The Great Québec Escape

We’ll pick you up in the morn­ing at Jean-Lesage Inter­na­tion­al Air­port (YQB) and at our rec­om­mend­ed hotel in Old Que­bec. Pour a lit­tle maple syrup in your cof­fee as we have an excit­ing first day ahead of us! We’re head­ing north to Saint-Ray­mond to dis­cov­er one of two sec­tors of the famed Val­lée Bras-du-Nord. Get ready for some seri­ous action-packed fun! 

We’ll start climb­ing on Sen­tier du Roque­mont and La Mon­tée du Belvédère, before blast­ing down the grin-induc­ing Tablerone and Le Grand Eggan. We’ll do a lap of the XC loop l’Écho des Julien before wind­ing down on Mon­sieur Roland. Of course, we’d be remiss not to hit La Tom­my L’Paquet, named after (you guessed it) our famous assis­tant guide! It’s a short but fun slopestyle-esque trail filled with berms, bridges and lots of jumps (all rol­lable)… tons of fun, just like Tom­my! We’ll end up at the Brasserie Roque­ment for a sam­pling of their refresh­ing brews. You’ll want to check out the local bike shop, Frenette, and pick up some VBN swag to help sup­port the local trails (and look super cool, too). 

We’ll then dri­ve to Shan­na­han to our love­ly abode in the heart of the val­ley — a stun­ning back­coun­try eco-lodge equipped with BBQs, bike wash sta­tion and cozy fire­places. With very lit­tle cell ser­vice you’ll have lit­tle choice but to tru­ly unwind, dis­con­nect and admire your sur­round­ings. We’ll enjoy an amaz­ing BBQ feast and share pho­tos, footage and laughs from the day. 

We have an absolute­ly epic day in store today, with trails that are bound to leave you speech­less and dumb­found­ed by their sheer beau­ty. So wild and rugged is the land­scape, you’ll have a hard time believ­ing we’re just an hour away from an inter­na­tion­al air­port and a bustling metrop­o­lis. Plus, being steps away from the trails in our pri­vate eco-lodge, we’ll be able to take full advan­tage of the day ahead of us.

And here the adven­ture begins: the full Neil­son trail (Est, Nord and Sud) can only be described as a work of art that show­cas­es the area’s var­ied land­scapes in all their glo­ry. Rag­ing rivers, strik­ing water­falls and gran­ite cliffs jut­ting from the for­est floor are brought togeth­er by an undu­lat­ing rib­bon of per­fect­ly carved sin­gle­track. Per­haps one of the coolest aspects of these trails is that they were built in part­ner­ship with Pro­jet Jeunesse, a pro­gram that puts shov­els and pulask­is in the hands of at-risk youth and pro­vides them with valu­able skills and mean­ing­ful work through trail building.

As we break by the Neil­son riv­er, we’ll gain an under­stand­ing as to why this land is deemed sacred to the Huron-Wen­dat First Nations of the area. A spec­tac­u­lar catered lunch awaits on the banks of the riv­er where we’ll feast on local and tra­di­tion­al del­i­ca­cies and sit stunned by our mag­i­cal sur­round­ings. We’ll ride all the way back to our lodge on a mix of flowy blue trails and final­ly kick back, crack a beer and jump in the riv­er to cool down. In the evening, we’ll enjoy a BBQ din­ner togeth­er before crank­ing some clas­sic Québé­cois folk around a bon­fire (where maple whiskey is known to flow gen­er­ous­ly) and cel­e­brate the days accomplishments. 

Once caf­feinat­ed, we’ll hop on our bikes and ride over to the cap­ti­vat­ing Delaney water­fall. And see­ing as no trip to Québec is com­plete with­out a healthy serv­ing of local, organ­ic maple syrup, we’ll indulge in true Québé­cois fash­ion in an out­door break­fast of thick French Toast and fruit… right at the foot of the waterfall!

As if that wasn’t indul­gent enough, we’ll begin a short ride on the super fun La Boréale and the brand-new Légende, which fea­tures a mas­sive slab ride next to a plum­met­ing water­fall that cul­mi­nates with a stun­ning panoram­ic view of the val­ley below. Then it’s onto the clas­sic Chute à Gilles, where we’ll cross the very same water­fall from below, before mak­ing our escape on Grande Éva­sion.

We’ll have an ear­ly break­fast and then dri­ve to Lac Delage and head to Empire 47 (which sits at the 47th par­al­lel), where we’ll talk shop, get changed, fill up water blad­ders and grab home­made snacks. 

E47 is well-known as the world’s pre­mier fat­bik­ing cen­tre, but rest assured the sum­mer­time sin­gle­track is just as wor­thy of admi­ra­tion as the groomed win­ter loops. We’ll warm up and get our legs spin­ning on the pump track and bike park (try to spot the downed Cess­na!) before head­ing into a nice mix of inter­me­di­ate-lev­el trails. We’ll sam­ple the goods on Huron, Kama­su­trail and Belzébrute where berms, flow lines and stun­ning vis­tas await. 

Back at the park­ing lot, we’ll clean up, load up bikes and grab a bite at near­by Pas­cal le Boulanger for deli­cious sand­wich­es and patis­series. Once bel­lies are full and thirst quenched, we’ll check in to our trendy hotel & resort for the next 3 nights, Entourage sur-le-Lac, over­look­ing beau­ti­ful Lac Beau­port. Hop in the hot tub, go for a swim or grab a pad­dle and try SUP’ing… you’ll soon dis­cov­er that life is bet­ter on a moun­tain bike AND at the lake. 

Today, we’ll hit the road for the myth­i­cal Mont-Saint-Anne (be sure to catch a glimpse of the 83-metre tall Mont­moren­cy Falls on the way!). MSA has deep roots in the moun­tain bike rac­ing world dat­ing back 30 years, host­ing its first UCI Moun­tain Bike World Cham­pi­onship in 1991. It’s home to some of the row­di­est, gnarli­est ter­rain on the East Coast, where old-school DH lines and tech­ni­cal XC sec­tions meld into a mod­ern day Enduro melt­ing pot. 

With the more recent addi­tion of fun, flowy, blue-lev­el trails like La Bout­taboutte and La Grisante, MSA is bound to leave you smil­ing from ear to ear. And those look­ing for more grav­i­ty-fed adren­a­line, we’ll pos­si­bly dip into the more chal­leng­ing La Yable, L’Érablière  and La Viet­nam. We’ll take a well-deserved break for lunch at the foot of a mag­i­cal water­fall to soak in the scenery and refuel. 

In the after­noon, we’ll keep the laughs going with a few mel­low jump lines and high-speed flowy sec­tions on l’Adorila and La Cairn, before clean­ing up to head into Old Que­bec City for din­ner. You’ll walk back in time as you stroll down cob­ble­stone streets, peruse shops, catch some live music and dine at one of our rec­om­mend­ed restau­rants for clas­sic Québé­cois cui­sine or fresh local gas­tronomie, before head­ing back to Lac Beau­port for a good night’s rest. 

After a hearty break­fast at the hotel (be sure to try cre­tons!), we’ll pack up our bags and head out for a short dri­ve to the famed Sen­tiers du Moulin where rocky ter­rain and mod­ern-day trail build­ing blend to make for an unfor­get­table des­ti­na­tion. We’ll tour the brand new, state-of-the-art wel­come cen­tre and learn about the fas­ci­nat­ing his­to­ry of the area’s rid­ing scene.

The trails here of all lev­els have been built thanks to a ded­i­cat­ed crew and over 10,000 hours of vol­un­teer work. You can’t help but feel the pas­sion, devo­tion and deter­mi­na­tion etched into every berm, bridge and rock gar­den. We’ll start off on the likes of Raph, Gros Buck and QMGbefore hit­ting Québec’s most pop­u­lar trail, Super G. We’ll regroup for a deli­cious trail­side lunch made up of baguettes, local cheeses and a boun­ty of pro­duits du ter­roir. Rejoice!

In the after­noon, we’ll head to the oth­er side of the moun­tain (the Tour­bil­lon sec­tor) to sam­ple some of the lat­est and most badass trail cre­ations imag­in­able. We’ll check out Slab City, a mas­ter­piece-of-a-trail that flows like one giant piece of Cana­di­an Shield. For the absolute experts in the group, we’ll head for an option­al ride on Wolver­ine; an impres­sive and extreme­ly chal­leng­ing mael­strom of gran­ite, dirt, wood­work, and steep slabs. Not for the faint of heart! Oth­ers will want a sec­ond go of Slab City after hav­ing test­ed out the gran­ite’s grip­pi­ness, before wind­ing down for beers at Archibald micro­brew­ery fol­lowed by Chez Boub’s famous pou­tine. We’ll then load the van and bid our farewell to this beau­ti­ful region. Then it’s off the air­port by 4:00 pm for those catch­ing a flight, and back to Old Que­bec for those extend­ing their trip. Au revoir et à la prochaine!