Camping au Bond de la Mer, Cap Chat, Canada
The wise in heart accept commands, but a chattering fool comes to ruin. ~ Proverbs 10:8
FYI – – It’s taken me almost a week of uploading pictures a couple at a time, to get them ready for this post. The internet service (as I mentioned might happen), is almost non-existent. We’ve been able to text, and phone calls on occasion, but putting the pictures into the site uses up our allowance quickly. But now this day’s done! Yay!!
The only problem is . . . . it’s been so long, I forget how to caption the pictures!
We celebrated my baby brother’s 50th birthday today by climbing two mountains! Happy Birthday, Lance!
We’re 30 minutes from the Parc National de la Gaspésie (45 from their visitor center), so that’s where we spent today – – and also tomorrow.
We actually arrived about 20 minutes early, and had to wait for the Visitor Center to open so we could get some information before we began our day, so we drove a short distance to a “Family” trail and took a look at the St. Anne River.
Makes for a lovely picture!
Today was a test to see if all the practice we’ve been doing the past 5 weeks has paid off! And I’m glad to say that it did! And we were soooo happy!
There are many trails of differing skill levels in this Park, and according to the VC staff, they’re mostly based on elevation, rather than technical elements. Remember the rock scramble we did the other day? They consider that technical skill, but not much elevation change. In this Park, it’s all about elevation. At least thats what he led us to believe. And we did. For the first hike. The staff we spoke with also advised us to do the longer hike first today, but we didn’t listen. We figured at our age, we should warm up first. 😊
Le Mont-Ernest-Laforce is a 4.6km (just under 3 miles), 156m (508 ½’) elevation change (most of which seemed to be at the end! Huff! Puff!), intermediate hike with a 3600 view at the top that they said should take 2 hours round trip. Sounded like a great warm-up trail! (FYI – it only took us 1 ½ hours, and that includes taking some time to soak in the view!)
At the parking lot, mosquitos found me. I wish I knew why they love me so much. They hardly ever bother Blaine. And when they manage to find sensitive skin areas – especially my neck – I get these huge, painful welts that last for days. So I covered myself in Deet, but apparently not before one little blood-sucking vampire found my neck, just above my right shoulder. Ugh!
I’m happy to say that there didn’t appear to be any other mosquitos the rest of the day.
There was also a giant, billboard-sized sign announcing “No Dogs” at each of the trailheads we did today, and a smaller “normal-sized” one a bit further along.
The white ones are called “Cow Parsnips”.
The trail itself was pretty much the same terrain, so we didn’t stop and take very many pictures, but once we got near the top – – holy moly!! Such expanse and beauty! And snow! Not where we were, but across the way. I’m jumping ahead a bit here, but we met a local guy on the next trail who told us he had friends skiing on that snow today!
And it’s so very quiet!
No traffic, no planes, and even the few people around whispered – including their kids.
And maybe roll around in it, or form snowballs, or make a snowman, or . . . .
I miss snow . . . . : (
That’s also where the caribou like to be. . . .
Looks pretty puny from up here, doesn’t it?
Are you impressed?
I was a little overwhelmed when Blaine pointed it out!
It looks impossible from here . . . . and yet . . .
How ’bout the moose make an appearance
so I can demonstrate the copious amount of respect I have for them? : )
So an hour and a half from when we began, we were driving to our next mountain – Mont Xalibu (ZA-lee-boo). This one is rated difficult. It’s 10.6km (6.5 miles) and has an elevation change of 540 meters (1,772 feet). I think I like the sound of the metric system much better . . . .
This description also promised 3600 views of the surrounding mountains, as well as looking down on lakes. They never mentioned the lengthy waterfall you could see – and hear – near the top. They also neglected to mention all the rocks along the way – technical skill in addition to the elevation . Going up was not so bad. In fact, I find stepping on rocks much easier on my lungs than walking an incline like the last trail. Maybe we go more slowly? I don’t know. But it’s easier. I have a much more difficult time, and thus go much more slowly, going down. Mainly because I lose my balance easy when I’m stepping down. Why? I have no idea. Blaine loves walking down on rocks though. And walking up inclines is much easier on his knees than walking back down inclines. See? We’re not always compatible. 😊
Still, they said 5-6 hours. We managed it in 5 ½ including a long stop for lunch part way up and a rest at the top. Not bad for two old retired people!
before Mont Xalibu heads off on it’s own.
Doesn’t sound like much, does it?
The problem is, #1, we’ve already completed just under 4 miles of mountain terrain,
and #2, they don’t account for the fact that you have to climb those 4kms!
And did you notice that we’re on the International portion of the Appalachian Trail?
Can you believe it?!?!?
If I had more internet service, I’d’ve taken the time to figure it out,
but I can’t spare my limited allotted service bites for research.
Sorry!
And we could clearly hear the waterfall!
In fact, it’s sooo lovely, I had to take three pictures!
We still have another kilometer to go??
and if you’re really good, you’ll also see that another couple has found it. : )
Thank goodness for those stone cairns in place
or we’d never figure out where we were supposed to go!
but we couldn’t believe we still had that far to go to get to the summit. ” )
Shouldn’t there be some kind of sign? Or a trumpet fanfare announcing our arrival?
As we ascended, once we broke the mountain’s summit, the wind kicked up something fierce! It was crazy windy! But they have these little open shelters (you’ll see the picture) that they built up here so you could sit out of the wind, which was very nice, except for one thing. . . .
FYI – the guy behind me isn’t the talker. (read on . . .)
That one was reading a book or something. : )
Remember the guy I mentioned? The local who’s friend was skiing? He and his girl stopped and talked to us (well, he talked) while we were finishing up lunch. He was very friendly and told us how his job sometimes is to be up here and take pictures of the runners who come by on their way to the top. It’s a competitive race – if you can believe that! Here I am extoling our climbing abilities (and lack thereof), and there are actually people who run up and down this trail! Incredible! Anyway, of course he made it to the top ahead of us and we found him sitting all cozy with his girl . . . and yakking loud and long. He never stopped, and the only shelter was the one next to them. We sat for a few minutes, until I announced that I’d heard enough and we left for the other viewing area up here.
Here, peace and quiet reigned. And it was even a little less windy. And I even took off my boots while sitting on a rock, and propped my feet up on a rock in front of me. Ahhhh . . . such undeserved bliss! Thank You Father, for the ability to come see this small but majestic portion of Your Creation!
you can see the observation area (not zoomed in) in this picture.
Just for some perspective. : )
And when we returned to the Jeep, there was another native Quebecious couple (she spoke decent English, he did not) we’d encountered on the trail and they asked for a ride back to the Visitor Center so they wouldn’t have to hoof it – – a distance of about 5-6 miles. We obliged, moving stuff around in the Jeep so we’d have a back seat for them and their gear. It seems they’d been hiking for two days to get to this point, spending the night along a connecting trail somewhere. It seemed a bit out of character for us to allow total strangers into our vehicle, but we both felt oddly at peace about it. And it felt great to be able to help someone out.
And so, we returned home, just under 32,000 difficult steps later and watched the sun set from the comfort of home.
