion of him and his dog ringing in his ears.

While all of this was going on, a camp site steward came up. I can’t stay at this pitch, apparently, as it’s been booked for the weekend. I have to move.
“But you should have come to the office and booked in. After all, you’ve been here a few days”
“Every time I’ve been past the office I’ve seen the ‘sorry – we’re closed’ sign in the window”
“But I come on duty at 12:00”
“And I’ve been gone by then”
“But you do need to register”
“How?”
“One of the campground rangers should have come to see you and given you the details”
“And did they?”
“… errr … no”
“And as you know that I’ve been here for a few days, have you pinned a note on my tent to tell me what’s happening?”
“… errr … no”.

But in the end I had to move and I’m now elsewhere, and my bed isn’t finished either. All of this just goes to prove what I’ve always said about most Government servants. They only work when they have too and when it suits them. Providing an efficient and effective service to their clients is the last thing on their minds.

Some good news anyway concerns the group Tokyo Valentine – you remember that I saw them yesterday on one of the free stages. I was quite impressed with what I had seen of them and so I’d given my phone number to the guy who was doing their sound engineering.

The result of this was that Rachel, the keyboard player, rang me back and we had quite a lengthy chat. She likes the idea of recording one of the group’s live concerts so that I can make up a live broadcast for Radio Anglais. Plenty of interaction with the audience – that’s the thing, even if the have to summon up a clacque. I want to make my audience feel that they are part of the performance.

But as for the other acts to whom I’d slipped a little note – not a word. As I’ve said before, just like most people, musicians seem to be just interested in moaning about the lack of airplay that they receive and it’s far too much effort to actually go out and do something about it.

But before we start to involve ourselves in the festival tonight, let’s just say a word or two about the volunteers.

If you haven’t yet been to the festival, you won’t understand just how much work is done or needs to be done here and without the volunteers, none of this work would be done and the festival would ever take place. The volunteers deserve a big round of applause from everyone.

The first group that I encountered was on one of the free stages in the main street. This is Paula Tozer and Friends.

They were nothing special. Technically competent, they were, and playing an assortment of 12-bar blues including a number by JJ Cale that I hadn’t heard before but they didn’t manage to set the crowd alight.There wasn’t anything that I would have considered for broadcast on Radio Anglais.

As for the musicians, I recognised the lead guitarist. He’s called Rick Bartlett or something like that and I’m sure that I’ve seen him elsewhere at the festival in a previous year.

As for the bassist though, he gave me the opinion of being rather sour-faced. I went up to him as he was umpacking, and told him that it’s been years since I’ve seen a Rickenbacker bass, but he merely scowled and carried on unpacking, totally ignoring me.

And talking of totally ignoring me, I went into Tony’s Music Shop to see what they had – I’ve bought a few things from there in the past at various festivals.

This year though, I went in and all of the shop assistants were busy chatting away to various callers. Eventually, someone bade farewell to one of his visitors and came over to chat to me. And while we were chatting, another visitor came in and he turned to chat to them about babies and children, totally ignoring me.

That was enough for me and I walked out, with him running behind to try to persuade me to stay. But whatever happened to North American customer service? It used to be legendary, but now it’s all becoming just like Belgium. It’s shameful.

Talking of thigs being shameful, here’s Mike Peters, my favourite busker.

He’s been shunted out to play underneath the footbridge far from the madding crowd surging down the main street. He’s here playing to an audience of … errr … just me. And this is shameful treatment for someone such as him because he’s miles better than many of the performers who have appeared on a paid stage – never mind a free stage on the main street.

This is another thing that is shameful in my opinion.

The festival was created, so we were told, to counter the DJ movement and recorded music, and return to live entertainment and live music. But here, what we have is a “musician” strumming a guitar every now and again, backed by a recorded drummer, a recorded bass and a recorded backing choir. And it’s in the main street too.

But whatever is he doing with all of this gear at the festival, never mind on the main street, when many artists much better than him and playing all of their own music are stuck out at the back of the festival miles away from the crowds.

The first formal band that I encountered was the Earthbound Trio at the Barracks Tent. They were to play a little later on as one of the opening acts for Grand Theft Bus and so were warming up before the crowds filtered into to tent.

And yes, the Earthbound Trio is indeed the name, even though those of you who are able to count will have not failed to have noticed that there were four of them up on stage.

Musically, they were okay, I suppose, but this isn’t really my cup of tea and so I didn’t stay around very long.

But this is much more like my cup of tea.

Ross Neilsen is by far and away the best rock musician that you are ever likely to encounter anywhere in New Brunswick and, furthermore, he plays with the correct number of musicians too. Just a drummer and bassist – no horns, no keyboards, no nothing. This is a genuine power trio although his two backing musicians this year seem to be different than those who I’ve seen him play with in previous years.

Now if ony he would play like this all of the time, it would be a magnificent performance and he would be the star of any festival that I would organise.

He does however have a tendency to run a “blues by invitation” kind of show where he invites his friends up onto the stage to join in with the show. And while his friends are without doubt quite competent musicians, you have to hear the opening numbers of any show that Ross Neilsen puts on to hear how much of a disappointment the “augmented” show might become.

One of the things that I noticed about Ross Neilsen and his mates is that while Neilsen and his bassist weren’t ‘arf freaking out at the front of the stage, the drummer, whoever he was, was quite simply and stoically playing away on his drums totally oblivious of what was going on out at the front.

It was quite a remarkable exercise in concentration from the drummer, given the distractions.

And distractions they certainly were because Ross Neilsen and his mate were putting on quite a show and giving it all that they’ve got out there on the stage.

And as my three numbers were up (I’m only allowed to photograph the first three songs) I passed a note to backstage to ask him to contact me. I’d love to use one of his live concerts on Radio Anglais on my radio shows and I’m sure that my listeners would love it too.

This group on stage at the Barracks Tent was the winner of this year’s “Rising Stars” competition and unfortunately I forgot to enquire as to the name of the band … "it’s Free to Grow" – ed.

The stage in the Barracks Tent is one of the smallest stages at the festival, and yet there are no fewer than nine performerss on the stage. It’s cramped enough when there are only three or four performers on here and these nine were really suffering.

Once again, the music that they were playing, technically competent though it might have been, was not my cup of tea and so I didn’t hang around very long.

But what did impress me was the bassist, who you might have seen on the previous photo. He was playing what looked to me like a six-string bass and it’s been quite a long time since I’ve seen one of those on stage.

My permabulations took me back to the Mojo Tent. I’d seen Matt Minglewood and his band warming up earlier as I was wandering around and I was determined not to miss his set.

He had a four-piece band, consisting of himself on guitar and vocals, a keyboardist and drummer who provided the backing vocals, and a bassist. And all in all, it was a very tight set and from what I saw, I enjoyed the show immensely.

And did you notice the bassist? Yes, we had a female bassist who looked as if she might have been Matt Minglewood’s grand-daughter.

From what I heard of her, she kept her bass lines simple and basic, but then what else do you need in a show like this? And if she ever reads these notes, she’s quite welcome to come round to my tent and have a play on my instrument any time she likes. After all, I do have a Jaguar in my truck, don’t I?

He was a really popular performer with the crowd and rightly so because what I saw of his performance was quite impressive.

I was inclined to ask him to do something for Radio Anglais but at the last moment I had a change of heart. It turns out that he is an out-and-out militarist and spent much of his time regaling the Canadian Armed Forces and their aggressive and unprovoked invasion of Afghanistan.

I’m not having my listeners infected by any of this kind of nonsense and so I desisted. People who adopt polarised positions have to accept the consequences of their actions.

And I couldn’t hang around anyway. The battery in the camera was going flat and Canned Heat are up next in an hour. I need to do some charging.

Having rustled up the battery charger and infinity lead, I shot off to Tim Horton’s for a coffee and a charge. But, to my surprise, the Tim Horton’s in town has no public charging points. Consequently, I refused my coffee and wandered off elsewhere, eventually finding an outdoor power point at the local church where I could listen to (but not see) Garrett Mason in the Hoodoo House.

Back at the Mojo Tent, playing to a disappointingly small audience, was Canned Heat.

I couldn’t understand that. For a start, the Mojo Tent is not the best venue for one of the oldest continuing groups in the history of modern music – the Blues Tent where I’d deen Michael Franti and Spearhead is much more suitable. And I couldn’t understand why the tent here was only half-full anyway. Canned Heat should have packed out the festival.

Mind you, talking to one of the stewards earlier, he told me that for one of the artists here, the tent had been filled to beyond capacity.

The problem that they have is that they sell tickets for the individual shows but issues Ultimate Passes so that people can wander around from venue to venue. And if all of the Ultimate Pass holders were to present themselves at a venue as well as all of the regular ticket holders, then the capacity of the venue will be exceeded.

Returning to the music, I’m not sure whether or not the drummer was the same as when I has seen them previously. He certainly looked different, but then there are a great many reasons why that might happen.

But what made me consider this is that the drummer has a high-pitched voice and you’ll recognise his singing on many of the group’s early hits. And he sand several of the songs last time that I saw them, including “Going Up The Country”. But this time, “Going Up The Country” was sung by the lead guitarist who has a quite different vocal range.

Nevertheless, te performance was quite good and I enjoyed what I heard. But I had other fish to fry – there were still several groups to see and so I set off on my rounds.

But my heart wasn’t in it and I rather lost interest. I treated myself to a big plate of chips (I’d had nothing to eat since breakfast) and headed back to Strider. And here’s a thing. On the side of the street was a hat with a note – something like “thanks to all the musicians” – and people were leaving money in it, even though there was no-one with it, never mind doing anything. Imagine that – in the UK – leaving money lying around like that. Some people have much more faith in human nature than I have.

Back in my tent, I spent a half-hour or so quietly reading a book but at the end of the day I decided that enough was enough.

I turned the light off and settled down for he night. I was going to have an early night.

-2

Thursday 17th September 2015 – AND SO TODAY …

… nobody managed to get in my way. But then again, I didn’t put myself into much of a position where I was likely to be interrupted or diverted (although anything is possible of course).

I had an excellent night’s sleep in the tent, which I reckon that I thoroughly deserved, and I was up early and at work by 07:30 with a mug of coffee and a pile of breakfast biscuits, and it didn’t take all that long to work on the 61 photos that I had taken yesterday. And then they all needed to be imprinted with the copyright logos.

Once I’d done that, I wrote up the blog for yesterday ready to upload as soon as I could find a wifi connection.

One thing that I did manage to do is the change the headlight bulb in Strider. I’d picked one up at Rouses Point when I was there a few days ago, and while I’d been looking for a paper for Strider yesterday, I noticed that there was a section in his handbook about changing the bulb. It looks pretty straightforward but it isn’t, mainly because I don’t think that it had ever been changed before and the clips took quite a bit of forcing with a pipe wrench to move them. But at least he’s all legal now.

I also took the opportunity to have a really beautiful and warm shower.

On the road, first stop was the Atlantic Superstore where I stocked up with food as we are running right low on fruit, veg and bread. And they also had a few other things on special offer. So I now have a full pickup and we’re (almost) ready for anything.

Tim Horton’s came up with an internet connection (they must have made a fortune on coffee since they started on the free wifi connections – I know that they have from me) and after all of that I went to my usual little spec on the boat launching ramp car park opposite the city for lunch.

Home Depot was the next stop, and there I bought all of the wood that I need to make the bed that I want for Strider. And so Strider is now all loaded up with wood. They also had the insulation that I want too, but that’s going to have to wait until I’ve done the bed. I don’t want to load up Strider with stuff that’s going to be in the way. I’m going to buy it as I need it.

And so off to the Festival, and at the Barracks Tent, which has now been erected, we were having a communal yoga session.

As I arrived, they were all going into the mass hypnotism session that they have usually right at the end of every session, and so I engaged in a conversation with the volunteer on the door. We were wondering what might happen should a marching band go storming past the tent at this particular moment

The free stage has been erected at the City Hall, and the first band up on there was Tokyo Valentine. They are local, from Fredericton, and have only been together for a short while.

The vocals were a little, well, hit-and-miss, but musically there was nothing wrong with them and they seemed to be enjoying themselves, as did the audience.

In fact, the rhythm section was quite impressive. The drummer was superb and I really enjoyed listening to him.

As for the bassist however, he was easily the best that I have ever seen at this level. And I’m certain that I’ve seen him before too. I don’t remember his face but I do remember his style of play and I’m sure that I’ve seen him before with someone else at a previous Festival.

We had two female singers. One of them was sometimes on the keyboards and sometimes on the tambourine. And her vocals weren’t all that bad but her style wasn’t really a style that appealed to me.

But she knew how to interact with the audience and at one stage went off the stage to dance with everyone in the audience, who clearly enjoyed it too.

The girl on guitar, who was really a mermaid apparently, kept it simple and basic and that’s all that you need to do. But she knew how to get an audience moving too.

All in all, I had to say, what a way to start the Festival. This was quite a good act to have on a free stage, considering some that we have had in the payable venues, and I approached their manager afterwards with a view to doing something with them on Radio Anglais.

But we shall see.

The Hoodoo House is now open for business too and we started off with Tomato Tomato, who come from Saint John. They’ve been at the Festival before but I don’t recall having seen them.

It’s a married couple, who have been together for 11 years, and the kind of music that they were playing was certainly different. It wasn’t jazz and it wasn’t blues either, but whatever it was, they put everything into it.

We had the guy on acoustic guitar and vocals (and by the looks of thing, banjo and a few other stringed instruments too) but it was the woman who interested me.

She was playing almost everything – the washboard, the cymbals, the tin can, and also the bass drum and the tambourine, which she was playing by hitting pedals with her heels.

That must have taken quite some co-ordination, but never mind. She managed it fine and it was really quite different

I’d seen Kill Chicago last year in the “new faces” competition and this year here they are again, back in the Barracks Tent as established performers.

I wasn’t all that impressed by them last year. It wasn’t that their music was bad in any way, it was just that the style of music didn’t appeal to me that much. It’s something like modern pseudo-punk, high energy stuff.

They were much more refined this year, having had 12 more months to work on their act, and the audience clearly enjoyed the music that they were hearing.

But as I said, it’s not for me and, in all honesty, I don’t know why it’s the kind of music that should feature at the festival. I don’t reckon that it’s blues, and it’s certainly not jazz.

Now, this is much, very much more like it.

We’ve all seen these before. It’s the Record Company and they’ve been here at the Festival before too. Playing proper music with exactly the right number of musicians on stage for a change, and they made the most of it.

We had a bassist and a drummer and also a third musician who played guitar but also occasionally played mouth organ (without the guitar).

Now I’ve said on numerous occasions that I don’t like harmonicas in blues bands, but that’s because most musicians don’t know how to play it properly. But here, the musician certainly knew how to use it, and he was using it in a novel way as backing to the bass and drums., and that’s different.

He also played slide guitar and bottleneck guitar (with a real bottleneck and this isn’t something that you see every day), and all in all, this was a really good performance.

They have moved clearly into first place on my hit list, and I sent a message backstage to contact them about doing something for Radio Anglais. We’ll have to see about that too.

Now this is an interesting duo, for sure.

We’ve not yet had an old traditional blues musician on stage yet – the kind that we always used to have back in the days when I first started coming to the Festival – but here we are at last, and about time too. And in the Hoodoo House, which is where I always used to spend my time back in those days.

This is Old Man Luedecke, and with a name like this, there has to be something about the blues in the performance.

He was accompanied by a mandolin … "PERSONdolin" – ed … player and between them they pumped out some good old Tennessee blues music during the time that I was there, and I would have stayed around had I not had other places to go and other people to see.

A couple of years ago, I’d really enjoyed Keith Hallett’s performance at the Festival, and I’d had quite a lengthy chat with him when I encountered him in the street back then.

He and his band had led my hit-list for quite a lengthy period that year (was it 2013?) until they were overtaken right at the very end of the Festival by the 24th Street Wailers and then by someone else whose name I have forgotten.

I was therefore quite looking forward to seeing his act this year, and when I noticed that he’d reduced his band from a four-piece to a three-piece (the right number of musicians on stage in any rock or blues band, in my opinion – lead vocalists may be extra) I knew that we were going to be in for a really good night back at the Barracks Tent.

And I wasn’t to be disappointed either.

And here he is, with his well-worn and well-battered semi-acoustic guitar, belting out the blues at 100mph.

As you might have expected, he’s soared to the top of my hit-list now and he’s yet another one to whom I’ve slipped a little note to ask him to contact me about doing something for Radio Anglais. I’d feature an hour-long live show by him at any day of the week. This performance was special.

Final act on stage (at least, that I saw – I’m not as young as I was and can’t keep it up like I used to) was Michael Franti and his backing band, Spearhead.

Franti is quite a well-known performer in North America with a string of hits behind his name (although he’s never made it across to Europe) and is one of the most popular live performers on the “circuit”. And it’s easy to see why from this performance.

His interaction with the crowd was stunning, to say the least. Just like Gord Downey last year, he knew how to reach out to the crowd, and that included going walkabout and having a dance on one of the refreshment tables in the middle of the hall.

And there’s no doubt whatever that everyone in the crowd enjoyed it. And going over to a woman in a wheelchair and giving her a big kiss was a piece of art.

The music though, was a long way short of the blues and that wasn’t for me.

But there was no doubt about the quality of it all because his backing band was superb. He had a young energetic lead guitarist, an old powerful bassist, a competent keyboard player and a wild, enthusiastic drummer, and they gelled together completely to belt it out for hours. I thoroughly enjoyed that part of the concert.

However all good things come to an end and I headed for home. But I was interrupted by a vegan wrap from a mobile food stand. They are all here now, and there’s a much bigger vegan choice of food on sale than in previous years.

Things are looking up!

And talking of that, what have – or haven’t you noticed tonight?

Despite all of my whinging yesterday, we haven’t had any brass sections. That’s a big improvement as far as I am concerned. I hope that it keeps up.

And by the way …

Wednesday 16th September 2015 – AND THE ANSWER TO YESTERDAY’S QUESTION IS …

… just about everybody.

Actually, that’s not quite right.

First port of call was the Scotia Bank. One of the things that I need is a bank statement with my name and Canadian address on it. And so to the Scotia Bank on the north side of Fredericton, and as you might expect, it was closed.

After a coffee however, it was open, and the bank quite happily obliged with the information. You can’t say fairer than that.

Next stop was Service Canada. They don’t have an immigration service office there – it’s in a separate department elsewhere and callers are only accepted by appointment. But they did have a telephone number and eventually, after a considerable wait and jumping through a great number of hoops, I was put through to a human being.

I need an immigration form 1M1442 setting out my entitlement to be in Canada. This can be applied for on-line, but the waiting list is … errr … three months, by which time I shall be out of the country. I can however obtain it at the border when I cross in.

And so after a great deal of discussion, there was only one solution – and that was to go BACK to Houlton where I crossed in yesterday, and pick it up from there. Of course, that will take a good few hours, but you spend more time debating the issue than actually doing anything and I am playing for high stakes here, so off I went.

And at the border we had the most astonishing arrangement that makes European bureauocracy look like nothing at all. I could only pick up the document as I ENTERED the country, so I had to leave the country, go and annoy the American immigration people (who were not in the least amused, and who can blame them?), do a U-turn, and then go back in to Canada.

Back in Canada, after much discussion, I ended up with the manager of the Canadian Immigration office there. They do indeed issue IM1442 forms there, but only for immigration purposes, not for demographic purposes. However he did accept that laws and rules and regulations change according to events, and he would have been quite happy to issue a document to me, but he needed something in writing from the Insurance Company.

And here’s the rub – the manager of the Insurance Company REFUSED to put the details in writing and to fax them to the Immigration Office – so that was that. I was there for a good few hours in earnest discussion, but I’m a miserable pleader at moments like this. However, I am in possession of the address of the Insurance Company Head Office (it’s in Dartmouth, opposite Halifax) and so I shall go to Home Depot and sort out a suitable pickaxe handle, then go for a drive.

Despite everything that the manager of the Immigration Service did for me, Service New Brunswick wouldn’t budge either, although they did give me the phone number of the Appeals body. I shall just have to apply on-line for this form – which of course takes much longer than the time that I’ll be spending in Canada – and the Insurance Company will still honour the policy as long as my application is ongoing.

Back at Fredericton (good old Strider), the Festival proper started tonight with two tents opened – the Blues Tent and the Mojo tent.

First up on stage at the Blues Tent were the Mellotones.

First thing to say about them, as you can see from the photo here, is that there are far too many musicians up there on the stage. Four too many in fact. I’ve no idea why they needed a brass section but there you are.

I mean – they were good at what they did – there’s no denying that of course – but it’s not my kind of music at all.

It certainly wasn’t blues, and as for jazz, well, jazz can be very good if it IS very good, but working over a few Bar-Kays numbers and that kind of thing isn’t really what I was expecting to hear. In fact, I found it all rather a dismal proceeding

From here I popped into the library. I’ve been writing quite a bit on certain occasions about the railway lines in New Brunswick and I went to see if they had any old maps of the area. And sure enough, they produced a set of old maps that showed quite a few railway lines, but it was dated from the late 19th Century and there were many lines which I know existed but were not recorded. I had been hoping for a map of the 1930s, but they had nothing from that era.

I wandered on from the library to the Mojo tent, in time to catch the start of the Downtown Blues Band.

We’d had the Bar-Kays in the Blues tent and so in the Mojo tent we had the Blues Brothers. The Downtown Blues Band played a re-hash of numbers from the film of the same name.

This was another occasion of far too many musicians on the stage. I’ve absolutely no idea why many of these groups want to have brass sections, and indeed why the organisers of the Festival want to book them. It beats me.

But then, as I have said so many times before, the rest of the audience enjoyed them. I’m clearly in a minority of one here.

The female singer was clearly enjoying herself on the stage. She was having a good time too.

And it has to be said – they were quite good at what they did. But to my mind, it’s not jazz and it’s not blues either. There’s clearly something that I’m missing here.

Back to the Blues tent and we had JJ Grey and Mofro from Florida. They’ve played the Festival before, but I somehow seem to have managed to miss them.

They started off quite well and I was feeling that I might actually enjoy this concert. But my feeling of elation didn’t last long.

They played a number that was crying out for a lead guitar solo, and they built up to this over a period of a good five minutes, or so it appeared to me.

And then we got it – the solo. But, would you believe, played on a trumpet. Well, I suppose, you would believe it after having read what I have written up to date. It was so disappointing as far as I was concerned.

And so back to the Mojo tent, and this was the Halifax group Paper Beat Scissors.

They are now living in Montreal and recording CDs, and they weren’t all that bad. They were something similar to Sigur Ros, but singing in English of course, and I didn’t mind at all staying here for a while to listen to them.

The one big drawback that they had was that they had a brass section.

When they wheeled on the French horn of whatever it is during the warm-up, I feared the worst. And I was right too, because even though the player started off on the keyboards and shaking his maraccas too, it didn’t take too long for him to get on the horn.

However, the singer had a good voice for what he was doing, and they were definitely the best band that I have seen here so far this year

But then again, that doesn’t say all that much for them. They haven’t had all that much competition to date as far as I was concerned.

Back again at the Blues tent, and we had Galactic on stage.

They started off with an instrumental number, and of course we did have the brass section that has featured in every act to date and it’s thoroughly dismayed me, in case you haven’t guessed

However, we were soon joined by a singer, a young lady from Louisiana if I remember correctly.

And their second number was a scorcher too. This was much more like it, even with the brass section and I quite enjoyed that. I was quite optimistic with that and was quite looking forward to the rest of the set.

But it was not to be, unfortunately.

Despite the energy that our vocalist was putting into her show, the third number degenerated into a rap number and if there’s one thing that really grates on my nerves, it’s rap music. This kind of stuff isn’t for me at all, and I beat a rather hasty retreat.

But not before we had had a little excitement on stage.

We had a small, lightweight platform on stage and they had an organ and a heavy drum kit crammed onto it. And I mean ‘crammed” too because there was no room for anyone to move and the drummer was extremely enthusiastic to say the least.

With the platform bouncing around, I was betting with myself about how long it would be before all of this went pear-shaped and sure enough, just a couple of minutes in to the performance, part of the drum kit collapsed across the stage. We had the roadie trying to rebuilt it all the time that the drummer was playing with what was left of the kit, and in the end they weighted it down with sandbags.

Now this is very much more like it.

At the Mojo tent we had Wintersleep.

I’d missed the start of their act because the performance of Galactic had started late, and so I can’t tell you all that much about them. but what I can say is that they were a four-piece band and I enjoyed their performance very much.

There was no brass section – or mouth organ – in sight while I was there and they were playing real music from my point of view.

Nothing quite as electric or as lively as Samantha Fish or the 24th Street Wailers, but then again, what could ever be as lively as all of that, but it was good enough to hold my attention for quite a while.

And so we definitely have a winner of today’s entertainment – something that was looking very unlikely after the first couple of acts this evening.

I’ll have to go and have a look for these and see if I can’t lay my hands on a live performance for broadcasting on Radio Anglais sometime in the near future. It would be quite enjoyable, that’s for sure.

And so I went back to Mactaquac Provincial Park and my tent.

I’d had a good night’s sleep last night for once and that had certainly helped with all of the issues that I had had to deal with during the day. I don’t suppose that tomorrow is going to be any different and so I’ll need to have a good night’s sleep.

And by the way …

… the photos that I’ve posted for tonight’s acts at the Harvest Jazz and Blues Festival are only a small sample of the dozens and dozens that I took during the evening. If you want to see any more of those that I took, you’ll need to contact me. Leave a comment and I’ll be in touch.

Tuesday 15th September – I WAS RIGHT …

… yesterday when I said that this first month of my stay in North America had been one of 30 disappointments. We’ve had another issue raise its ugly head today too.

There’s only one company in Canada that insures vehicles for people with non-Canada driving licences (and they make people suffer financially for that of course) but it seems that since April this year they have ceased that particular line of business. And so the motor insurance for Strider has been rejected, leaving me without insurance cover.

However, the company has said that cover can remain on a temporary basis while I apply of a driving licence in Canada and so that’s what I’ll do. Apply for a Canadian driving licence.

Of course.

How long it might take, and whether it might be granted is of course another thing completely, and then there will always be an appeal process if it’s refused. But by that time of course I’ll be back home in France and it won’t be an issue. And next year is, of course, next year.

And so tomorrow, I’ll get on the case.

But if you think logically about it, it’s all a nonsense. There is without any doubt at all at least one company that insures drivers with foreign driving licences. If there wasn’t a single one, then how would car hire work? I’ve hired dozens of cars in North America and each hire has been with my French driving licence. And I still can do so (because I’ve checked). You aren’t going to tell me that a car hire company is going to let its customers drive around in uninsured vehicles, are you?

And it’s true (or it was true – at least in the UK) that when I worked in the motor insurance business, a company or a person could insure himself against liability. But he had to deposit a bond of £50,000 (and that was in 1972 – I shudder to think what that figure would be today) per vehicle and that money is tied up. I can’t see a hire company going through all of that, having the money tied up, no tax relief, no interest payments and all of this.

No – there is a company somewhere that specialises in this business and I have to find it. I’ve always said that where there’s a will, there are relatives. It’s just one more problem to solve. Now, how do you go about setting up a car hire business in Canada?

But apart from that for the moment, I slept the sleep of the dead last night. I crashed out at 20:28 and that was that until I had to go and ride the porcelain horse. An early(-ish) start and I did a pile of work and then a copious breakfast. I really can’t believe all of this for just $59:40 (including tax).

But while I was eating my breakfast I was watching TV (something that I rarely do of course) and the disclaimers for the adverts (which are often longer than the ads themselves) are quite often funnier than any comedy programme you would care to name. This morning we had a “do not take {this product} if you are allergic to any of its ingredients”. And you can’t make that up, can you?

Back on the road Walmart came up trumps with the big tent pegs that I’m going to need if I use this tarpaulin oversheet idea for the tent, and it also produced a couple of gas canisters for my cooker (they are becoming harder and harder to find as everyone changes over to the bigger sort) and a set of stubby spanners, which cost just $4:49. Ideal for getting into tight corners. But Mardens couldn’t produce a 19mm ring spanner at any cost. Still, I have an open-ended one and a socket and I hope that that will do me if I need anything.

At the border, I was whacked for import duty on the truck cap. $90:00 or something like that, but I don’t suppose that this is excessive really. It’s worked out as 5% of the value (in Canadian dollars), including, would you believe, the sales tax that I had to pay in the USA. That’s a bit near the knuckle.

I had a race down the Trans-Canada Highway with a lorry – simply because I didn’t recognise his number plate and I wanted to see where he came from.

As it happens, he comes from Georgia (that’s Georgia USA, not the former Soviet republic) and so he was a long way away from home. It seems that the Maritime Provinces are becoming more and more popular.

Af Fredericton I picked up my parking pass for the next three days (foreign visitors can park free in the town centre for three days if they apply to the tourist office for a pass), picked up my media passes for the festival and went to have a chat with the people at Service New Brunswick who gave me a couple of useful tips.

At Value Village, it’s Pensioners Day and I profited to the maximum with a pile of books, a couple of CDs and also (at long last) the Canadian cable that I need for my laptop power pack (which saves having to hump around a pile of adapters. Walmart and Home Depot came up with nothing exciting and so I went for my traditional falafel platter in the Lebanese restaurant and then came back here – “here” being the Mactaquac Provincial Park campsite where I stay when I’m here.

But we did have a very interesting encounter this afternoon. You may remember yesterday that I was talking about big old British single-cylinder motorcycles. Anyway, wandering down the street in Fredericton I noticed a young guy sitting on, of all things, a Triumph T100. 1971 it was, and it looked it too. In original, unrestored condition looking every day as old as it was. We were chatting for hours about old British bikes and of course, AJS and Matchless motorcycles figured heavily. And it turns out that he has a friend who has a fetish about the big AJS and Matchless singles and who, at the last count, has 14 of them, plus numerous crates of bits and pieces. And so he’s taken my e-mail address and says that he’ll pass it over to this guy.

And so that was that. I buried myself in my sleeping bag ready for bed.

Now who is going to come along and spoil my day tomorrow?

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality

Tag Archives: new brunswick

Monday 12th October 2015 – IT’S THANKSGIVING.

Sunday 11th October 2015 – I THOUGHT THAT I HAD LEFT …

Saturday 10th October 2015 – MY QUIET WEEKEND CONTINUES

Friday 9th October 2015 – I HAD A QUIET …

Tuesday 6th October 2015 – WHAT A NICE NIGHT!

Monday 5th October 2015 – AND THAT WAS ANOTHER NIGHT TOO

Sunday 4th October 2015 – I DUNNO …

Tuesday 22nd September 2015 – HERE IN THE NICE AND QUIET …

Monday 21st September 2015 – IT WAS COLD …

Sunday 20th September 2015 – YOU MAY REMEMBER …

Saturday 19th September 2015 – SOMEONE IS ON A POWER TRIP …

Friday 18th September 2015 – I KNEW THAT …

Thursday 17th September 2015 – AND SO TODAY …

Wednesday 16th September 2015 – AND THE ANSWER TO YESTERDAY’S QUESTION IS …

Tuesday 15th September – I WAS RIGHT …

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