Eastern Quebec

After we left Quebec City region we started driving and encontered some of the steepest climbs and descents we have ever had our RV and car on. When we saw a 9% incline Mike thought that was the steepest we had seen. Steeper than the roads we were on in the Rockies in Canada or the US. Next we saw a sign for 10% incline and then one for 12%. We now know that we can do fine towing the car on these types of roads.
The St. Lawrence looked far too rough for our little inflateable boat. Mid afternoon when we considered stopping it started raining so we decided to just continue driving as there was no use stopping in the middle of nowhere in the rain. Later in the afternoon wse saw a major weather alert about really bad thunderstorms and the possiblity of very large hail. We decided to drive our tin can out of the alert region. We knew that we had to take one very small ferry that connected highway 138. It is free of charge. We saw the ferry and lined up. We were last in line to board. The person looking after the boarding came and measured our vehicle and then asked us some questions. He decided we were fine and tied a ribbon on our mirror to say we had been checked. At the last moment he happened to mention (in English) how we were to go about paying when we got on board. I said that I was very surprised because I had read that the ferry was free. Well this started a discussion where we finally discovered that the ferry we were just about to board went across the St. Lawrence on a longer, more expensive trip, than the one we thought we were getting on. If we had actually got on the ferry we would have had to pay twice to get across and right back and taken a full day to do it. The ferry we wanted was actually 20 minutes down the road!
In Forestville, Quebec we pulled over to check something and had a visit from the police. It was a bit disconcerting but they were great. They had seen some vehicle putting out a lot of smoke and thought at first it was us. It wasn’t but they nicely walked around our RV and checked our wheels for excess heat. When asked they told us where we could park free and not have a a problem. All in all very helpful local police.