The Perils of Pauline (uh, I mean Sara)

Yesterday we had a minor tragedy: in spite of being ever conscious of my own ineptitude and clumsiness; never mind that I had checked and re-checked to be sure the strap was firmly attached to my wrist; scrupulous to a fault about taking care to keep a firm grip on it and never carelessly setting it down to be mindlessly left behind--

I NEVERTHELESS DROPPED MY $400 CAMERA ON A WOOD FLOOR IN A GALLERY IN THE TINY HAMLET OF SAGUENAY AND BROKE IT BEYOND REPAIR!

But of course at that point, ever the optimist, I held out hope that the problem was minor or better yet that it would magically fix itself, even though the lens would not retract and the message on the screen ominously said "System Error (Zoom)".  Although every single person we've met in Canada has been so friendly and helpful, the lone woman in the gallery was talking on her cell phone and barely registered my dismay, so we walked out and went next door to the Savonnerie to ask where the nearest camera shop was located.  No camera shop, we were told by the kindly soapmaker, but wait...he did know of a gentleman in a Librairie, a mere 20-minute walk, who was very technical and might be able to help. He wasn't sure what the English word for Librairie, was but we dug into our rusty French and decided it was something like a bookstore and decided to give it a try.  Following his directions, we walked and walked and eventually came to the little shop exactly at noon.  
Closed for lunch between twelve and one, said the sign on the door.  And darkness filled the shop. 

It is hard to describe the lack of facilities in Saguenay.  We had opted out of the ship-sponsored excursions which all started at the crack of dawn and involved either four-hour hikes or a two-hour zodiac adventure to the Saguenay Fjord with accompanying lecture about its "geological, biological and morphological" development.  Transportation to the site by local schoolbus.  It seemed more prudent to simply walk around the little town on our own.  There was a nice little church across from the scene of the camera tragedy, the ill-fated gallery, the soap shop, and that was about it.  The rest of the buildings were mostly residences.

Tom was ready to abandon the plan and go back to the ship before we missed lunch, but miraculously across the street was a little local restaurant called Lucerne--the only restaurant we had seen--and I prevailed by saying we'd walked all this way and maybe the bookstore man could actually fix the camera.  He was dubious but agreed.  

Inside, ten or twelve locals were sitting at the lunch counter or at one of the several booths and after giving us a few quizzical looks, ignored us.  Madame la proprieteur handed us a menu, we ordered a half carafe of wine and some ailes de poulet (chicken wings) and frites and I swear you could just as well be in the middle of France.  To say there is zero American influence is an understatement.  I don't know why that amazes me but it does.  Although not the gourmet Seabourn, the wings weren't bad, the fries crispy and the wine passably good.  We went across the street around 1:10 and there were already people monopolizing the time of the guru.  We passed the time talking to a portly gentleman in a chef's coat who said that he was the chef at the Auberge on the port, the lone hotel in town.  We of course had missed that on our walk. His son works for Cirque de Soleil and once he had spent six months rehearsing for the show in a small town in Texas whose name he couldn't remember.  

Finally, my turn came and the man examined the camera briefly, looked at me and said "la camera ne marche pas." "Oui, je sais," said I in response to the obvious.  "The camera does not work."  With a sad shake of his head, he handed the camera back to me.

On our long trek back to the ship, it occurred to me that if there was no one aboard the ship who could force the camera back into submission, perhaps I could continue to take pictures with my IPhone.  

If I could just figure out how to transfer them to the blog. 

As you can see, I have done so but pictures of the Saguenay Saga are lost forever inside La Camera and here are just a few of today's little town, Baie Comeau.

Here were are in front of another mural, this one in Baie Comeau.  A nice local took our picture together.

This is inside Claude Bonneau's gallery on the lone business street in Baie Comeau.   The gallery contains paintings by Claude but is also jam packed with junque like this room of Coke memorabilia, all charmingly displayed.  None of the stuff is for sale, only the paintings, but it's a fascinating collection.

 

More of the stuff...