Currently it is Sunday night, 8:16pm est. We are in La Baie, at the Auberge 21. A beautiful hotel, restaurant facility, with the proprietor, Marcel as our host and gourmet chef. It is apparently above freezing, as there is currently steady drizzle outside. But let's start from where we left off..
Yesterday morning we departed Real Masse' around our daily 9am departure time. But not before our new "trail boss" (lower case for a reason) took his position. Our first question was "where do we fuel up at trail boss". A quick glance at his trusty Garmin, and the quick response was "it's 8 miles away". Ok. Instead we informed him we get gas right here at the lodge, pull around back genius. (interesting fact: we didn't fuel up the night before, because Real Masse' has a heated garage that we park our sleds in overnight, and if we had fueled the night before, the fuel would expand in the tank.)P
As we headed out onto the trail, trail boss took the third position, right behind Ole and Craig. That lasted about 30 miles...29 more than I expected. But when we stopped for our first break around the 15 mile mark, squabbling had already begun. trail boss was adamant that we were to go one direction, while our 30 years of experience Ole and Craig informed him, no, we go this way.
So at the trail head, and more squabbling, at the 30 mile mark, junior trail boss was sent back to his rightful position running P11 out of 13. The pecking order resolved, harmony ensued. Temporarily.
Everything was going according to plan. We arrived at lunch Petite' Palace around 2pm. Pretty nice place for a bunch of sledheads.
After lunch, is where things jumped to high tension. We usually only ride a trail once, sometimes twice if made a wrong turn, but we rode this particular trail THREE times. A new record as far as I am aware of. All the while, junior trail boss telling us we need to go the opposite direction. Why won't anyone listen to me? If I was a betting man, I'd say we need to go this way. NON STOP.
After our third trip back down the same trail, Ole went into the local Ski Doo dealer at the end of the trail head. We knew this was going to be a 20 minute ordeal. To occupy his time, Big Al began reviewing his trail map of the Quebec Bush, and throwing out his suggestions of a way through.
Right on schedule, Ole came back 25 minutes later, with a plan. Go back and pick up the trail behind the gas station in town. Perrrrfect.
We found the gas station, but to be sure Ole, flagged down the local constable to see if we could get some confirmation on our directions. The very friendly and helpful Officer Felix Denis, quickly informed us that the trail we need is currently closed. The trail crosses a couple rivers. And the rivers are not frozen.
Officer Denis has a quick resolution though. He knew the local President and Trail Master of the ORV trails, Francois Fugere, and he just happens to live a couple blocks down the road. A quick discussion, and he said he would lead us through about 10 miles of local/private ORV trail, and reconnect us with the trail we need without crossing any rivers! Perrrfect. ( inside info: I have to think and make mental notes inside my helmet all day so I can write this stupid blog each night, my original headline was going to be "A River Runs Through It")
Once we were escorted with, flashing strobe lights on the ORV of Mr. Fugere, back to the snow trail, we had a couple rough miles of a connector trail and all was smooth. For a short time.
We now had a quick 40 miles of smooth trail to our warm accommodations for the evening. The facility we were supposed to stay at had a brew pub and very nice accommodations. We arrived around 7:45, ready for an adult beverage and an evening of fun. Perrrrfect.
Craig went inside to check our group of 13 in, while the rest of us began taking off our saddlebags. Not so fast, he came back out and said. This is where our new job posting comes in to play. If anybody would like to submit a resume' for creating and VERIFYING our reservations, we are hiring. Our reservation was for Sunday the 31 of January, not Saturday the 30! And they are full, with a little league hockey tournament in town.
With a lot of help from the hotel front desk we found one hotel with 4 rooms ( 2 suites with 1 bed each and 2 rooms with 2 beds) and one hotel with 6 rooms. Perrrfect. But the snow trail doesn't go to either of them. We have to take our gear in taxis to the 2 separate hotels. And leave our sleds at the place we thought we were staying, in the their secured snow machine parking area. So we called a taxi.
The taxi driver, who Big Al aptly described as the Grandfather, John Hammond, who created Jurassic Park, made 4 trips back and forth dropping off team members and their gear at their respective hotels. How the hotels were chosen for each, I am not privy to. But the snow gods were in my favor as I got to share a cinder block room with 2 beds, off the floor, with my riding partner, RS, as did Craig & Ole. Tine Bear and Metro Dave got their usual honeymoon suite, and Big Al, Mr. International, got his own one bedroom suite.
According to the pictures I saw, the others did not fare so well. Upon check in, Jamie "junior trail boss" stated he wanted the room for the whole night. The "receptionist" retorted "the whole night? Usually it's by the hour." Needless to say each of the remaining six got their OWN room, and for the bargain discount of only $25.00 per night! Perfect right? (steph could you plug in that pic?) 💋
Back to our hotel... so after a quick check in, we headed to the adjoining bar. It was Country Western night! There was plenty of cowboy hats and line dancing and Kenny Chesney going down. You haven't seen country night at the bar until your the lone 6 English speaking Americans in a French speaking country night. They even know all the words to the American country artists.
While watching the evening unfold, Big Al decided that if he just had a cowboy hat, he could go International again. So the challenge was set. Big Al promptly set about searching for a cowboy willing to part with his cowboy hat. When nobody would bite at an American $100 bill, he switched up to a Canadian $100 bill (why I don't understand, the American bill is worth $135-$145 right now). He was in business. Big Al the Canadian Cowboy was in from Wyoming for a one night engagement. (stef could you insert big al here)
I retired shortly thereafter, before the midnight hour. We had a 7:30am curtain call to catch a taxi back to the hotel we were supposed to be staying at to load our sleds, grab breakfast, an get on the trail.
Another bottle of wine has just been sent to the table, tune in later for Day 4 Frost Bytes.
Get up all stinky
Cheers,
"Stick"