Notre Dame de l'ile

Not free on Monday for the group fixture, I decided to hit the road early on Tuesday morning to check out the newly re-opened Ile Notre Dame and then continuing on to the South shore at Cote Ste. Catherine for a return via the Champlain bridge.

Not sure what Goose Village was referring to, I checked it out later at home to find it was one of the many ghost neighbourhoods of Montreal.
https://ville.montreal.qc.ca/memoiresdesmontrealais/goose-village-le-village-aux-oies-ou-victoriatown

Some construction in the secondary Casino parking lot caused a detour onto the road, which has the benefit of extra space for social distancing, at least for awhile.

I would suspect that in the more litigious country to the south, such an inviting hazard as this supposed ramp back to the main path would be a boon to lawyers.

In the background sits a heavy duty floating crane, which the Seaway uses to lift lock gates in the winter when maintenance is being carried out or during the shipping season if a gate is damaged by a ship and has to be replaced.

This one is actually owned by the American Seaway entity, the St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation and would normally be stationed at the two American locks at Massena, New York. The Canadian version is perhaps away for maintenance itself.

Just ahead is a Desgagnes bulk carrier that is used primarily for Arctic Sealift operations from late June to November so it is sitting in self-isolation until ready to load at Cote Ste. Catherine lock or possibly the Port of Valleyfield.

There were a few cyclists on the island but it was easy to keep clear of them as they were all passing me to the left! Before exiting the island, I stopped to view Habitat 67, which my partner and I toured last summer including the apartment owned by Moshe Safdie. Who knows when these tours will be available again.

At the St. Lambert lock, I stopped to see what construction was causing the continued closure of this access to the South shore.

Turns out it has nothing to do with the bridge at all but the endless road construction on Riverside drive that is blocking this access point. Two cyclists coming from Cote Ste. Catherine were pissed to see the bridge closed. They said there was no indication anywhere along the dyke about the closure, which is ironic as I passed at least six signs on Ile Notre Dame advising about the closure. It is unfortunate that two different organizations (the Corporation for the Jacques Cartier and Champlain bridges, and the St. Lawrence Seaway authority) manage these different access routes between Montreal and the South Shore making consistency and sharing of information challenging.

For myself, I knew in advance that St. Lambert was closed and planned my return via the Champlain bridge.

It was only ten in the morning but the sun was already starting to beat down. However, the ride along the dyke was actually very pleasant as there were not too many bugs yet and the air was pleasantly cool coming off the St. Lawrence.

Once on the South shore, I chose a route that branched off from the main Route Verte at Brossard and followed, briefly, the St. Jacques river with lovely expanses of tall rushes.

Beyond this point, it was more suburban and, although I was able to follow bike lanes along the myriad streets, I would say that it was not worth the detour off the main route.

When I got back to the river path, making my way to the Champlain bridge, I came across a new Goose Village.

It was time to head home but...

I guess I should have checked all the websites before planning my route. Not wanting to head back to Cote Ste. Catherine, I turned north and followed the river to old reliable Jacques Cartier. In the end, it shortened my ride by 10k, which wasn't the worst thing in the now baking heat and I got one nice viewpoint along my alternate route.

So, I ended up with 69k for the day and got home just before the thermometer touched 30C.

G. T. Bishop