Author: Tom V

After lots of hikes this fall outside the city, some with rocky trails and strenuous climbs to lookouts, we decided to keep it close and simple last Sunday, with a hike at Cap St Jacques. Is it too close, too familiar and too flat to be considered a “real” hike? Regardless, it proved to be a popular enough choice for the 25 people who gathered in the parking lot at 9:30 am, under a cloudy sky and with a temp of 0 C. Many of them likely had low expectations. How exciting, or even enjoyable, could a hike at CSJ be?

Before the hike, the requisite group photo. Two of our crack photographers set up their cameras on a car trunk and used the self-timers to get a couple of great shots with all 25 of us in it. That does not often happen!

We set out at 9:40 am. While shorts-clad Bruce set out for a lengthy run, the rest of us followed the winter-version of the Red Rabbit trail. This is the ski trail marked as 10.9 km on the trail map. This route is a popular mid-week ski run for many members during the winter. The trails were clear and easy to walk — the snow we had received a week and half earlier had disappeared during last week’s warm spell.

 

About halfway along, we ran into club member Marc, who was out for a late-season bike ride on the asphalt trails of the park. He received a warm reception from several of the other female members!  (See the “Picture of the Week” on the Info page.)

We noted that some interesting trail maintenance had been done during the summer and fall. On one section, a solid boardwalk had been built over a low-lying section of ground. Hmm, not bad. But the most interesting find was a new feature at the “Havre aux Tortues” on the western side of the park. This somewhat bizarre looking structure was so recently completed you could still smell the freshly cut lumber. Apparently, it is designed to serve as an observation point so people can watch the many turtles that come ashore there without disturbing them. There were no turtles there this day, must be out of season.

A bit further along, we came upon evidence of fervent activity on the part of our namesake creature, the mighty beaver. Indeed, they had been chewing through some substantial trees. Some had already been felled, while others were most of the way there. Being nocturnal, they were also nowhere to seen when we passed by.

The hike unfolded at a comfortable pace for everyone. With the well-marked and familiar trail, we were each able to go at our own speed, which meant we spread out a bit. We regrouped a couple of times, and then we all arrived back at the parking lot within 10 minutes of each other. The final tally was 11 km in 2 hr 20 min. Everyone enjoyed their outing. The final consensus? It may only have been CSJ, but it was a great Sunday morning hike!

Most of us were surprised to wake up on Sunday morning and be greeted by a blanket of snow on the ground. But it was only a thin layer and it served to add a cheerful wintery atmosphere to our hike at Mont St Bruno. The temp was about -2 C under overcast skies.

There were 24 of us who gathered at the chalet at 9:45 am. Two people opted to go running on the trails before meeting up with us later. After the group photo, we set out at 10:03 am to do a big counter-clockwise loop of the park. We took trail 1 to Lac du Moulin and then joined trail 5 for 1.5 km. Then we took trail 1 again, past Lac à la Tortue and then around Lac des Bouleaux to the only hut with bathrooms on the trail. After a pit stop there for a few minutes, we took trail 3 to Lac Seigneurial, before switching back to trail 1.
The hike had been promised to be about 2.5 hours long. As we got close to the parking lot, I realized that we were on track to arrive back after only 2 hours. Far be it from me to cheat two dozen eager hikers from their promised allotment of outdoor exercise. So we extended the hike by looping around trail 9. This trail, which is a skate-skiing trail when the snow arrives, was cut into soft grassy fields and it was actually more work to walk on than the dirt and gravel paths of the other trails. We arrived back at the chalet at 12:30 pm. We hiked 11 km in 2 hr 27 min. A nice, easy hike that everyone was able to enjoy!

I dragged myself out to Mont St-Hilaire last Sunday to meet 9 other hikers.  It was a mostly cloudy day, abut 10 C.  Note that none of us were at the hike the previous day, so we had 19 members in total out on club hikes this weekend.
I say “dragged” because I was feeling a bit under the weather.  Fortunately, I had already arranged to delegate the hike-leading duties to the capable hands of Steve Bubnich.  After we reached the first lookout point of Burned Hill 1.5 km into the hike, I decided I had subjected the group to enough of my coughing and wheezing and I turned back.  But the remaining nine hikers continued on.  They conquered the main lookout of Pain de Sucre and then continued north on the trails that loop near Dieppe and Rocky.  It was another great outing at Mont St-Hilaire. 

Many thanks to Steve for leading the hike and ensuring that everyone had a good day.

 

Each year we have in mind to organize an Adirondacks hike, but we are often thwarted by bad weather or scheduling issues.  This year we finally succeeded, although much to my frustration I was unable to participate!
Monique Isler led a group of 9 hikers up to the summit of Noonmark Mountain, near Keene Vally in the Adirondacks.  The weather conditions were good with a temperature range of 10-13 C and no rain.  Indeed, it turned it to be warmest at the summit as the sun broke through as they stopped there to admire the view and have lunch.  It was a long hike, about 5 or so hours on the trail.  Several of the hikers said it was one of the best hikes they had done in a long time!

Thanks to Monique for making this hike happen.  We promise to try and schedule more hikes like this in the future.

 

Last Sunday turned out to be a nice day for a hike.  Apparently, many others agreed as we were 32 hikers (plus 4 dogs) at Prevost.  Indeed, the parking lot was unusually crowded as another walking club from St-Jerome with an even larger gang than ours were also setting out for a hike.  Fortunately, we took a different route than they did and we did not see them again until we returned.

It was cool, about 7 C, but mostly sunny as we set out shortly after 10 am.  We followed the usual route along the MOC (McGill Outing Club) trail and first went to summit of Mount Shaw.  While there is a view from the lookout, it is a bit of an exaggeration to label this a mountain!  We took a sharp descent down the other side, past the long-abandoned building foundation.  We then made our way over to Lac Paradis.  While many of the leaves had fallen, there were still enough red-tinged trees to make for some lovely scenery.  The water of the lake was too enticing for two of our dogs to resist and they went in for a dip.  Continue reading “32 Hikers Enjoyed a Great Day at Prevost Oct 19”

We had proposed Oka as the ski destination for Sun. But on Sat, one BT member talked to the people at Oka and they recommended that skiers would be better off going north of the city, which was much more pessimistic than the comments on their web site. So we changed the Sun destination to the P’tit Train du Nord at 10:30 am instead. I updated the info on the @skibeavertails twitter feed and informed those people who had e-mailed me about skiing on Sun.

It was a sunny and cool morning last Sun, a really nice day to get in a rare April ski outing. I really wanted to go go go, but my nagging head cold said no no no! So for the first time this ski season, and much to my regret, I wimped out and stayed home. Mickey and Sharon were out at the PTdN and reported that the skiing was just lovely. Here is Mickey’s outing summary:

P’tit Train du Nord: Mt Roland – Val David – Mt Roland (34 km)
Weather: Glorious
Temp: 2C – 7C
Snow conditions: PERFECT – no bare spots at all
Wax: Aqua klister (+2C to +12C)

Mickey had tried out the Aqua Klister the previous Wed afternoon at Bois de Liesse. He reported that, “For the first lap I used red wax, and it was very slow. The second lap I used Aqua Klister — it was as fast as green wax.” Now I know that some people have a fear of klister, but it is really not justified. Yes, it is sticky stuff, but the trick is to have the solvent and rags to clean it off the skis when you get back to the car. It is worth the effort!

While Mickey and Sharon were claiming “last skiers standing” status at the PTdN, Dave Inglis was doing the same at Cap St Jacques. Although they had stopped grooming there a week earlier, the trails were still skiable. In addition to sharing “last skier standing status” with Mickey and Sharon, Dave has also made a credible bid for “most distance skied” at 620 km. When he reached the 600 km milestone a couple of days earlier, Dave took a commemorative photo in which he holds up all six of his fingers (look for that next time you shake hands with him)!

It really was a perfect day for a last ski outing. Congratulations to Mickey, Sharon and Dave as our last three skiers standing for 2014!

It was quite something to wake up last Sun and see all the blowing snow outside. Many people had — shall we say — mixed emotions about this turn of meteorological events. But as cross-country skiing enthusiasts, us Beaver Tailers had only one reaction — Whoo Hoo!

 

OK, maybe not all of us. But six of us made our way through the sloppy, but quite manageable, road conditions to get to Mont St Bruno last Sun. We all arrived late and did not get started skiing until after 10:30 am. The six of us this day were me, Monique I, Winnie, Jacques, John and Vivian.

They had not traced the trails that morning, they said because the snow was falling too fast when they arrived at 7 am. As a consequence, they did not charge a trail fee. The temp was steady at -1 C and violet wax was the way to go. Although they had not groomed, our late start meant that other skiers had gone ahead of us and established very nice tracks. There was a bit of clumping of snow under the skis, but the skiing was otherwise just great. It was windy that morning, but the thing with cross-country skiing in the woods is that you rarely feel it. The couple of times we skied along the lake’s edge and got the full breeze, it did not feel so bad due to the mild temp.

 

We all did trail #1 with a few extensions, so we covered about 10 kms.  Not a lot, but not bad for Mar 30! Everyone was very happy they had made the effort to make it out.

Sharon posted a note on the forum that she went to Mount Royal that day and had a great ski. I later heard similar reports from two other BTers who went there. So there was still plenty of great skiing to be had on our doorstep last Sun.

It was a nice day at Montagne Coupée, especially for those of us who have come to appreciate the center over the years and had missed not going for so long.  I sure hope it won’t take another three years before our next visit!

Even among us keen cross-country skiers, there is starting to be some level of winter fatigue.  Plus, on Sunday, it was still looking to be a cold day.  And it’s not like we have had much fresh snow, right?  So with all those factors, it was perhaps not surprising there were only 11 Beaver Tailers out at Gai Luron last Sunday.

 

But those of us who made it to Gai Luron were glad we did!  We had some of the best ski conditions we had seen anywhere all year.  It turned out they had received several cm of fresh snow the day before.  Add to that a beautiful sunny day, with a quite comfortable temp of -10 C.  Also, the trails had just been freshly–and expertly–groomed.  At that open area where all the trails start side-by-side, we were greeted by stretches of immaculately groomed corduroy snow.  Once we got into the woods, the sun was streaming through the trees onto fluffy mounds of snow covering the ground and branches.  The tracks were deep and perfectly formed in the new snow–no sign of old crunchy snow anywhere.  Conditions were truly glorious!

 

A couple of us had to overcome some “equipment checklist lapses” at the start of the day.  Winnie forgot to bring her ski boots and Scott arrived with the wrong skis.  But they were both able to quickly rent the missing equipment and so they enjoyed a full day of skiing with the rest of us.

It was just another one of those days at Gai Luron where you marvel at how nice it can be to spend the morning skiing at a center located only 40 minutes away!

 

What we traditionally refer to as Far Hills is now officially known as “Parc Régional de Val-David–Val-Morin – Secteur Far Hills”.  The Far Hills chalet is at the eastern end of the regional park.  The western end is called Secteur Dufresne and has the Anne-Piché chalet located at the entrance.  The Anne-Piché chalet is where we set out from when we do our annual Val David hike in the fall.  The trails run between the two chalets.
I had not been to Far Hills for a few years, so it was a treat to finally get back there for a ski outing.  As we pulled into the parking lot of Far Hills shortly after 9 am on Sun morning, the parking lot was already surprisingly crowded.  Much of that was likely due to the ski lesson programs they run there — we saw kids of various ages forming into groups and being shepherded by instructors.

It’s been a cold winter and last Sun morning at Far Hills was no exception.  It was -15 C as we got our skis ready.  But it was sunny and there was fresh snow on a thick base, so the conditions were looking to be ideal.  We were 13 Beaver Tailers, including one new person trying out the club for the first time.  We formed into four groups of 2, 2, 3, and 6 skiers.  I set out with Glenn K, John P, Helene C, Cheryl and Sue-Anne. Continue reading “Sun Feb 16 — 13 Enjoyed a Gorgeous Day!”