September 15, 2025
Tammy woke up with some congestion. No fever, so we are hopeful. She took some OTC meds, fingers crossed. She said she'd be fine chilling out at the ABB, so I started plotting. There are two (2) more national parcs within my reach from the ABB. I picked one of them and plotted a loop route that brought me more northeast to explore the paved roads in that direction.
I get on my way about 10:00 am, and as soon as I leave any semblance of Sherbrooke, it starts getting good.
It's about 64 degrees, the sun is shining, and ole Pants is quenching his thirst nicely.
A little more color peeping through in these parts.
There must be hundreds of lakes in southern Quebec. I guess they basically dammed just about every waterway there is. Here, if you say you live on a lake, it's not all that impressive.
I get to Frontenec National Parc and pull into the visitor's center. This makes my seventh N/P to visit in Quebec. The parc ranger informed me that there are no paved roads in this parc, and the trail I want to walk is a 15 minute ride away. It appears to be smooth dirt, so I give it a shot.
Before I got the Dual Sport, I never would have tried this. But you learn to let the tires walk a little in the looser stuff and that skill applies with any bike. I took it easy and got there just fine.
I ate my lunch at the parking area, and then started walking the Grande Pins (Big Pines) trail. It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood.
This parc is not heavily used, as evident by the low wear on the trails.
The trail was aptly named - these are among the largest White Pine trees I've seen anywhere in Quebec. For whatever reason, when this region was clear cut, they must have left these trees.
Nice shade on the lake shore to sit and be thankful.
The parc brouchure mentioned a waterfall, but it's been so dry lately, there is no water to fall.
And so I continued on.
Now about 4 KM into the walk, the trail pops out of the forest at this lake.
There was a little kiosk at this point of view. It's got laminated identification cards of the birds found here, along with a pair of binoculars for anyone to use. I've never seen that anywhere before. What a great idea!
I identified a couple of common birds, and then moved on. These guys are warming up in the clear shallow water.
Quite a few of the maple trees here are giving it up.
The trail turns into a gravel bike path, which made the walk easy and more direct. If I come back here, I'll be with the mountain bicycle.
Say - what's that I hear rustling in those leaves?
You better run along little buddy and find a meal. It won't be long before you slip into a hole until Spring.
I get back to the FJR after about 6 KM of easy walking. I never saw one person the whole time. That was a peaceful walk and I'm glad I decided to come here.
I'm still holding hope for seeing another moose, but no luck yet.
It's now about 3 pm and my route says I've still got 200 KM to go, so I start riding more deliberate. The roads in this area are pretty straight.
Now I know why they call this area Thetford Mines.
I fully understand that we need to have raw materials to make things, but seeing the entire landscape destroyed from these practices gives me a bad feeling. Google A/I says that historically, aesbestos was mined here, but now they seek other minerals.
Soon enough, I pulled out of that area and it gets pretty again.
I took the last 100 KM in one chunk. About 10 km from home, I rounded a curve and spooked a deer grazing in the ditch. It seems they are coming out earlier now. By the time I got back to the ABB, my helmet was completely covered in bugs. Little gnats, it would seem. I guess thousands of them are imbedded in my jacket and pants - lol.
Yet another wonderful day in Quebec!!
Stay thirsty, my friends....
