Despite the threat of rain and the lack of sleep on my part (ah, those insidious pub nights!), CO took a day trip out to Mont Saint-Hilaire yesterday.

We made off under a light sprinkling at 10AM and hiked up the Rocky 2 trail (4.4 km), enjoyed a light lunch on the summit, and then made our way to the more scenic Dieppe summit (yes, we know, 380 m hardly qualifies Hilaire as a mountain).  Along the way, we were distracted by a chorus of bullfrogs and spent a good amount of time trying to figure out where all the little critters were hiding — I believe we counted just short of a dozen in a small pond.  We then trekked down the Dieppe train (3.8 kM), grabbed some treats at the visitor centre, and made our way back home.

While not a terribly difficult hike, we still love Hilaire for its pastoral scenery, its wildlife observation opportunities, and its proximity to the city.  It’s great for beginners, and we look forward to running another hike there later this summer.

As always, more photos are available in our Flickr pool.

Sunday’s hike at Mont Tremblant may go down as one of our most eventful day trips, ever.

It began as we impatiently headed up to the mountain — perhaps a little too impatiently.  Coming around the corner one after another, we all caught sight of the cruiser on the side of the road at the same time, hitting the breaks.  Unfortunately, we were too late, the cherries came on, and our lead car was motioned over to the side of the road.  Poor Di ended up getting his first speeding ticket ever.  Boo!

Mont Tremblant itself was quite busy, but the trails themselves weren’t particularly crowded.  Which is great, because there were only two trails open, both rated “black diamond”, i.e. advanced.  Sorry, newbie hikers.  But onward we trudged, on the ski lift to the village, up the stairs to the trailhead, and towards the summit.

Finding a lovely waterfall, the group posed for photos, hamming it up for the camera… at which point Hussein lands butt-first in the frigid glacial river.  At least he brought a spare pair of socks.

Not long after, I misstepped on a slippery rock and performed a flying elbow drop on a boulder.  I aborted the hike at that point as I was pretty sure I’d broken a rib (6.5 hours in the ER said otherwise), but I’m told the rest of the group completed the hike.  Well done folks!

More photos from the hike are available in our Flickr pool.  Upload yours!

As might be painfully obvious, the website has been rather quiet lately, despite the fact that we’ve been busting our butts to get our members out on some fun events.  We’ve been relying a little more on our mailing list and Facebook group to keep you folks up to date on the goings-on of the club, as well as our general meetings and monthly pub nights.

The reason for this is that we’re currently re-evaluating the best way for us to get the word out to our members, and have a few changes in the works.  We’re trying out new media, including Twitter, and are re-evaluating the need for some of our currently-used options.

This all means that we’ll be re-working our website and our communications options, including the addition of an official, full-time VP Communications position that will handle all of this.  In the meanwhile, please bear with us and tell us what you think!

ARC’TERYX Shopping Night

Wednesday evening (last) our partners at ARC’TERYX Montreal opened their doors for CO members. This event was rather important as it marked the first time ARC’TERYX and CO got together since the partnership was shaken and the A’T crew did not disappoint:

CO members were offered the chance to brows, inform themselves on different products, and learn about Arc’Teryx as a company, and as a group of cool people. What makes this different from going in off the street, you might ask? Well, first of all, the Arc’Teryx staff gave us a few presentation, designed for CO members to better understand exactly what the benefit of certain technologies are in regards to outdoor gear, and secondly CO members were able to take advantage of the partnership discount on A’T gear and merchandise.

Thanks to all who put this one together, and thanks to Nicolas and the entire Arc’Teryx Montreal team for being really cool and taking their time.

And thanks to those of you COers who came out for it; it was really nice to see some familiar faces again!

PUB NIGHT!

 If it was interesting to see all the ‘old schoolers’ who came out to the A’T shopping night, then drinking with a few of them again was that much cooler.

At about 20:00 the majority of us began to descend on the Cock and Bull and the beer flowed liberally and the stories came out just as easily. It was a great evening of catching up with old friends and new(er) CO members alike, and it was awesome to hear everyone’s horror stories from their outdoor (mis)adventures.

To all those folks already out of town, we lifted a pint for you! See you at the next one.

Good evening friends!

Your friendly CO execs have two announcements for you tonight.

First: our by-election was held today; the ballots have been tallied and our new Secretary-elect is Shelby Leslie!  He’ll be taking over from Hussein on 3rd January, 2009, and we’re all looking forward to working with him and benefiting from the experience he brings.

Second: our members may have noticed that the forums were recently getting attacked by spammers, who were at times posting very inappropriate material.  Thanks to all that kept an eye out and reported these shenanigans.  We’ve taken measures to stem this, as follows:

All new registrants on the forum will have to be approved by the executive body.  It’s a pain, we know, but sadly this is the best way to ensure that we maintain the high quality of the posts.  To this end, we’ve also banned Chris and Greg.

If your registration has not been approved within 48 hours, please contact me via e-mail at astavrow@concordiaoutdoors.org to sort everything out.

- Angelo

Last night the CO descended on the Ste-Elizabeth Pub to kick back and take it easy. Although we had intended on making it an outdoor evening on the sick terrace of the St-Liz mum nature had different ideas. Sound’s sort of weird, the CO not ready to spend the evening outside in the first snowfall of the season, doesn’t it? Well, even with Tristan (who organized the even – Good Job, sir! Good Job!) warning us to wear our wools, few of us had brought enough layers to school/work that day to accommodate a prolonged battle with the elements.

Setting up on the second floor we hijacked a corner of the pub. It was a merry time and, though I left early, completely enjoyed myself (next time I won’t trouble anyone with a speech, or I’ll have one prepared and not sound so…well, like me).

I’d like to thank Tristan for putting this together, and to thank everyone that showed up. New and old. It’s the membership that makes the CO special, interesting, and fun, and it was nice to see so many people not in a meeting/official or sweating environment. We’ve gotta do this more often.

CP

CO returned to Mont St-Hilaire for an entry level hike of about 9km today, once again beating the odds on the weather report and taking advantage of unseasonably warm temperatures and sunny skies.

A few new faces joined us –some at the last possible minute– and we learned a few valuable lessons:

1. Angelo seems to be a magnet for idiot drivers;
2. Pants can and will turn into hotpants over the course of a hike;
3. Even with GPS, CO always gets lost.

Plenty of feathered friends showed up to greet our amateur birdwatcher, Wanda, including chickadees, blue jays, woodpeckers, and an incredibly large turkey vulture, which was probably waiting for Angelo’s knee to give out.

On our way home, an impromptu visit to Vergers Les Jardins d’Emma (yep, they remembered us!) gave us the opportunity to buy some fresh (and delicious) apples, do some ungraceful bouldering, and laze about in the sun (pictured above).

All in all, a great Sunday.  Thanks to all who came out!

Long prepared, well executed. That’s how I would sum this trip up. While pretty much everyone in the group had to deal with some aspect of the organization, and we got lucky in finding some last minute additions to fill the team out, everything went off with nary a hitch. Before I get into the travelog part of this post I would like to share with everyone (those that came along and those that didn’t) what a good experience I had with these people. We were well balanced, sarcastic, cynical, and friendly: even after humping it for 20+km in a single day everyone was still cheery and fun to be around. Thank you all for that, and thank you all for making every aspect of this Exped as fun as it was. Oh, and despite my linguistic argument concerning Roti, I realized today I had the name of the Swiss one wrong: I forgot the ’s’ (Rösti).

DAY 1 (Friday, October 17): I only got there around 09:05 and, contrary to all the hexes and curses CO has so far endured, the Cars were already there, drivers ready to go, with Linn and Matt already chatting away. Soon after that (by about 09:20-25) everyone else (with the exception of…you guessed it…Hussein) had arrived and were loaded in. After a quick cell call to an apartment up the street (Hussein ) we were off by 09:35-40, a feat unimaginable to CO regulars! With very little detouring (though I once again managed to ensure that we took the longer way) we found ourselves in the parking lot of the Munro Service Centre in the Parc du Mont-Tremblant earlier than every expected (I have no idea what time it was). After a few trips to the can, and a moment to check in, the eight of us were off, down the road to the trailhead with our packs on our backs.

With us bitching about walking a paved road we hit the trailhead in no-time, turning on to a x-country ski course (ie: wide path) that led us into the barren boreal (most of the leaves were down by the time we got there) where we talked and got to know one and other as the trail casually rolled the 6-8km (again, I forget) to the first hut, which we hit before we noticed it. We met a pair of mother-daughters hiking the trail for the 2nd time who shared the cabin with us without much ado. They even played a game of Werewolf with us that evening!

That night, after stoking the fire and figuring out where we’d be sleeping, we figured out the truth about god, solved the world’s economic issues, and saved humanity in general (ah, campfire discussion with a bunch of academics). We played the heretofore mentioned game of Werewolf, an odd Norwegian game called ‘Shrink’ that left me confused and tired, and howled with the wolves (they sounded so close at one point on day 2 Matt led a team to find what they might have killed). Then, having gone to bed, Matt almost gave me a heart attack with his ‘getting comfortable’, Thomas dreamt of crashing planes and looked for consolation (Hussein was having none of it) and Shelby dreamt about the end of the world…again.

DAY 2 (Saturday, October 18): Morning arrived and those of us that woke early (Linn, Chris, Hussein, and Thomas) checked to see if Tristan (who’d slept outside) was dead (he wasn’t). Matt and Shelby (who really aren’t morning people) woke up and scared the mother-daughter teams away. Copious amounts of coffee perished as a result.

We hit the trail at around 11:40, striking back along the widened x-c path until we hit a sweet singletrack. Turing onto that we followed the switchbacks, mudpits, and at times the river for several kliks, taking two or three breaks and a lunch as we rose and fell along the ridge of the ‘mountains’ (or the east coast equivalent, even spotting a Pine Martin (cute as all hell, though Tristan would have you believe these cuddly critters are ‘dangerous’), before we came across the nicest waterfall. There we sat for a few minutes, knowing the hut was only ‘1.3km’ from the falls, and enjoyed the deafening sounds. Matt went to sleep and, at his request, we left him when we departed.

That last ‘1.3km’ was the most wretched piece of bullshit signage I have ever encountered. We walked another 45minutes (even though we’d managed to do 3km in 30minutes right before we hit the ‘1.3km’ sign) before we arrived, broken and weary, at the 2nd hut. This is where we showed our expert-level backpacking abilities (GO TEAM SUPERTRAMP GO!): from arrival (like I said, broken and whatnot) to full-blown coffee and snax, was no more than 5 minutes. Solid work team! This hut sat on the shores of the river and we had our very own set of rapids to sleep beside.

That night (Matt, you ask? Oh yes, he rejoined us about an hour and a half after coffee and snax) we cooked much oddness (Shelby, Tristan, Hussein, & Matt made a: Lentils, Black Beans, Couscous, Cheese, Split Pea and Ham Soup, Pepperoni ghoulassh that looked rotten, tasted like something, and stuck to your ribs like a solid slug from a 12-gauge), talked smack about everything (the academic thing was discarded after the first night) and went to bed with 3 people outside to die (Matt, Shelby, & Tristan).

DAY 3 (Sunday, October 19): Deciding to get an earlier start we woke up the freezing dead and ate breakfast, drank so much coffee animals were getting caffeine high from our breath, and hit the trail at 11:00. It was supposed to be the largest km day of the three and we wanted to cut our departure time.

For the first third the trail was–in my mind–nicer than the previous day. We hiked rolling singletrack through thinning hardwood forests, following the river for a while, then to the top of a ridge where the pines and softwoods thickened, then descended into a pristine valley, surrounded by about 5 peaks, with a slow moving stream at the bottom. I thought that this part was majestic and worth the walk. Then, for the next 5-8km, we returned to the x-c trail/road as it cut a 15deg ascent into the side of a ‘mountain’, draining the life out of everyone (with the exception of Thomas, who bolted ahead, wrassled with two black-bear cubs, almost hit a car, and then did homework until we showed up). We were in mechanical mode after that, stopping for a brief lunch and catching Thomas we trudged the remaining million km, following the road for the majority of it, until we found the Lac Munro Center.

Elated, Hussein took a swim (much to the cries of a plethora of tourists from Antwerp, one of whom took our group photo for us), Matt refused, and the rest of us discussed food. What on earth could take away the joy of an experience like this? Hmmm? Ever drive through Tremblant Village? Yeah, well, that and the crazy Swiss prat who threatened Thomas and his car because we tried to eat at his restaurant, barely finding anything to eat in the whole area, we were pretty slain by the time we hit Hwy 15 again (with Greg screaming at Matt and I for getting a Tim Hortons…hush, Greg!).

People got returned, Cars got returned, Pine Martens probably forgot we even exist, everyone was returned to Mtl by 20:00 (an estimation, I have no idea) and we all parted ways. All-in-all a sick, good trip from which most needed two days of sleep to recover from (incl the Tree Planters…which was surprising to me).

CP

This past Sunday’s hike of Mont Sutton represented one of the first Trips of the new semester for the CO. It was a chance for some of us to meet some new members (the group was a little smaller than we would have liked) and cover some nice terrain just as the colours of fall started to move into the Eastern Townships.

We left from CO HQ relatively on time (we wanted to leave at 8am and got off by 8:30, which was good for us) and although the sky threatened to open up on us (it was relatively grey) our luck managed to hold out. We made the mountain in good time, and we were treated to a perfect fall morning: one cloud hovered half-way up the side of the hill, and the boreal was just starting to show signs of the autumnal bliss that is just getting started. The weather was a little cool, but whatever: we set off up the run to find the trail.

Trying to make an early departure time we kicked some butt and made really good time in the ascent. With Greg and I navigating we only got lost a few times, and turned what could have been a relatively straight-forward hike into a few interesting loops, visiting two peaks (which both had nice vistas of the surrounding landscape) and a pond (I think it’s the first one we actually managed to convince Hussein not to swim) before returning to the cars and scoping out a Tim Horton’s in short order.

While taking lunch on the lift platform at the top of the ski hill, just as the sun faded and the wind picked up, we were consumed by a low-lying cloud. I thought that was really cool (and sort of cold). And was actually one of the highlights of the trip for me. Otherwise the sun was out and it was that perfect temperature that lets you sweat just a bit, wear that nice fall gear that collects dust in a Montreal-area environment, and just enjoy the trail.

I’d like to thank both drivers (Syd and Sue) and all the folks that came along. It was nice to meet some of you, and a pleasure to hike with all. I only hope that we can run many more of these so our other new members (and older ones alike) can get more of an opportunity to get out there.

CP

I would like to take the opportunity to welcome all of the new members who came by our tables at the two Concordia University club’s fairs and signed up to the CO. We’re glad your interested, and we’re going to do our best to welcome you, and get you and your friends outside this year.

I would also like to thank all of the volunteers and people who helped out with the tabling for the two fair days: Ariel, Sue, Greg, and Hussein, and those members who showed up just to say hi and to spread the word (too many of you to name, but thanks nontheless).

As for a blog report about how all of it went, here we go:

Thursday Sept 4th, Loyola Campus: The CO booth was faithfully managed by myself, Sue, and Ariel, and although it threatened to rain all morning we were treated to a sunny and warm afternoon, a free vegitarian lunch (which Sue had to convince me to try…it was good) and some inflaitable games. The CSU did a pretty good job in organization and they even ran some distractions in the inflatable obstacle course and a mass Twister game (which Sue placed in the top 3 for, winning us some respect from the Yoga group, Art of Living).

Monday Sept 8th, Sir George ‘Campus’: I got there early. Way early. Anyway: It was called the Tastes of Concordia fair. We didn’t know that. And besides, serving energy gel, rehydrated chili, protein bars, and treated water probably wouldn’t have been such a big draw anyway. So thank’s to Ariel for bringing some Argentinian candies (that tasted suspiciously like non-Argentinian candies..hmmm). Wedged between the Chinese and Indian Student Associations, we figured that the good smells from these two would bring members out way. Well, it didn’t exactly work out that way. But we ate well. Semi-sunny and eventually really rainy we did out best (Hussein, Ariel, Sue, Greg, and I) and filled ourselves with the tastes of Concordia while at the same time trying to figure out what some clubs did while waiting for the mother ship. It was a good day for us.

CO power!

CP