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KAMOURASKA, Quebec (AP) – When the pandemic fell, the unlimited views and insane sunsets of Kamouraska became a distant and unattainable dream for this cyclist from Virginia. It is one of the most beautiful places in Quebec and, for me, an annual touchstone that I could no longer touch.
It is finally at hand. On August 9, the day Canada conditionally reopened the border to American tourists, my car with the bike was packed and ready to go. But I wasn’t. I had postponed the required coronavirus test too late to be sure I had the results on time.
On Labor Day, with my paperwork now complete, I drove north, crossed the border, and quickly cycled through a tapestry of storybook villages, canola fields and wild rose hedges. along the vast expanse of the St. Lawrence River.
Americans who wish to experience Canada’s vibrant autumn or its wintery landscapes can do so again. But getting here means jumping through hoops before you go. And to be here is to adapt to hypervigilance against the virus. Canada doesn’t mess around with COVID-19 – and doesn’t suffer from it like people in many parts of the United States are now.
These hoops? To enter Canada as a tourist, you must be fully immunized. You must take a COVID variety PCR test no more than 72 hours in advance, with results ready to be presented at the border if you are driving or at the departure airport before you can board.
You must first register with the Canadian government and obtain a code. You should lay out the basics of a backup quarantine plan ahead of time, in case you are randomly tested again upon arrival and tested positive.
You can’t be like the Atlanta man the border guards were talking about when I walked through. He had stopped a few nights earlier, unvaccinated, without testing, without registration and without hope of entering Canada, more than 16 hours from home.
I crossed the Thousand Islands Bridge in Ontario, where there was no waiting. Two officials checked my vaccines and my test documentation before I could make it to the border crossing, where I had the information and my US passport checked again. The guard asked a few questions and cheerfully sent me on my way.
In the nearby town of Brockville, people wore masks both inside and out. They were masked in the streets of downtown, in the waterfront park and in parking lots. When I gave in to my unnatural craving for Tim Hortons coffee, a rarity in most of the United States but everywhere, just across Canada, a group of about 10 people walked in together.
They were masked, but not socially distanced. The staff immediately ordered them out and told them to come back properly separated, a few at a time.
This contrasted with the laxity along much of the Interstate 81 corridor and upstate New York, where few shoppers in stores off the freeway were masked and no enforcement of the distancing was not evident. After my trip, St. Lawrence County in New York was seeing new cases of COVID at a rate 12 times higher than across the river in Ontario.
Vigilance in Ontario only intensified when I reached Quebec the next day. It was the first days of Quebec’s “vaccine passport”, the first of its kind in Canada.
Residents over 12 years old must have passport to be seated indoors or on terraces of restaurants, bars, concert halls, outdoor events of more than 50 people and most other public places that are not judged essential. Foreigners do not need and cannot obtain the passport but must present proof of vaccination as well as an identity document indicating a residential address outside Quebec. Proof of vaccination is not required to stay in a hotel in Quebec, but must be presented to enter the halls and other common areas.
Upon entering the still very lively Estaminet restaurant in Rivière-du-Loup, my friend Suzie Loiselle, responsible for tourism for the vast region of Quebec Maritime, held up the passport application on her phone so that it could be scanned by the host.
“Adequately protected” – “adequately protected” – flashed on the screen in green. With that and my vaccine card, we got our seats.
The pandemic hit hard in Quebec, as in Ontario, before Canada overcame its vaccine shortages and beat the United States and much of the world in immunization. Today, 70% of Canadians are fully vaccinated compared to 55% of Americans.
“We went through hell during these first three waves,” Quebec Health Minister Christian Dubé said when the passport was announced. “People want to get vaccinated and they want to have normal lives. “
For many Americans, a system to record the movement of people in public places has failed. In Quebec, Loiselle said, it was widely accepted by the public from its inception. “Most of the population really wants to have access to things that were closed during the pandemic,” she said. Now they have their freedom of movement and assembly again, from government enforcement.
I stayed at the Auberge sur Mer, as I usually do, in Notre-Dame-du-Portage, a village on the outskirts of Rivière-du-Loup, in a single room next to the elegant main house and its good restaurant. Here, the wide river makes the transition to the sea, the Charlevoix mountains in the distance on the other shore. The view from the balcony of my room and all along the shore is breathtaking.
The bike ride to Kamouraska and back, some 40 miles or 64 kilometers, passes through misty islands and fog banks stuck in coves under a sky that always seems turbulent, except in the early morning calm. It’s a recipe for the beautiful sunsets which, along with kayaking, whale watching, hiking, biking, and food, draw crowds from all over Europe in normal times.
The route here is part of Route Verte 1, a major stopover in Quebec’s enormous network of over 3,300 miles or 5,300 km of cycle paths. The Route Verte (Green Lane) system was developed to provide cyclists with safe long-distance routes with amenities such as guaranteed space for cyclists in campgrounds and accredited hostels with secure bicycle storage and facilities. healthy food.
On this seaside road and other roads in the Kamouraska hills, you can cycle in peaceful solitude. You may find that a loneliness that you choose is very different from that that a virus imposes on you.
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IF YOU ARE GOING: Download the Canadian government’s ArrivCAN app and follow the steps. All. Save screenshots of all key documents in case your phone is not connected to the border, or have hard copies. Or both.
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