We were on that cruise, too, and were disappointed that expedition toys were only briefly available and only to show them off. Like you, we feel the expedition nature was oversold. Once they get all the permissions in place to use the toys, I think the cruise would be as advertised.
However, we thought that in general the cruise was excellent and enjoyed most if not all of the tours We also thought that the Octantis was beautiful and extremely well designed, and the crew and staff were excellent. The food was generally very good and the service excellent.
We were also on the National Park tour you accurately described, although our bus did not have to wait for 30 minutes to pick up the sack lunches. But we thoroughly enjoyed the experience in the Park on our own.
I guess we wouldn't agree that Saguenay and Cap aux Meules could have been skipped. We had a very good tour on Saguenay which included very interesting wine-tasting and gin-tasting stops. Our tour in Cap aux Meules included an excellent beer tasting along with several very scenic stops. In both cases we enjoyed seeing the local village culture.
So overall, with the caveat of being prepared with the proper permissions for the use of the toys, we would recommend the Canadian Discovery cruise.