Chic-Chocs Series: Discover Vertigo-Aventures

Discover the Chic-Chocs Mountain Range in Eastern Canada

Let’s discover one of the best-kept secrets, Vertigo-Aventures

You like fresh snow, remote mountain range, you are in for something different.

Eastern Canada is not the number one destination in the world for backcountry skiing. But if you are in the East, this has to be on your radar for its accessibility and the possibility to get very good turns for a fraction of the price to go to Japan.

Discover the Chic-Chocs with this special series on the different location and guiding services available.
We start this series with Vertigo Aventures. This is the destination for serious backcountry skiing. Located in the Western part of the Chic-Chocs, Vertigo Aventures is based at the foot of the Mont Blanc Massif and it get dumped with massive snowfall year after year.

This is the destination for serious backcountry skiing. Located in the Western part of the Chic-Chocs, Vertigo Aventures is based at the foot of the Mont Blanc Massif (Quebec, Canada) and it get dumped with massive snowfall year after year. This is my third season and I’ve seen snowpacks ranging from close to 2 m this year all the way to close to 3 meters in the valley. Ski Runs are very diverse and you can choose from 200m vertical 25 degree

Ski Runs are very diverse and you can choose from 200m vertical 25-degree angle slope all the way to close to 600m vertical and 40+ degree. The terrain is in majority below treeline but you also get some nice open fields above tree at or above treeline. Oh, and the tree runs are just out of this world.
The real benefit is the number of people on this huge territory. You are basically alone. With a capacity of 12 clients, it is actually rare to even see a skin track, and you certainly never have to ski in anyone’s tracks.

If you are in for adventure, if you like remote places, if you’re in for the snow, the terrain, and the quality of the crew, this is my number one place in Eastern Canada (so far! and by far!)

Showers not included

The 40th Nato Telemark Festival

Last spring, I got he chance to to to the 40th telemark festival organized by the great Dickie hall, founder of the North AMerican Telemark Organizasion (NATO).

If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you know just how much I respect Dickie’s implication for the sport. I mean, 40 years, that’s just insane.

This year is supposed to be the last so I would not miss it for anything.

With a great group of friends we drove to MRG, thanks to Marie-Claude and Phil for organizing everything. The combo of a great telemark community, this great mountain and your best ski buddies is hard to beat.

Here’s a video of the week end

I’d really like to thank Dickie Hall and all his crew for another great festival. I don’t know if someone will take over Dickie’s festival, but regardless, I promised myself I would go back again this next year. I have met so many great person, and the skiing is just incredible.

In the end, the quality of this festival is the proof that the telemark community is not a fad. Telemark is timeless, and I’ll bet that it’ll still be around in 40 years.

Backcountry Telemark skiing grand opening in Jacques-Cartier National Parc

It is with great pleasure that we finally saw the Jacques-Cartier National Park in Quebec, Canada, open a 1 sq. km area to backcountry users.

Mathieu Brunet, Park director, was really please to see the minimum snowpack of 1 meter finally reach Thursday evening. This season was not the most constant with two major rain episode in January and February.

After two year in the making, obtaining the environmental approval for this pilot project, , it was finally happening and it produced immediate results, confirming the potential. On the first week end, more than 200 persons went and came back with smiles on their faces.

Having developed the idea and selected the area, I was pleased to hear about that. Eastern Canada does not have a great deal of backcountry access and the park opening could really be the start of something. Who knows! One thing is for sure, the sport is growing fast and people dream of powder.

The backcountry area:

With 300 meters of vertical, an average of 30° slope, there is definitely great terrain. It’s a forested area with birch, spruce and fir, it has a moderate density. The top plateau has a 150 meters vertical at 20-25° slope and has a low density, it is perfect for backcountry beginners (i.e advanced skiers/boarders). For more information, you can call the park at (418) 848-3169

The Park is 30-40 minutes from Quebec City and the Welcome center is a few hundred meters away for the base of the area so the access is not a problem. We’ll try to have a short video edit shortly.

Make sure you subscribe to our free email updates below

Telemark tutorials

Absolute Telemark is in the process of making a tutorial on telemark skiing.

HD quality, well conceive by more than 15 years of teaching experience, each lesson will be 12-20 minutes long and available for pc/mac, Ipod/Ipad, Android tablets and phones

These tutorials will cover subject like:

Basic telemark; a series of 3 tutorials will cover everything a beginner needs to know to get started. It even include a fast forward method for alpine skiers or snowboarders, eager to get rippin’ fast.
Telemark freestyle; a series of 2 tutorials will cover the new style telemark: switch telemark, snowpark jumps and modules.
Mogul telemark, a series of 2 tutorials will cover all the know how from the fundamental to all the advance stuff.
Powder telemark, a series of 3 tutorials will cover how to travel the backcountry, tree skiing, and of course powder turns

These tutorials will be release for the 2013-14 season.

Just register to our free email updates below. And make sure to visit our telemark tutorial page

Telemark in the trees

Telemark skiing in the trees is

So much fun
Always as fresh track left somewhere
Less prone to avalanche (still subject to and one should always evaluate risk accordingly)
Less wind packed, less windy, warmer, just great place to be in a stormy day (like in the video below)
Tight (trees hurt, I know from experience)

Here is what I mean in this old edit