Norway Day in Gatineau Park

Gatineau Park: P9 to Huron (17 km)
P9: N45 31.258 W75 50.928
Huron: N45 30.336 W75 53.999

Today Mike and I were to meet up with Kenmore at Huron for waffles, brunost (sweet goat cheese), warm solbærtoddy (a hot black currant drink), and jam to celebrate Gatineau's 6th Norway Day held by the Norwegian Embassy and the NCC.




After a very satisfying lunch we decided to head down Trail 3 and have a taste of the backwoods.



From Trail 3 we jumped on to Trail 9 to Trail 12, towards Shilly Shally and then down Trail 11 to the Parkway.



Dodging skater skiers and waffle hungry kids, we quickly jumped off the Parkway again and headed down Trail 9 making our way around Lac Fortune. Conditions for these trails were perfect. This section of Trail 9 ended with two smoking big hills before joining Trail 32. It was at this crossroads that we parted company with Kenmore as he still had another 30 odd kms to ski back to his car in P6.



All said and done these back trails were simply awesome and highly recommended - especially if there is some fresh snow to fall down on should the need arise (as superbly demonstrated in the photo below by Mike).



Somewhere along this Trail 32, Mike and I came across a small boy shouting for his father. Apparently his ski had come off and his father and brother had continued on down the trail while he opted to park his exhausted self in the middle of the trail and scream bloody murder. Luckily grizz had donned his Good Samaritan hat this morning and decided to save this lad from the encroaching wolves. After spending several minutes fixing the boy's ski and then skiing with him down the trail we met up with his brother and father. Surprisingly they didn't offer a reward.



Cheers to Norway Day and another great day in the Gatineau.



Although I hope to be proven wrong, this winter could very well go down in history as the best cross-country ski season ever.