The year 2007 was crowned with success, according to the Tourist Office (OTC) general manager of the MRC of Rivière du Loup, Pierre Bélanger. The organization draws up a very positive assessment of the year which has just finished.
The OTC, in particular, has realized three exploration circuits for tourists highlighting the natural environments of several villages of the MRC.
The management of the tourist Office of Notre-Dame-du-Portage was also a success for the OTC. This first experiment enabled it to present the regional attractions to more than 1200 people.
"That was extraordinary. It is interesting, because it is complementary to the office that we have Rivière-du-Loup. That makes it possible to keep people longer in our region ", underlines Mr. Bélanger.
During next months, the OTC team will work, amongst other, on the project to accomodate the boat cruise passengers arriving at Gros-Cacouna. A first phase will be for Cruise ships of approximately 150 passengers.
Within the year, the OTC will be able to also say if it is possible to think about of accomodating international cruises.
The mayor of Cacouna, Jacques Michaud, wants to instore a inter-shore freight ferry for traffic between his municipality and Bay-Comeau. He admits however that the project is likely to wait a few more years before being implimented.
Mr. Michaud stresses that this coastal service is complementary to the Re-gazification project for LNG. He specifies that Énergie Cacouna will require the use of a tug boats company to facilitate the accosting of ships once the port is built.
The mayor of Cacouna request that Ottawa finances an unloading ramp, evaluated to 10 million dollars, to allow this coastal traffic. Mr. Michaud indicates that it is necessary to evaluate if this work can be done at the same time as the construction of the methane terminal.
Here is the list of the ships that made a port of call at Gros Cacouna. From 1995 to 2000, the list of ships comes from Transport Canada and gives the origin and the Destination of these sea giants. As for the list of ships before 1995, it will only give the name of the ship and the date of arrival, based on observations and notes of the Cacounois/ Cacounoises. (Thanks to Bernadette and Damien Dubé)
The majority of these ships will take on board forestry products such as paper for the production of newspaper originating from F.F. Soucy in Rivière du Loup, paper paste and wood. Concrete, salt, dynamite, milk, cheese, peat moss, sulphate, calcium, machinery also, containers of assorted products will be loaded.