En Route à Schefferville

It is taking me 2 days to get to Schefferville from Montreal. The first day was spent flying. Actually, most of it was spent waiting to fly. The AeroBus service from the main bus station in Montreal takes people directly to the airport for $14 in 45-50 minutes, at specified 25 minute intervals. There are a number of regional airlines that fly to Sept-Iles, many stopping in Québec city. So, a brief 45 minute flight took me from Montreal to Quebec City, in the smallest plane I've flown in (which is still pretty big). Rationally, I think smaller planes make more sense and I expect them to be easier to actually get in the air: it amazes frankly, how the bigger super-jets are even able to get airborne in the first place. Yet, psychologically, the smaller planes move a lot more, and bounce around more in the turbulence, making it worse if you're a bad flyer or have motion sickness. I did have bouts of motion sickness, mostly as a result of gas bloating I've been experiencing. A phazyme gel cap (simethicone) gets rid of the bloating, and by extension, my motion sickness.
The Quebec Airport is possibly the smallest airport I've been to (even smaller than the one in the Galapagos!). I had to wait 3.5 hours for my connecting flight to Sept-Iles, which was a lot easier to endure thanks to free wireless internet access :D The Airport in Sept-Iles was about the same size, though actually felt nicer. I haven't seen the airport in Schefferville yet, but I expect it to be even smaller. I think the Quebec airport was in the middle of development / expansion, so we'll see how it changes in the next year or 2. I'll be back...
From Sept-Iles, there are 2 ways to get to Schefferville. The fastest is by local airline (Inuit Air, for example, which might even fly to Schefferville from other locations), and the cheapest, by a factor of 6, is by train. Getting a train ticket took a bit of hunting down, but I finally figured it out. Other internet posts that turn up in a Google search mention the fact that you can't actually get a ticket from the train line itself (Quebec North Shore & Labrador), but you have to go through a local travel agent. That is now Tshiuetin Rail transportation, in Sept-Iles. The train leaves Sept-Iles for Schefferville on mondays and Thursdays, and returns the following day on Tuesdays and Fridays. The train costs 1/6 the price of a flight, but takes 10 hours, through some slowly changing boreal terrain, which is like many areas of northern central Canada: moderately repetitive. But still pretty neat, and you get to watch the vegetation change slowly, with the trees getting smaller, more black spruce & tamarack replacing aspen and conifers, more lichen and less moss (boo for me :P). The occasional burn or clear cut along the way is also impressive, and breaks the monotony, as well as at least one tunnel.
Unlike the previous descriptions I found, there was no dome observation car, but instead, there was a dining car with some processed food. I brought my own foodstuffs, but did take advantage of the ice cream bars from the freezer. The best place to hang out is probably on the deck between the 2 cars, where the windows are cleaner and often open, so you can look out and appreciate the scenery and even poke your head out tentatively (while watching for upcoming signs!).

I admit, I was tired this morning getting on to the train, after a hectic week of coordinating materials and delivery (some of which didn't quite work out). I managed to have 2 boxes delivered via Greyhound to the bus station in Sept-Iles to pick up on my way to the train station. But, it took 1 day longer than they told me it would. Thankfully, I allotted extra time for just such a possibility. The thing I have learned most this week is that you get much better service and are more likely to get results in this province if you speak french instead of english. Why people do their jobs better depending on what language I speak is a bit perplexing, but there it is. Welcome to Quebec.
Anyway, I was tired. And it's a small, regional railway, so it's not like Via where there are signs directing you and people checking your ticket. I was a little surprised when I checked my luggage on the train that the handler asked me my destination: I figured the train must stop along the way. And it does, including Labrador City. When I went to board, I was given a vague direction, and I went out the door of the tation, left, and got onto a car, without a single staff person directing me outside. The train pulled out of the station 10 minutes before the scheduled departure time (9 AM), and I began to look around for the observation car. There was none. I began to become concerned that I boarded the wrong train. About 2 hours into the trip, during one of the drop-off stops, an employee of the railway asked me what my desination was. I said “Schefferville”, hopefully, and breathed a huge sigh of relief when he didn't react as if anything was out of the ordinary. The first sign I was, indeed, in the right place. Then I slept. For most of the trip, with breaks to eat, walk around, and wrestle for my water bottle with one of the screaming kids on the train. The screaming was annoying, but I think he was teething. Quite cute & cherubic otherwise.

The train arrived roughly on schedule, about 11 hours after leaving Sept-Îles. Unfortunately, this is earlier than usual, so my ride was not there to pick me up at the station. After waiting almost an hour, and watching everyone leave (including the taxi), I dug out my bug spray to ward off the growing number of mosquitoes swarming my tender flesh. Luckily, The superintendent of the train took pity on me and offered me a ride into town. No one seemed to know where the McGill research station was, or even that there was one in town. Honestly, the town's not that big. The station is on the north-eastern edge, next to the airport, so I can understand that most people don't see it. The sign is also incredibly faded and only legible if you already know what it says. So, I made it. Now, to work on designing a field experiment, despite not having all the materials yet. *sigh*