Weekend Val Morin
After my last night at work (celebrated by my colleagues with Duvel, McChouffe, Duvel, Orval, Delirium Tremens & Floreffe), my supervisor was kind enough to let me go home earlier. And so the plan was to get a couple of hours of good sleep, then go to the bank, video rental store, supermarket .... Instead, we failed to hear the alarm clock and only got up at 11:30am, discovering there was already a shitload of snow outside (there was a snowstorm warning, but we weren't expecting it until late afternoon).
So we quickly got our stuff together, called the free shuttle service of the rental agency (coz our rental car would be ready at 1pm). 1:10pm, still no shuttle bus, so I called them again and they were gonna send someone over. Only 20minutes later they showed up. And u gotta know they're only 500m from our place. (We didn't walk there, remember all the snow). So finally they picked us up, did all the paperwork and got the car .... COMPLETELY snowed in.
So instead of having the car ready to go, I spend half an hour clearing the snow and getting the car out of his parkingspot. The friggin' car didn't even have wintertires, so no grip at all. Talking 'bout the worst service ever!!
Finally managed to get the car out (2pm) and we had to make a stop at the vide rental store to get some DVD's for the weekend. (We booked a room at a cosy B & B with TV/DVD). After one of our briefest visits ever (coz we wanted to leave ASAP, considering the snowstorm and that Montreal has the worst traffic ever, especially during rush hour), we still needed to buy ski pants.
Luckily our neighbour advised us a good store: Mountain Equipment Co-op. And not that far from our place either. So we managed to get an excellent deal (31 bucks) for a pair of waterproof all activity pants). And for a small 5$ you receive a lifetime membership of the Co-op so you can get the best deals on first quality outdoor equipment (Yeah, we're happy campers all right!).
But suddenly I found something chewing on my leg. It was T. She hadn't had breakfast nor lunch and getting very very grumpy without her caffeine fix. Luckily salvation was near:
They have the best doughnuts ever! And the cool thing is that you can actully see how they're made in the store! Very cool indeed!
So with a large coffee and some yummie tummie stuff, we finally hit the road at 4pm. After an 1,5h bobsleigh ride, we arrived at destination. Some freshing up and ready for dinner at "Le chat noir" in St. Adèle. Turned out to be, because of the bad weather, all tables were cancelled and the restaurant was only open for the 2 of us. Which was nice of course.
Next day, it was time for some action, so a after a very healthy breakfast we went to the Belle Neige mountain for a fresh dive into the snow. We got a personal instructor that explained the basic techniques of snowboarding. And after that introduction that only took an hour, we were on our own. Even T. managed to stay on the board.
After a couple of hours of falling and retrying, T. called it a day (it is a high energy demanding sports, especially for couch athletes as we) but I decided it was time to tackle the big mountain. So I bravely took the ski lift and that's where it all went wrong. When getting of, instead of jumping of the chairs and sliding away from the skilift, my board was horizontally and I fell down. My knee got so twisted that even professional yoga people would hold their breath. CALICE DE TABARNAC D'OSTIE!! (--> that's Quebecois swearing for ya)
Somehow I managed to get down the mountain, high on adrenalin from the pain, I guess. Coz then the pain really started kicking in. The first aid people put some snow on it (wich comes very cheap here in winter), and advised me to go to hospital. Although it hurt, the pain wasn't inbearable, and I was still able to stand on my knee, bend it. And because of the ice, my knee wasn't swelling up that much and didn't look bruised or anything. So we decided to wait and see.
The rest of the day was going to be lazy .... The very kind host of our B & B gave us hot chocolate with marshmellow flavour and a bag of frozen peas for my knee. Though only able to walk up the stairs as a 100-year old, I knew that hearty food would bring some relief. The cold ale, mussels and fries of Spago really made up for it. But at 9 o'clock I was as dead as a rock (I think the nightshifts were still playing tricks on me).
Next morning, we wanted to go cross-country skiing or snowshoeing. Since my knee was still aching, we did an easy snowshoe trail. And it turned out to be real fun. To conclude our great outdoors weekend, we went to have dinner in a very good local restaurant "Le Matou" that serves local produce. Great thing about most restaurants here, is that they are BYOW (bring your own wine or apportez votre vin). So you can enjoy an exquisite meal with a very fine bottle of wine without fear for bankruptcy!
Here are the piccy's, for more, see my photoblog "A snapshot of Montréal".
Surfer girl, you look so fi-i-i-ine!
Trying to keep that balance!
You snowshoe me and I snowshoe you?
Standing on top of the world ...
Ice cave woman
Page5 boy!
Arf!
Beware of the spikes!
So we quickly got our stuff together, called the free shuttle service of the rental agency (coz our rental car would be ready at 1pm). 1:10pm, still no shuttle bus, so I called them again and they were gonna send someone over. Only 20minutes later they showed up. And u gotta know they're only 500m from our place. (We didn't walk there, remember all the snow). So finally they picked us up, did all the paperwork and got the car .... COMPLETELY snowed in.
So instead of having the car ready to go, I spend half an hour clearing the snow and getting the car out of his parkingspot. The friggin' car didn't even have wintertires, so no grip at all. Talking 'bout the worst service ever!!
Finally managed to get the car out (2pm) and we had to make a stop at the vide rental store to get some DVD's for the weekend. (We booked a room at a cosy B & B with TV/DVD). After one of our briefest visits ever (coz we wanted to leave ASAP, considering the snowstorm and that Montreal has the worst traffic ever, especially during rush hour), we still needed to buy ski pants.
Luckily our neighbour advised us a good store: Mountain Equipment Co-op. And not that far from our place either. So we managed to get an excellent deal (31 bucks) for a pair of waterproof all activity pants). And for a small 5$ you receive a lifetime membership of the Co-op so you can get the best deals on first quality outdoor equipment (Yeah, we're happy campers all right!).
But suddenly I found something chewing on my leg. It was T. She hadn't had breakfast nor lunch and getting very very grumpy without her caffeine fix. Luckily salvation was near:
They have the best doughnuts ever! And the cool thing is that you can actully see how they're made in the store! Very cool indeed!
So with a large coffee and some yummie tummie stuff, we finally hit the road at 4pm. After an 1,5h bobsleigh ride, we arrived at destination. Some freshing up and ready for dinner at "Le chat noir" in St. Adèle. Turned out to be, because of the bad weather, all tables were cancelled and the restaurant was only open for the 2 of us. Which was nice of course.
Next day, it was time for some action, so a after a very healthy breakfast we went to the Belle Neige mountain for a fresh dive into the snow. We got a personal instructor that explained the basic techniques of snowboarding. And after that introduction that only took an hour, we were on our own. Even T. managed to stay on the board.
After a couple of hours of falling and retrying, T. called it a day (it is a high energy demanding sports, especially for couch athletes as we) but I decided it was time to tackle the big mountain. So I bravely took the ski lift and that's where it all went wrong. When getting of, instead of jumping of the chairs and sliding away from the skilift, my board was horizontally and I fell down. My knee got so twisted that even professional yoga people would hold their breath. CALICE DE TABARNAC D'OSTIE!! (--> that's Quebecois swearing for ya)
Somehow I managed to get down the mountain, high on adrenalin from the pain, I guess. Coz then the pain really started kicking in. The first aid people put some snow on it (wich comes very cheap here in winter), and advised me to go to hospital. Although it hurt, the pain wasn't inbearable, and I was still able to stand on my knee, bend it. And because of the ice, my knee wasn't swelling up that much and didn't look bruised or anything. So we decided to wait and see.
The rest of the day was going to be lazy .... The very kind host of our B & B gave us hot chocolate with marshmellow flavour and a bag of frozen peas for my knee. Though only able to walk up the stairs as a 100-year old, I knew that hearty food would bring some relief. The cold ale, mussels and fries of Spago really made up for it. But at 9 o'clock I was as dead as a rock (I think the nightshifts were still playing tricks on me).
Next morning, we wanted to go cross-country skiing or snowshoeing. Since my knee was still aching, we did an easy snowshoe trail. And it turned out to be real fun. To conclude our great outdoors weekend, we went to have dinner in a very good local restaurant "Le Matou" that serves local produce. Great thing about most restaurants here, is that they are BYOW (bring your own wine or apportez votre vin). So you can enjoy an exquisite meal with a very fine bottle of wine without fear for bankruptcy!
Here are the piccy's, for more, see my photoblog "A snapshot of Montréal".
Surfer girl, you look so fi-i-i-ine!
Trying to keep that balance!
You snowshoe me and I snowshoe you?
Standing on top of the world ...
Ice cave woman
Page5 boy!
Arf!
Beware of the spikes!
posted by E. Stilker at 4:01 PM
2 Comments:
T chewing on your leg?? Daar zal ik me maar niets bij voorstellen :D
Denk je dat we daar in de zomer nog kunnen snowboarden? Ik ga nl volgende week eens proberen of ik dat ga kunnen, en dan zou het wel leuk zijn om dat een keertje in Canada te doen!
laat je winterkledij maar thuis als je in juni naar hier komt. de sneeuw zal dan volledig verdwenen zijn. dat is het voordeel hier: we kennen hier echte seizoenen. de lente en herfst zijn wel erg kort, maar de winter en zomer zijn heerlijk! in de zomer halen we makkelijk 25 tot 30 graden, ook in de skigebieden.
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