PhotoGeo Trip Down East – Part 1

My friend Dan and I are half way through our photo trip down East. We are taking 10 days to cover what could be done in about 18 hours. When my wife and I were considerably younger we drove straight through, but what’s the fun in that?

Our goal is Mahone Bay just southeast of Halifax. On the way, we will stop near Granby, Baie-Saint-Paul, the Saguenay, Gaspé, in Québec and Kouchibouguac National Park in New Brunswick before arriving in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia. For each, a shorter day of driving is followed by a full day at each location to explore. Each of the places were carefully chosen, ‘curated’ really, to satisfy our interests as retired geographers, and to suit our needs as outdoor landscape and nature photographers.

Day One: to Granby, Québec

We left southern Ontario on Tuesday and made good time to the Monteregian Hills east of Montreal. The Monteregian Hills are a series of volcanic plugs that begin near the Vermont border and run westwards across the Eastern Townships to just past Montreal. Mont Royal in Montréal is one of them. They were formed about 125 million years ago as the North America plate moved over a hotspot, much like the Galápagos Islands and the Hawaiian Islands, except these were, rather unusually, formed under much thicker continental crust.

My goal was to capture the orchards and or vineyards of the area, with one or more of the hills as a backdrop. I also wanted to get a sense of the ‘Cantons de L’Est’, as they are known in French, with their mix of very English placenames and Québecois culture. As a fan of Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache series of novels, I also wanted to see some of the places she has used in her novels.

Of course, the best made plans . . . It is wildfire season in Canada and while the fires, some 2000km to the northwest, have not been a problem for us in the east, the smoke has. Many evenings have had an eerie, warm glow caused by smoke high in the atmosphere. We haven’t smelled it, nor has it caused breathing issues, but the slight yellowish tinge to otherwise sunny, blue-sky days has marred our hopes of grand vistas and views. Even Lightroom’s ‘Dehaze’ slider can only do so much.

So we’ve had to adapt. For example, early morning and late evening landscapes have been a bust due to the haze, so we’ve taken to spending more time photographing some of the cultural sites in the region and visiting some natural areas to photograph birds and wildflowers.

Day 2: Around les Cantons de L’Est

Our day around Granby began at Le Marais de la Rivière aux Cerises at Magog, an extensive alder wetland area with a number of trails and well-developed boardwalks. Frogs, turtles, waterfowl, a variety of passerines, plus wetland plants were our focus here.

I am taking full advantage of in-camera Focus Stacking mode (8 shots with a differential of 5)—so easy to do, even when handholding the camera. The resulting JPEGs, a necessary evil of in-camera Focus Stacking, are surprisingly good and editable, provided there is no ghosting. For the photos I wish to pursue further, I still have the raw frames to create a higher-quality stack using Affinity Photo.

It was a hot day, so by 11:30am, we were ready to move on. During lunch at North Hatley, Dan mentioned a monastery nearby that was inspiration in a couple of Louis Penny novels, so off we went. On the way, though—how could we not stop for a bright yellow house! The smoke had temporarily cleared, giving us a clear blue sky to work with.

Now, for the Abbey. Wow! A beautiful building in a stunning setting, though the interior of the church itself is very austere. The gleaming copper was compelling as were the repeating patterns of windows and stone.

Finally, we were off to Knowlton, of Louise Penny fame. I have to admit to being a bit underwhelmed. Knowlton is a nice enough village, but neither Lac Brome Books nor La Relais Bistro were anything like the bookstore and bistro in her novels. Furthermore, when the bistro is charging $14 for a can of local beer—a can!—, you know it has become a bona fide tourist trap. How unfortunate. Call it the Louise Penny premium, or the price of fame.

Day Three: To the Charlevoix Region

On the way to the beautiful Charlevoix Region, I just couldn’t pass up taking a slight detour to see one of the many covered bridges in the Eastern Townships. And it turned out to be a winner. After many backroads, we were finally within spitting distance when our way was blocked by a downed tree. A few minutes of careful limb-breaking, ensuring the tree didn’t come down on us, and we managed to clear away enough of a hole to drive through, Whew! You just never know what you’ll encounter!

Note only is the covered bridge red, it has only one wire marring the scene and, even better, it is set atop a wonderful little waterfall. To top it off, there is a somewhat bouncy bridge that offered the perfect photo spot, provided neither one us moved (we were the only ones there—talk about a good day!)

After zipping around Québec City and all the construction going on, we were off towards Baie-Saint-Paul and the The Charlevoix Region. The north shore of the St. Lawrence River is a spectacular coastline of cliffs as the ancient and eroded Laurentian mountains were split by a 1000km-long rift during the formation of the Iapetus Sea some 500 million to 1 billion years ago. It’s one of the reasons why the St. Lawrence, at this point, is a true, brackish to salt water estuary, and one of the world’s longest (655km) and deepest. At Baie-Saint-Paul it’s 25km across!

Even more impressive is the origin of Les Éboulements, where we had booked a room: it is the central uplift of the Charlevoix Astrobleme, a massive impact structure or crater, 50km across, formed by a 4.5km wide meteor that slammed into Earth 450 million years ago. Once you know what you’re looking at, it’s even visible on Google Maps, even though it wasn’t ‘discovered’ until 1965.

Now, how to photograph it, with milky skies from wildfires. Right. Almost impossible.

So now, we are off to the Saguenay region and one of the world’s longest fjord. Part 2 is now live!

Thanks for reading. If you have any questions about where we are travelling and the techniques used in the photos, be sure to add a COMMENT.