Mr. and Mrs. Pants Canadian Adventure, Summer 2025

[FJRoss]

I pull into the quaint little town of Sutton and I get that tingle we've all known to love and expect.

Is such old hat nowadays one doesn't even notice the electric Ford Mach-E. In the quaint little town.

There is a surprising number of full electric and plug-in hybrids in the province of Quebec. More than I have seen elsewhere.
Gas is more expensive there, electricity is cheap and there were some pretty good incentives/rebates earlier on.

[Hppants]

This is true - I've seen dozens (plural) of mustang lightenings in Quebec. Honestly, it is kind of "old hat" here. I would say that nearly half of ALL vehicles less than 5 years old are PIHVs.

[danh600]

I certainly understand that waiting for hot weather to break. It was late Oct to early Nov in S FL. One of the things I like about moving. Actual full blown hot summer here is 3 months instead of 9.

Thanks for this report. I enjoying seeing these areas.

Just curious. If someone lived on one of those back road rural areas. Can they legally cross the border to see an American neighbor or family member? To shop or what not?

[bigjohnsd]

Just curious. If someone lived on one of those back road rural areas. Can they legally cross the border to see an American neighbor or family member? To shop or what not?

No

[Hppants]

I certainly understand that waiting for hot weather to break. It was late Oct to early Nov in S FL. One of the things I like about moving. Actual full blown hot summer here is 3 months instead of 9.

Thanks for this report. I enjoying seeing these areas.

Just curious. If someone lived on one of those back road rural areas. Can they legally cross the border to see an American neighbor or family member? To shop or what not?

Agree with John - just cause you can doesn't mean you may. At the end of the road, at the crossroad, to the left was a border crossing station. I went right.

[bungie4]

Up until the 1950's s Canadian, or American, could cross the border at will to stay permanently. It was called naturalization and in researching my families history i found many who did it.

I also found the infant mortality rate was shockingly high up until the 50s. But that something else entirely.

[Hppants]

9/2/25

Today is a speical day. So special, we're gonna clean up the ABB getting ready for it. Now let me say something about that: coincidence or not, both of the ABBs we've chosen for this year have a WHOLE house vaccum system. The unit is in the basement closet and the suction hard pipe runs in the wall with one tap on each floor. Ingenious!



It makes cleaning the house MUCH easier as you only have to fight the suction hose. I wonder if this is popular in Quebec and/or Canada? Too disruptive to open the walls at my house for this, otherwise, I'd install a system as soon as I got home. It's that cool.

We cleaned up around the place getting ready for company!



Our friends Turk (FJBandit) and his wife Jana dropped in for a visit. I invited them to come see us, and it worked out great as they were on vacation touring in the region, and added us to their itiniary.

They got settled in and we decided to take happy hour to the lake. Tammy made one of her famous charcuterie boards for us to enjoy.



Later, I cooked some steaks on the grill and we had a nice quiet conversation at the ABB. It was so nice to see friends.

Stay thirsty, my friends....

[Hppants]

9/3/25

I slept like a rock - I suppose 2 IPAs and a snort of fire water didn't hurt that cause last night. Turk told me that he and Jana also were cofortable down in the finished basement. I was glad to hear that, and was concerned not knowing much about basements. I made some coffee and laid out a continental breakfast for us, while we plotted for the day's activiites.

I drove Jana's car for the day, as the nice SUV was FAR more comfortable for us than my truck would have been. First stop, Mont Orford National Parc.



Nothing too extravagant - I just wanted to show them the parc and we took a short walk on a trail to check it out. We spotted 2 loons on the pond, but Turk may or may not be checking out a couple of ladies here.



So much fun to have a day with friends.





From the Parc, it was as short drive to Magog to look around.



Tammy and I ate at this cafe' a week or so ago, and really enjoyed it. So we decided to eat there for lunch.



From Magog, we ran south a bit to the monestery so that Jana could buy some cheese from the fromererie. And then we drove 30 minutes to one of the winery/cideries for afternoon refreshments. Then it was back to the ABB for more laughs. I prepared a simple taco bar for dinner and the conversation continued into the evening.

Stay thirsty, my friends....

[Hppants]

September 4, 2025

Another good nights' sleep - I'm living large. I laid out the same continental breakfast with coffee this morning. About 8:30 am, Turk and Jana were loaded up and on their way. We thanked them profusely for taking time out of their vacation to come see us. We had a great visit with them.

The sun is shining and the temperature is really pleasant. Tammy asked if I felt like a paddle, and that sounded just fine so we grabbed our stuff and walked 50 meters to the lake shore.



The kids are in school, the workers are at work, and we've got the lake all to ourselves. Well, except for that pair of loons we saw.





There's a small uninhabited island in the middle of the lake. We've been wanting to explore it since we got here, and today is the day.



I helped Tammy onto the island and this is very nice. It would appear that at one point, there was a structure here of some kind. We will come back here for a picnic one day.



A picture is worth 1,000 words.



Tammy caught me being thankful.



Looks like this was an old hunting tree stand - we figure the island was the top of a hill before the lake was formed.



Satisfied with our discovery, we got back in the boats and paddled around the island shore. The water is crystal clear.



It was a nice date with my bride.

After lunch, I took the truck about 15 KM away looking for a less congested and somewhat flatter place to ride the bicycle. I found that along the banks of the Saint Francois River.



It's starting to happen, ya'll!!



It was nice to see the river while I was riding.



I did a couple of "out and backs" on each side of the river and ended up with about 27 miles for the ride. Perfect.

Stay thirsty, my friends....

[bungie4]

Interesting fact de'jour:

Loons cannot walk on land.

Speaking of loons, awesome to see Turk!

Edit: oh ya! The vacuum.. that's a central vac. Fairly common up here. Our house has one but for some reason, goes unused.

I find it a little funny your reaction to the basement. I've never seen a house without one. Well, I've seen a house with a half basement the other half being a crawlspace. Our house a full suite downstairs. A full bath, kitchen, two bedrooms and a living area - along with a storage room and a laundry room.

[Hppants]

The whole concept of a basement is so counterintuitive to me. There are NO basements at home. I'd have to issue a personal floatation device - lol.

[fontanaman]

So did you pick the ABB because it is a good location for fall colors? Hopefully you will get to see the colors. It is a photographer dream. Tip. Are there are any ski hills in the area? If so go there because the colors will start there first.

[Hppants]

So did you pick the ABB because it is a good location for fall colors? Hopefully you will get to see the colors. It is a photographer dream. Tip. Are there are any ski hills in the area? If so go there because the colors will start there first.

We can definitely see the color changing generally from the highest tops, and working its way down.

We wavered back and forth on a "second location" for this summer. On the one hand, 4 months is a long time to be in one place, and a new place offers a lot of opportunities to see new things, learn some nuances within the cultures of Quebec, etc. But on the other, having to pack/unpack the crap an extra time seemed unpleasant. When we learned that the 1st place wasn't available for the entire summer, then the decision was made for us. We really liked the look, location, and price of the first place, and didn't want to lose it in the interest of staying all summer in one area.

So we looked into a lot of options for place #2. Knowing we would be leaving late August, I didn't want to go north or east from Quebec City out of fear for getting caught in poor weather. I also didn't want to go somewhere too far away - wanting to make sure we got there in 1 day. I have mentioned before that our son works for the Gov't of Quebec, and I asked him to chat about it with some of his co-workers who are from here. A common suggestion was the Eastern Townships, which is the region we are now in. We then found out that the fall colors here are always very good. That sealed the deal.

As it turned out, the packing/unpacking thing wasn't nearly as buzz killing as we thought it would be. Packing for this was MUCH easier than packing to leave home. Also - we easily could have gone a bit further away distance wise, and still got to place #2 in one day. Perhaps for me (not necessarily Tammy), ideally, I'd want to go twice as far away as I could ride the FJR in one day trip. Meaning - if I draw an imaginary circle around our first ABB, representing the farthest distance I would ride the FJR in a day and still get back to the ABB, then I would DOUBLE that distance and find a place there for ABB #2. This way, from ABB #2, I could potentially get back to my imaginary line to explore, and get back to the ABB in a day. That method would allow me the opportunity to see the MOST land within the region. Tammy wouldn't understand that, and her priorities are much different. So it doesn't exactly go that way.

Still further, when we are picking a spot to summer, we are not getting too far into the weeds. We'd rather discover it raw. To be clear, I'm looking at basic stuff. Is there a place to paddle close by? Decent amount of forest with multi-use trails? Few mountains for some contour? Things like this. Tammy wants to know how far she's got to drive to get to shopping. Museums. Is the food scene decent?

It's worth noting that the price of the ABBs varies tremendously no matter where we go. There are good buys to be made (comparatively), but you have to put in the work during the planning. Reservations get cancelled and new places come up often. We are at somewhat of an advantage when it comes to location. Since we are there so long, it doesn't have to be in the middle of everything, and honestly, a bit outside is preferable to us, as long as it doesn't mean 45 minutes to the grocery, pharmacy, gas station, and other "essentials". Generally speaking, these people are NOT experienced in selling property. They take horrible pictures and when they describe the property, often, they stress on stuff that nobody cares about, and leave out very important details that everyone would want to know. We've learned to ask specific questions in order to get the rest of the story.

Regardless, summering in an ABB comes with strings attached. In the end, it's the owner's property - they can do what they want to do. As the renters, we don't have much of a leg to stand on. And so, we have to be flexible and somewhat ready for a surprise. That has taken some getting used to.

And so, we put it all into our "algorithem" and we hope for some luck. So far, so good.

Meh - just some musings regarding logistics....

[bungie4]

I was kind of shocked about the duration you stayed at ABB Numero 0. Having rented two bedrooms in my house through ABB, i knew that it was a really bad idea to rent longer than 30 days to a single person. At least in Ontario. It seems that that after 30 days they have tenants rights. Not something you want in Ontario as landlord/tenant law in Ontario is very skewed in favor of the tenant (and rightly so).

[Hppants]

I was kind of shocked about the duration you stayed at ABB Numero 0. Having rented two bedrooms in my house through ABB, i knew that it was a really bad idea to rent longer than 30 days to a single person. At least in Ontario. It seems that that after 30 days they have tenants rights. Not something you want in Ontario as landlord/tenant law in Ontario is very skewed in favor of the tenant (and rightly so).

Hoestly, that never crossed my mind. Both of the property owners we are renting from this summer actually prefer to rent to longer term guests (more than 30 days). They don't have to worry about cleaning, prepping, re-stocking, etc more often. As "Superhost" with ABB, they actually offer a discount for longer term rentals. As host, they can decide and filter out long term rentals as a possibility.

Once we are settled in and it's apparent that the place we've chosen is reasonably close to our expectations, then our biggest risk is that during our stay, the owner sells the property, has it repossessed, or other circumstances arise that would force us to vacate. While not likely, this is a legal possibility. One of the questions we ask the owner before we commit is:

"Do you have any plans to sell or otherwise see circumstances arising with the property during the time of our requested stay that would force us to vacate?"

The rest of our questions are more logistical - this is the only one on the "legal" side that we ask. And in reality, they can lie and it really doesn't matter. We are at their mercy.

We've been offered by property owners to sign a short term lease instead, removing ABB from the transaction. The owners have offered us higher discounts, usually in the form of splitting ABB's share (theoretically a win-win for both of us). I've hesitated on this because my exposure increases if, between the reservation and the move in, the owner sells or otherwise I get into a legal tiff. Ex: the owner doesn't really own the property. Property has been repossessed. Property is not what it was advertised to be. Etc etc. If this happens with ABB, I can (with only a few exceptions) get my money back. With a short term lease, I'd have to sue the owner. And paying $5,000 in attorney fees to potentially recover $5,000 doesn't make much sense, not to mention you can't squeeze blood out of a turnip. This is what you get when you give ABB their cut, rightfully so, IMO.

[bigjohnsd]

Joey, it might/would be helpful if you published your "Algorithm" in its entirety.

[gixxerjasen]

Joey, it might/would be helpful if you published your "Algorithm" in its entirety.

Yer talking about a man who made a career out of risk management. You sure you are ready to read Joey's extremely thick book on that?

[bigjohnsd]

Joey, it might/would be helpful if you published your "Algorithm" in its entirety.

Yer talking about a man who made a career out of risk management. You sure you are ready to read Joey's extremely thick book on that?

Yes

[fontanaman]

Joey, it might/would be helpful if you published your "Algorithm" in its entirety.

Rather than trying to understand the "Algorithm" I want to make it simpler on my feeble mind by hiring Joey to find my next ABB in Arizona.

[wheatonFJR]

Meanwhile, back in Canada...