.: Ski XCOttawa.ca :: Skiing in Ottawa and Gatineau Park

Another successful trip to La Forêt Montmorency
By:  Megan McTavish   (2015/11/20)

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Located about an hour north of Quebec city, La Forêt Montmorency is an outdoor research and tourism centre operated by the Université de Laval. Not only do they offer great environmental education and research programs, they also cater to cross country ski enthusiasts. In mid October they pull out their snow making guns and dig up the snow they have kept under sawdust from last winter to make an incredible 2.5km loop to ski on. Teams from all around Quebec, Ontario, Vermont, and even PEI head up to take advantage of this amazing ski opportunity.   It is obviously becoming more and more popular for early season training for those of us who live in the East and sighting of some of the World's fastest skiers, like Alex Harvey, Noah Hoffman and Kris Freeman were reported this year, along with Thunder Bay's NDC and the Pierre Harvey training center skiers. 

The first time I went (2001) it was relatively unknown and you had to rely on natural snow, which in early November is a bit of a risk.  This year it was warm with no natural snow, but that didn't matter because their "Glisse Boréale" was in great shape.

XC Ottawa was joined by Chelsea Nordiq, the Quebec and Ontario ski teams, Nippissing University, as well as several local junior teams, some skiers from Craftsbury Vermont, and many more.  We were there for four days of skiing, the first two being fairly wet, and the next two cooling down.  Basically we just got some skiing in, did some fast skiing, ate lots of food, slept, and finished it off with a short time trial.

Here are some pictures:


Maurice Samm (coach of Chelsea Nordiq) watching Leena and running the time trial.


Karl seeing if he can remember how to go fast.


Andre chasing him down.



Andre, obviously having less fun than Megan.

For a comprehensive history of our trips to Montmorency, see Sheila's article from the 2013 trip HERE.

Also, check out their facebook page HERE.

 
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