Day 54 Mont St-Hillaire, Quebec
Hudson to Mont St-Hillaire
Distance: 120 km
August 16, 2006

Breaking news-a skunk felled the mighty Aussie Taj!
This morning at approximately 4:00am the little, furry, black and white creature was nosing around their tent, when Peter, thinking whatever it was that was scratching and poking around could be discouraged by a solid ‘whack’, was unpleasantly surprised when the beast retaliated by spilling the nasty, oily contents of it’s smelly little stink-sack all over the Kookaburra Lodge.
Following the nasty spillage from the wicked creature, the contents of the Kookaburra Lodge came tumbling out of the tent, coughing, splattering, and gasping for air.
Poor Carol-Anne was retching and vomiting from the foul stench.
Since their tent had been sprayed, all the contents of the tent were tainted by the fetid stench; they could not return to sleep, so got up for a cup of tea to ponder their stinky predicament.
In the meantime, the brazen skunk returned for more excitement, and was nosing around the trash it had scattered around the camping area; Peter decided it was time to exact revenge and sprayed it with the hose-this time sending it away, albeit probably wet and stinky.
It probably went away to brew another rank and malodorous concoction-this time embittered even more by its last experience, and even more trigger happy for the next opportunity to soil some more poor unsuspecting campers.
The camp employee happily reported that a few days earlier someone had made their way tearfully into the camp store looking for skunk spray, as the same thing had happened to them.
Another guy in charge (we think) came roaring up to our site in a golf cart to investigate the scene of the crime.
He seemed rather proud that one of his skunks had sprayed another camper, as he had a huge grin on his face, and obviously found the situation very amusing (so did we, but not at that moment, it was too soon for humor.)
He kept asking, “Was eet the beeg wan or the leetle wan that make pee on your tent?”
“Ze beeg wan is the mamma skunk and she ees the wan to make pee on the tent.”
(They weren’t sure, but assumed it was the ‘beeg wan.’)

The poor Aussies, what a terrible thing to have happen; they can now say that they have truly had The Canadian Experience.
I think we should be warned more of skunks than of bears as they are definitely more prolific and not as scared of us-as-we-of-them (like the spiders and bears.)
Carol-Anne, understandably angry and embittered by this unwelcome of Canadian experiences suggested that we write to our MP’s and lobby for the abolition of skunks.

And wouldn’t you know it that this furry little stinker set in motion a series of most unfortunate events that ultimately led to us having one of our longest days ever.
To second the bad start to the day, we missed the first turn and ended up back-tracking 6 km-not an auspicious start to the day, when just 2 km into the ride.
Since the Aussies had such rotten luck, we decided to stick with them and go to a Canadian Tire to buy a new tent (The Almighty Taj was chucked-along with pillows!)
While there, Lewis took out his wallet to use a coin to change his cleats; the wallet didn’t make it back into his pocket, and thus, we set out-sans wallet.
Approximately 50 km away the wallet-less pocket was discovered when trying to buy lunch in Montreal-panic ensued, and was followed by frantic phone calls to all the places we’d been along the way-no such luck.
We spent a while in Montreal on the phone, trying to negotiate our way through the language and bureaucracy at Canadian Tire to reach the appropriate people.
I know that one can end up pulling out one’s hair when trying to get through in one’s own language, so never mind in French.
After cancelling the credit cards and sitting around with long faces for the appropriate length of time, we pressed on.
Poor Peter was carrying the tent in a backpack, and this was not the day to be doing it as the roads were terrible; cracked, bumpy and festooned with holes-making it a very slow and arduous ride.

Even though the distance was short, it turned out to be one of our longest days yet, as we got in at 6:00pm, just in time for the dinner clang.
Poor Aussies-all their stuff reeks and it will probably take ages for the smell to dissipate-oh well, at least they can boast to their grandkids that they were sprayed by a genuine piece of Canadiana!
They have not had good luck with the beasts and insects in Canada; Carol-Anne has been stung twice by bees, once giving her a bad infection that necessitated a visit to the doctor followed by antibiotics, and then she was stung in her tent in the wee hours of the morning before dawn (why and how a bee got into the tent shall always remain a mystery.)
Poor Peter had to wake up and tend to another bee sting, while all bleary eyed and half asleep, and Carol-Anne had to suffer the indignity of another sting.

As it turns out Bob also lost his wallet today, but had the fortune of having someone decent find it, as they turned it into the local police station (who called his wife and left a message, “please call the police regarding your husband Bob.”)
Not the kind a call one wants to receive, but in this case, with a happy ending-not so for us unfortunately, leading me to think this Karma thing is a bunch of crap as I have found a few wallets and have always returned them with all the contents still inside!