Falls Trail

I just got back from vacation as I had said in my previous post, Weekly Photo Challenge: Fleeting Moments. As promised, I’ll be posting in a bit more detail on my various adventures in Saguenay Lac Saint Jean.  The first place I visited was the Falls Trail (Sentier des Chutes) found in the Fjords du Saguenay National Park.  This trail was supposed to be a intermediate to difficult level hike.  They had some really crazy markers as well for distance.  Their 1 km didn’t feel like 1 km..more like 2km (but thats maybe because by the end of the path, it was just like a wilderness obstacle course of climbing big boulders, walking up steep hills and paths full of water running through it.  I’ll take you along for our walk on this trail!

LETS BEGIN!!!

The first 1.5 km was pretty smooth.  We had to pay with this envelope ($6 per person) then started off on a pretty decent dirt path between slight slopes and tall trees.  At the 1.5 km mark, there was the first Falls.  That one I featured in my previous post mentioned above. There was 3 levels that you could climb up to get close to the falls, which was just breathtaking (how many times have I said that already?)

At around 2-2.5 km, we had the viewpoint and the top of the falls that we were at before.  The view was so amazing (for lack of a better word).

The next point was at 3.5 km where the second falls was situated.  This one is a bit less majestic as the first but its located at a nice little peaceful area.

It was such a beautiful atmosphere to relax and regain energy before we decided that we’d try to move on for another 3 km to the top of the mountain with the limit that wherever we were, at a certain set time, we’d have to set back.

So the next place was undetermined distance from where we were.  This part for the last part was crazy…we had to climb a mountain and drop back down to reach the walkway to cross and walk over all sorts of crazy paths over mossy boulders, water and mud, etc.

In the last 3km path, we went by a few areas that were pretty nice.  Like the one before, where it was a stream or river or something running along the wall.  We walked on the slippery path on the side.

We also passed this lake called Lac mort, translates to Dead Lake.  For something dead, it sure was peaceful there.  It was really quiet and we made a stop here on the way back to recuperate energy.

After Lac Mort, that was it.  The path went from bad to worse.  It was just path of boulders and on top of that it was going up a steep path.  By the time, we reached the 5.5km marker, we had a flight of wooden stairs which lead to the boulders below.

At that point, our time limit was up, our water was all gone so with only a few hundred meters left, we had to just go back before it got too dark in the forest (since we didn’t have any flashlights).  Sad, but it was a decision that had to be made.  Next time, we will be better experienced and bring a whole lot of water and probably energy bars and maybe pack those hiking poles (or whatever you call them).

Hope you enjoyed that! More adventures from Saguenay Lac Saint Jean coming up!!