From Baie Comeau to Sept-Iles

From Jonquière we drove to Baie Comeau with a quick stop in Chicoutimi where James took us to the studio of an amazing puppet maker/papier maché sculptor named Ann Jones who let us into her studio and showed us some of her works in progress which was pretty cool.

After that it was straight on to Baie Comeau where on Sunday we had one of the maybe three days on which we could see the sun we've had so far on the tour. We tried to take advantage of it and spent the afternoon exploring the banks of the mighty St Lawrence, which really is quite impressive in its massiveness.

We had two shows on Monday, both at the deceivingly large local English school. I say deceivingly because in comparison to the size of the school the audiences were quite small, including an audience of 23 students for the high school show. However they were amazingly attentive and we had a great show.

That evening we were taken to L'Orange Bleue, a very nice local restaurant, by Max Côté who is the Community Learning Centre Coordinator at the Baie Comeau High School. Max, probably familiar to past generations of Geordiers, proved to be an interesting and extremely knowledgeable fellow and filled us in on the amazing, and kind of unbelievable history of Baie Comeau.

The next day we did I Don’t Like Mondays in an actual theatre at the Baie Comeau CGEP, with a stage and lights and everything, we even had actual dressing rooms. It was nice to not have to change in a bathroom stall for once, with the ever present danger of dropping costume pieces into the toilet. The audience was responsive and we had a decent Q&A.

After that we set off for Sept-Iles, or rather we would have if we hadn't gotten stuck at the bottom of a very small but very muddy hill outside the CEGEP. In our efforts to extricate ourselves from the muddy pit we managed to tear up the lawn pretty good and pop one of the tires of the van. Fun! So James waited diligently in the rain for the enormous tow-truck while Charlotte and I played cards in the van. Eventually everything was sorted out and we set off for Sept-Iles.

- Adam