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Location: Gaspé, QC
After taking a day of rest and emptying my truck of everything I own in Fort Kent, I packed it back up with skis, food, water, and a sleeping bag. My destination was a whimsical place in the province Québec on the Gaspé Peninsula, which, like a tongue, juts out into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. I consider myself to be an adventurer, but unfortunately in this age of civilization, most corners of the world have been explored. So what is left for me is to visit as many of those corners as possible doing a lot of cool things along the way.
This trip was not a let down. I planned to leave on Monday of last week, but after checking the weather forecast, which I am certain detracts from my image of being an adventurer, I saw that the snow conditions would most likely deteriorate because of rain predicted for Monday. Yes, snow. The plan was to go skiing. In late May. No, I am not crazy. Would there be any snow to ski on at all? I had no idea. But why let that be an open-ended question? I decided to get an answer.
After quickly reading the forecast and consulting a small map en français, I made a rough sketch of what I would need to survive a few days in a place even more at the end of nowhere than Fort Kent, Maine. Okay, what do I need to survive? I need to eat. So I jotted down some quick ideas for food, centered on a meal of pasta and an interesting pre-bottled tomato sauce for dinner and some whole wheat bread and Nutella for breakfast. I need to drink. Water that is. Alright, I’ll just buy three gallons it. I need to sleep. Throw a sleeping bag and some pillows into the bag of my truck, and voila, I have shelter. It seems that our needs are really quite simple!
With the engine of my truck still warm from driving four hundred miles the day before from Vermont, I set out an additional two hundred or so miles for le Parc national de la Gaspésie, a 310 square mile park with twenty-five peaks exceeding 1000 meters. No, I didn’t believe it possible either that such a place could exist east of the Rockies. The drive was pleasant from Fort Kent into the interior of Québec. The rolling hills undulate towards the shores of the Saint Lawrence River, often dramatically, with descents so steep I tapped the brakes just in case.
Since I left in the afternoon, by the time I reached the river, the sun was waning, moving slowly down to the water and horizon out my window. It was a perfect day. Long, narrow clouds had been painted with broad strokes across the sky, so that when the sun began setting, the colors produced had a tremendous effect. I continued along the river, which at the point that I emerged is more a part of the Atlantic Ocean, for an hour through coastal towns still emerging from the throes of winter. Most everything was closed and still boarded up.
Finally I reached Sainte-Anne-des-Monts, where I made a right turn back into the interior of the peninsula, away from the seashore of the Saint Lawrence. I was disappointed. All that was in front of me out the glass of the windshield were hills. Tall, yes, but lacking any mountain character, or that which I was in pursuit of: snow. Rather discouraged, I cruised along, my stomach turning inside out, looking forward to my first fire-cooked meal of pasta and tomato sauce.
Suddenly, a break in the hills gave me a look that made me shudder and giddy all at the same time. I spotted mountains. The real thing. There were roughly cut chasms and crevices on the faces of the now dark shadowed mountains. It was nearly nine o’clock. The sun had set, but my adventure had just begun.
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