Here is a letter we have sent to the Minister of Tourism - Quebec. Be warned!
January 12, 2003
Dear Sir,
We just returned from the worst vacation of our lives. We had decided to try a week of snowmobiling on the famous Quebec trails, and left our New York home in great spirits, arriving at our hotel, Auberge La Cuillere a pot, in St. Donat, some seven hours later. Our initial impression was positive, and we were even considering making this an annual family trip. Then things went terribly sour. On our first day of snowmobiling, we got back to St. Donat after dark, and proceeded to get lost trying to get through town and back to our hotel. The trails, which had been well-marked outside of town, had few signs inside the village, and none in English. We stopped, and asked for directions, and were told to go back the way we had come, head towards the main road, and follow the sidewalk approximately 1000 yards past the supermarket, until we would see a snowmobile sign on the right. Turn there, we were told, and the hotel would be a little way along that trail.
This we did, and were following other snowmobile tracks when we were stopped by a policeman. We told him that we were lost, and asked for help. His response was to ask for our license and registration, and then disappear inside his car, leaving us standing still and cold for a half an hour in subzero temperature. When he finally emerged from his vehicle, he handed us a $140 ticket for driving on the wrong sidewalk. Apparently, when we reached the main road, we should have gone through a deserted parking lot. At the far end of that lot, signs would have directed us to the trail on the south side of the road. We, in our ignorance, had followed other tracks across the road, and were traveling illegally on the north sidewalk.
The unfairness of this episode, and the rude treatment at the hands of the constabulary, got us very upset, and we decided to leave the next morning. Our innkeeper tried to dissuade us. First, he said, he had never heard of anything like this happening before. Perhaps he could persuade the police to reconsider. He made a few phone calls, to no avail, and said that the problem lay with new police procedures - as of December 16, the provincial police had taken over all municipal enforcement. Furthermore, he said, we had reserved our room for seven days – if we left early, we would still have to pay for the entire week! We left anyway, and vowed never to return to this Canadian province.
Obviously, there is very little that we can do to protest our poor treatment. We will take our tourist money elsewhere, of course. And we will post a copy of this letter to snowmobile usergroups. That may persuade a few others to avoid your inhospitable province. The economics of this situation are simple. Quebec collected its blood money of $140, but lost thousands of dollars in tourist income from us, our family, and our friends.
Sincerely yours,
Betty and Steven Bloom
January 12, 2003
Dear Sir,
We just returned from the worst vacation of our lives. We had decided to try a week of snowmobiling on the famous Quebec trails, and left our New York home in great spirits, arriving at our hotel, Auberge La Cuillere a pot, in St. Donat, some seven hours later. Our initial impression was positive, and we were even considering making this an annual family trip. Then things went terribly sour. On our first day of snowmobiling, we got back to St. Donat after dark, and proceeded to get lost trying to get through town and back to our hotel. The trails, which had been well-marked outside of town, had few signs inside the village, and none in English. We stopped, and asked for directions, and were told to go back the way we had come, head towards the main road, and follow the sidewalk approximately 1000 yards past the supermarket, until we would see a snowmobile sign on the right. Turn there, we were told, and the hotel would be a little way along that trail.
This we did, and were following other snowmobile tracks when we were stopped by a policeman. We told him that we were lost, and asked for help. His response was to ask for our license and registration, and then disappear inside his car, leaving us standing still and cold for a half an hour in subzero temperature. When he finally emerged from his vehicle, he handed us a $140 ticket for driving on the wrong sidewalk. Apparently, when we reached the main road, we should have gone through a deserted parking lot. At the far end of that lot, signs would have directed us to the trail on the south side of the road. We, in our ignorance, had followed other tracks across the road, and were traveling illegally on the north sidewalk.
The unfairness of this episode, and the rude treatment at the hands of the constabulary, got us very upset, and we decided to leave the next morning. Our innkeeper tried to dissuade us. First, he said, he had never heard of anything like this happening before. Perhaps he could persuade the police to reconsider. He made a few phone calls, to no avail, and said that the problem lay with new police procedures - as of December 16, the provincial police had taken over all municipal enforcement. Furthermore, he said, we had reserved our room for seven days – if we left early, we would still have to pay for the entire week! We left anyway, and vowed never to return to this Canadian province.
Obviously, there is very little that we can do to protest our poor treatment. We will take our tourist money elsewhere, of course. And we will post a copy of this letter to snowmobile usergroups. That may persuade a few others to avoid your inhospitable province. The economics of this situation are simple. Quebec collected its blood money of $140, but lost thousands of dollars in tourist income from us, our family, and our friends.
Sincerely yours,
Betty and Steven Bloom
