Day Two – May 23, 2012

We got away from Cornwall mid-morning and headed east. Just outside Montreal, Sue realized that what she was interpreting as a half-full gas tank was actually the battery meter and, in fact, we were running on empty. Luckily we were able to remedy the situation before these two uni-linguals were stranded on a Quebec expressway. Wouldn’t that have been an adventure! Another lesson learned.
Despite construction, we managed to maneuver our way around Montreal – keeping to Uncle Mike’s advice about staying in the centre lane – and headed down highway 40 EST.
When we saw the signs announcing Shawinigan ahead, Madeleine began to dream about the Memorial Cup. What the heck – we headed north to Shawinigan, and lo and behold found the arena with a little help from a really sweet young fellow in a hardware store. We were able to pick up a couple of tickets and got invited to the Tailgate party. We found a campground right on Melville Isle in the middle of the city – five minutes from the arena. Was this meant to be or what?

Shawinigan was playing last year’s champions so the crowd was “enthusiastic” to say the least but sadly, they didn’t quite have what it takes to bring the big boys down. …But we did get to see the “little guy from Shawinigan”…