I was lucky enough to go on a three days fishing trip to the Mastigouche Nature Research with my father and brothers. It’s only a 3.5 hrs drive (accounting for the horrendous Friday afternoon traffic) and yet it’s a completely different world:

• In Mastigouche, going out for sushi involves using a row boat.

• Montrealers who complain about potholes have obviously never driven there. I have never been so happy to own a small four-wheel drive.

• Consequently, we rarely exceeded 45 km/h. What’s your average speed on residential streets?

• In Mastigouche, it is socially acceptable, and even expected, for you to get drunk every evening.

• You can actually see the stars up there. Fortunately I was out during the few weeks of the year where we can do that without losing extremities to frostbite or bodily fluids to thousands of blood suckers.

• If you thinks that rents are bad, you haven’t been paying $284 a night for a 4 bed log cabin.

• No depanneurs, we drove 43 km each way for for some potatoes, bread and mushrooms.

• Montreal has pigeons and seagulls, Mastigouche has quails and loons. At least you can eat one and buy food with the other.

• Cells phone won’t work up there. Come to think of it, there are a lot of places on the island where they don’t work either.

• No electricity, which means that the dominant smell in the cabin is propane…I’m sure that for some places this would be an improvement.

• And for now, neither has decent public transport.