August 15-16, 2020

Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park

I’m not a finisher. I’m a 90% is good enough person, which drives Chris a little nuts. He likes to be 100% finished before he moves on to the next thing. Lucky for me, I take most things to 80 or 90% and he makes sure they are finished!

Except in some cases, like scrapbooking, blogging or recording memories. In these cases, he takes a zero percent approach, which is generally fine, as these are not even remotely his interests! So, in true 90% complete fashion, I did not make a single note about the last two days of our trip!

It was pretty close to checkout time by the time we were ready to leave Chutes PP. We didn’t bother to dump on our way out. We knew the drive would take about 3 hours, so we made some lunch and coffee and settled in for the drive. This stretch of the Trans Canada highway isn’t nearly as pretty as some of the other driving days we had, but it’s at least better than driving on the 401!

We arrived at Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park just before 5 pm and there was a line up to check in (a first on this trip!). There were about 6 or 7 RVs/cars in front of us. About 30 minutes passed before it was our turn to check in (because of Covid, we all waited in our cars to check-in, instead of going up to the window or standing in the hut). The sun was shining and it was a beautiful day, so the wait to check in wasn’t terrible.

We stayed on site 171 in the Jingwakoki Campground, which was quite a drive from the front entrance. It’s the larger of the two sections for camping, but most of the sites were occupied by tents, tent trailers or smaller travel trailers because you have to cross a pretty tiny bridge to get into it! We had a very nice site, with a water view (through our kitchen window) and water access right across the road from us, however, the site was oriented in an odd way. In an effort to be as far away from the restrooms as possible we decided to place Holly on the right hand edge of the site. The only problem with this was that this plan required Chris to back into the site very precisely between a bunch of trees. After two weeks on the road, he backed Holly in perfectly between the trees like a pro!

As soon as we were levelled, we put the stabilizers down and immediately took Daisy across the road to play in the water. She could have chased sticks all night long! We each took a quick dip and went for a short walk around some of the campground and to the small beach. Supper was whatever was left over in the fridge.

In the morning, I took Daisy out for a walk around the other parts of the Jingwakoki Campground that we hadn’t walked the evening before. We made some coffee, packed up and were pulling out of the campsite just past 8:30 am. We were lucky when we stopped to dump our tank that there was only one trailer in front of us. We chatted for a few minutes while they were finishing up and then took our turn. With a small combined tank, we’re pretty quick, which is a good thing because the rain started just as we were locking up the back storage and by the time we pulled out, it was coming down! And there were about 3 trailers in the line up behind us. Good timing on our part!

I really liked the feeling of Samuel de Champlain PP. It had pretty trees and lots of different types of sites, some with beautiful views. We didn’t have a lot of time to explore here, but I’d love to come back and spend a weekend sometime. Maybe next time, we’ll get a chance to explore it’s other campground and try floating on the river (which I hear is very popular!).

Only a short drive away, we stopped in Mattawa in the pouring rain to pick up some breakfast at Tim Hortons. We had planned to also stop in Deep River to give Daisy a chance to stretch her legs, but it was raining quite a bit so we just continued on home, pulling into our own driveway at about 1 pm. By the time we arrived home, the rain had stopped and we were able to unpack without getting soaked.

We had an amazing 16 days traveling with Holly, but it was nice to be back home, see our kids and have a few hours to settle back in before getting back to the grind on Monday!

Next stop: Home!

Chutes - Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park - Home

Towing: 583 km

Driving: We didn’t unhitch.

Batteries: Our stay was short and our batteries stayed above 12.1 for the night.

Fresh Water Tank: We still had a little bit left in the fresh water tank.

Combined Grey/Black Water Tank: We dumped our tank on our way out, but my photo was blurry, so I don’t know how full it was!