Hiking: Parc du Mont-Mégantic
We were once again treated to nice and cool weather on a Saturday a few weeks ago. My buddy Matt and I decided to kick it up a level in our hiking adventure. This time around, we drove down to the Eastern Townships (Cantons-de-l'Est), heading towards Parc national du Mont-Mégantic.At 1,105 meters (3600 ft) Mont Megantic is the second highest peak in all of Quebec and the highest mountains in Quebec's Eastern Townships. It's located west of the city of Sherbrooke and about two and a half hours from Montreal. It's a spectacular area to hike as there's over 50 km of hiking trails where we can criss-cross the mountain to each of its four peaks. There's quite a few point of interest at this park as there's an astronomy observatory located near the summit of Mont Megantic. There are quite a few other activities you can do over here, such as: mountain biking, snowshoeing and cross-country skiing,
Matt and I were feeling particularly great for this day as we have decided to take on the hiking trail des trois sommets. The first summit would be Mont St-Joseph at 1065 meters in altitude with a difference in altitude of 500m. Afterwards, the trail brings us to the summit of Mont Victoria at 1055 meters in altitude to finally finish the loop at Mont Mégantic at 1105 meters in altitude. From there, it's an easy stroll back to the reception area.The difficulty level for this trail was ranked as EXPERT, with a total distance of 15.2 km of hiking trails estimated to take between 5 to 8 hours to complete. Boy, were they right about classifying this as EXPERT!
The first leg of our journey started with us taking on Mont St-Joseph. Right from the get go, it's rough on the cardio and our legs, as the trail didn't stop going up and straight up with no end in sight! We were both flabbergasted! We couldn't believe our eyes as we stared at each other while climbing this mountain. Holy Freaking Saint Joseph! ;)We adapted the hiking trail at our own pace and of course took some time to take lots and lots of pictures as the scenery was incredible! At one point, we were literary hiking in the clouds! It was an incredible sensation. It was windy, the weather was cool and we couldn't see anything all around us!
Here's a list of photos taken chronologically, from start to finish:
The adventure begins!
Ready to take on Mount Saint-Jospeh!
Don't take another step forward Matt!!
Man! We still have to climb ...
...and CLIMB!!Man! I can sure use those hiking sticks just about now...
...Oh thank god! Stairs!
Still climbing up...but the surroundings are amazing.More shots while heading to the first summit.
Wow, nice view!
Almost at the same level as the clouds!
We were at 1000 m in altitude at this point. What a view!
We've made it in about an hour an half (If i remember correctly!) at the first summit.
We're in the clouds!!
This was my favourite part of the hiking trip. It was a thrilling sensation to be in the clouds. Click the image below to see a video while we were at this observation point. (Please be patient, the file is 6mb. It will only play when finished downloading)
Onwards to Mont-Victoria!
View from Mount Victoria
View from Mont-Mégantic. Which wasn't as impressive as the other summits IMHO.
Picture of a tree taken while we were strolling back.
Picture of Mont-Mégantic as we were heading home.I hoped you liked the all the pictures I posted. I have lots more if you want to see them. Just ping me, and i'll provide you a link to them.
I can't wait for our next adventure! Till next time, TaTow!
Posted by John Parillo at 10/14/2006
0 Comments on "Hiking: Parc du Mont-Mégantic":
Post a Comment