← PreviousFirst snow, and no underground city7 December
This morning, Stéphane is browsing a pet-sitting website, the idea being that you look after people's animals in their homes while they're on holiday, and stumbles upon an ad for New York from 24 to 27 December. On this kind of site your profile makes all the difference and the reviews people have already left about you are crucial, so it's extremely hard to get started without any. We therefore decide to embellish reality a little and write that we work in an animal shelter. Bingo: Samantha replies almost immediately that if we're available for a video call, she'd be delighted to chat. After less than ten minutes of conversation, she asks us to come and look after her two little dogs while she's away. Of course we accept, and we hang up thrilled: we're going to be able to go to New York for Christmas, and without paying for accommodation! When you know that at this time of year a decent room in a nice neighbourhood costs at least 75 euros a night, we're not complaining.
The American metropolis is only six hours' drive from Montreal, the equivalent of Paris to Bordeaux, and we don't really have any option other than going by car. The bus is outrageously expensive as well as slow, and flying costs an arm and a leg for a tiny distance. We look for a car-share, but there too the Christmas period and the sky-high prices it brings push drivers to ask unreasonable amounts for a seat in their car (sometimes up to 90 dollars a seat!). We decide to rent one ourselves and offer the trip on car-sharing sites at a fair price, so that other people can take advantage of the opportunity while we cut our costs. Everyone wins.
13 December
The end of the week has been a long time coming: tonight marks the start of our first “chalet weekend”. Here, people say they're “doing a chalet” when they rent a chalet for the weekend to flee the city and escape urban torpor (no, we're not going to spend our weekend chopping wood to build a house). Determined to live the experience like locals, we join a group of ten people, including a few friends, and head for Saint-Sauveur. And when you picture a chalet lost in the woods, this one is literally lost, since we can't find it at the address given. Our friends have to call the owner, only to discover that the road we need to take doesn't officially exist on maps yet and that we have to follow very precise directions.
Once there, the chalet lives up to every promise, straight out of a Canadian cliché. The living room is huge, with a high ceiling and a magnificent wooden floor. A mezzanine holds two bedrooms and a luxurious bathroom, as does the basement, which throws in a pool table for good measure. As with most chalets here, there's also an outdoor hot tub. We mingle with our weekend companions over a buffet-style aperitif, drinks and laughter. These people are all different but all interesting in their own way, and we have an excellent evening, which for some will end in the early hours.
14 December
We'd planned to go skiing today, but unfortunately the weather has other ideas. Snow would have been welcome but no: for lack of cold, today it's raining. Rain not being the skier's best friend, we decide to postpone our outing until tomorrow. After a more or less late wake-up (9 am for some, noon for others), we “start” the day with a very hearty brunch that drags on… until 3 pm. Knowing that at this time of year it's dark by 5 pm, we slowly start moving, just so we can say we didn't spend the whole day doing nothing. Since we're in Canada and in the countryside, logically there's no need to go far to find a beautiful spot. Good thing: we're a twenty-minute walk from a lake.
So off we all go across the Canadian countryside in search of this famous lake. The path turns out to be more complicated than expected, as we're surrounded by private properties. We have no way of reaching the lake without crossing private land. We nevertheless manage to find a trail by cutting through the undergrowth and following a cross-country ski track. When we arrive, we find the typical Canadian winter landscape: a frozen lake surrounded by snow-covered fir trees. We all move closer to the edge, taking great care not to step onto the ice, which could break under our feet at any moment. After a few photos it's already 4:30 pm and the light is starting to fade dangerously. We decide to head back to the chalet.
After a hilarious game of Time's Up (the game where you make your teammates guess characters over three rounds), we set about preparing our evening feast: raclette! We won't lie to you, we're finding raclette harder and harder. Is it because of our very simple diet over the last three years, when our tight budget steered us towards basic food? Or is it just how we've naturally changed? Either way, we enjoy it less than usual and feel quite queasy after the meal. After several games of Werewolf and a trip to the outdoor hot tub under falling snow, it's already 4 am, time to go to bed, because tomorrow we have to leave the rental by 11.
15 December
After a short night during which Stéphane was in a very bad way (thanks, raclette), it's already time to pack up and clean the place before handing back the keys. While some of the group head to the nearby ski resort to enjoy the delights of alpine skiing, we decide to go back to Montreal. Cassandre is very tired and doesn't feel confident about her snowboarding skills after a five-hour night. She'll in fact spend the whole of Sunday sleeping. Ah, the joys of parties and alcohol…
21 December
Marjolaine, a friend from Paris (and incidentally a former flatmate in Melbourne), arrived in Canada the day before yesterday. She has come to celebrate Christmas with her brothers, sisters, uncles and aunts at her father's place in Quebec City. So we offered to have her stay a few nights with us in Montreal before she takes the road. The poor thing arrived in Canada two days ago and, unluckily, right in the middle of a cold snap. Two days ago we did indeed experience our first serious sub-zero temperatures: minus 21 degrees, feeling like minus 30. That stings. It's so cold that the moisture in our noses freezes instantly every time we breathe in. Our friend had thought to bring snow boots, but her coat is ridiculously useless against this cold. Luckily Cassandre had a spare winter coat, otherwise she'd have ended up frozen solid! Since she has to be at the airport at 3 pm today to pick up her brother and sister, we have time to introduce her to a very typical local activity: snow tubing.
The principle is simple: slide on an enormous rubber ring like the ones you find in water parks, except that this time you're hurtling down snowy slopes. There are several big tubing centres around Montreal but, as our time is limited, we settle for the nearest, which is also the smallest. After 30 minutes on the metro and a 15-minute walk, we arrive at Montreal's snow-sports centre in the Angrignon district. You can do all sorts of winter activities there: snow tubing of course, but also skiing and snowboarding (mainly for beginners), sledging, a snow park and so on. The tubing run, 280 metres long with a steep slope, has enough to thrill even the most seasoned. To get to the top you take a moving walkway and then climb a few stairs (not easy, by the way, with a rubber ring that comes up to your hips!). Then all you have to do is sit in it and race down the run at full speed, screaming. After two hours of sliding and fun, it's time to turn back, because time is flying and Marjolaine's meeting time is fast approaching.