Today’s plan was to visit La Cité de l’Énergie before moving on to the Lac Saint Jean area. As usual, things sometimes take longer than expected. This museum gives a fantastic presentation of the role of energy and its forms, starting with an immersive 360 degree presentation. We learned about the various sources of energy (oil, natural gas, nuclear, solar, hydro, wind, biomass, marine, etc) that we consume on a daily basis and pros and cons of each of these types.

Many of the exhibits are interactive and teach concepts.

We could even take a selfie.

The museum incorporates a former power transmission tower that supported power lines across the St. Lawrence River and now encircles an observation tower. One can take an elevator up to a viewing area and see the City of Shawinigan and the five hydroelectric generating stations that are located here.

Power generation in Shawinigian dates back to 1898 with the creation of the Shawinigian Water and Power Company. The town was a company town and was laid out modelled on New York and thus has its own Broadway Ave. The city once had an aluminum smelter and a number of chemical industries that profited from the bountiful electricity.

The last part of our visit was a tour of one of the historic generation stations where we learned a great deal about the water pipes and alternators that make up a generation station.

A great deal of the electrical equipment was made by Canadian Westinghouse in Hamilton, Ontario!

Now famished after so much science and learning, we had to replenish our own energy at the cafeteria. A hamburger, fries and Haagen-Daz ice cream did the trick!

The facility houses the Jean Chrétien Museum and gives a great overview of Canada’s role in international affairs. Ruth was happy to see a section devoted to Aline Chrétien that featured many of the outfits she wore at official functions but more importantly spoke to her personal accomplishments internationally and nationally.

It was now too late to continue to Lac Saint-Jean so we returned to our free camping spot by the lake and spent most of the evening talking with fellow travellers Marc and Aline instead of going for a healthy swim.