The Route Home

So we're back on the trailhead home. Trip has been more than a success and we only have a few small stops to make on the way back. The foie gras farm that we missed is one of them. Or so we thought. After powering through the vast majority of New Brunswick and stopping to eat crappy poutine in Edmunston, we spend the night in St. Apollinaire. The town is only on our map because of a farm known as "le Canard Goulu". It's a traditional small-scale Quebec foie farm, with a loyal base and what at first appears to be open visitation to the farm. It becomes clear on arrival that it's merely a storefront, not a real farm. There is, however, a petting zoo in the back, which, much to our chagrin, doesn't have any ducks with big livers. So we bought a small pate and decided to move on, disappointed that one our finale highlights was going to go down as a failure. The storefront is pretty and all, but that isn't what we came for.

Thankfully the second promised to make up for it. A friend from Quebec had given us her sister's number on our first drive through. Her sister is an owner of a wicked cranberry farm in Quebec. To be precise, the second largest farm in Quebec. And so young as owners, it's extremely impressive. Her husband took us in his massive ford to roll around the farm. In what is an extremely base example, the farm is basically a bunch of trenches dug out to produce cranberries. As it turns out, with a large capital investment, you can do a lot with cranberries. After the initial hit in the bank, they basically take care of themselves. Very hardy, easy to maintain, they choke out weeds and live through the winter if cared for properly. Once planted, the plant is good for life.

The harvest is also a point of real interest. They flood the entire field before running an agitator tractor through the lot to loosen the cranberries. The cranberries float to the surface, then are dragged by a massive hose between tractors on either side of the field. At the end they are being dragged to is a massive suction hose which runs them up to a conveyor to a truck, the water is sucked up and drained into the next pond. The filter also gets a lot of the branches and leaves out.

Once the truck is full, it goes to the sorting house, where it gets graded and separated into bins. Another interesting note is wintering. Cranberries winter well, but before winter, they flood the trenches again to cover the plants. This water will freeze, but ironically, stays warmer than the air, and won't kill the plants.
Another super interesting innovation. On top of letting us come into Quebec and checking out their farm, they also gave us free reign on a cranberry patch, to pick what we could. We probably only took two pounds, but they go a long way and they are extremely annoying to pick by hand. I have to thank both Christine and Seb for their hospitality and for letting us get our hands on fresh cranberries, something I don't think I've ever had before the last few days. I actually just finished cooking the last of them about an hour ago.

After the cranberries we hit the road to Ottawa, the end, and only one more stop before that. For the record, the drive back featured the most poetry inspiring leaves in the entire world. The changing colours are nature's insanity at it's finest. Too bad I'm no poet.