FNC 2021: The Noise of Engines (Le Bruit des Moteurs, 2021)

The Noise of Engines (Le Bruit des Moteurs, 2021)

Director (and writer): Philippe Grégoire

Cast: Robert Naylor, Alexandrine Agostini, Marc Beaupré, Tanja Bjork, Maxime Genois, Marie-Therese Fortin, Naila Rabel

Alexandre, an instructor at the Canadian customs college, will finds himself under surveillance by police investigators trying to get to the bottom of the sexually explicit drawings that have been troubling the town. – IMDB

The Noise of Engines is Philippe Gregoire’s debut feature. It is an interesting one to talk about no doubt. Filled with dry humor in a rural small town Quebec setting where only a few things are known, the story follows a Canada Customers firearms instructor who is suspended for inappropriate sexual conduct and goes back home for two weeks for his suspension while telling it as a vacation. As he returns to help his mom with their family business running the racing track, he gets approached by a young Icelandic female drag racer with an incredible love for André Forcier’s films. They share each other’s views and stories while Alexandre is under suspicion of an investigation of sexually explicit drawings first found at the church but showing up elsewhere.

This film starts off in the right direction. The dry humor is right on point and the story feels very correlated as it sets up the workplace environment where Alexandre works as well as his character. It gives a good feeling of his relationship with his mother which is a bit conflicting with some tension and some care as well. And it also sets up his character towards his feelings towards the town and the authority that it has, specifically the two officers investigating the town’s troubling affair. Much like the Icelandic female drag racer which enters on a rather bizarre note as well. All these characters set in their place rather quickly and the humor sets in along with it.

In some ways, the film explores the small town in its rather humorous jab at the normalcy. However, it also highlights the hurdles of both authority and the small town diplomacy much like the deeper issues that get him suspended as well as the mysterious drawings and its artist. While the film itself does feel slightly disjointed at parts, especially when it enters the final 15 to 20 minutes which takes a rather abstract form, moving into the no narrative scenic wandering from Alexandre, it does still have a charm to it both in its humor and the story of Alexandre as he tells more about both his unintentional career choice and what he wants in his heart.

Overall, The Noise of Engines starts off as a comedic film which takes a turn gradually to something a bit more dramatic and relatively deep. It does feel a tad abstract in some executions especially its ending but it still has some conversations that do give some room for thought. There’s a little bit of mystery as the question of who drew the drawings looms in the air despite the absurd suspicion the officers have. As an afterthought, there is a subtle connection of André Forcier films that are mentioned but I have no idea who it is and haven’t seen his films so maybe its time to look that up.

*The Noise of Engines is showing during Festival du Nouveau Cinema on its virtual platform until October 31st.*

My June Adventures!

Half of 2021 has gone by! I honestly can’t believe it! I don’t really know what happened other than a lot of work…like my real job. Nothing else seemed too eventful. But then, its inevitable when a good few months of 2021 was still under pandemic restrictions and as we end June, we are now moved to the green zone which means a minimum set of restrictions or as everyone likes to call it deconfinement. Deconfinement for us just means being able to go hiking more and being more active as the warm weather hit. I mean, downright heat wave right now but overall, we did have some mild weather before this week.

Either way, let’s see what happened in June!

Workout

June 5th Walk 4.70km 49mins
June 6th Walk 4.88km 50mins
June 12th Walk 3.43km 37mins
June 13th Hike 6.38km 1hr29mins
June 19th Walk 4.06km 44mins
June 20th Walk 1.61 km 20 mins
June 24th Walk 4.87km 58 mins
June 26th Hike 3.04km 52mins
June 27th Walk 1.38km 16mins

Tallying up the deliberate walking and hiking (excluding all my work errands and to and from bus terminals and workplace), I had a notch higher than May, which is already pretty good. I’m overall going for longer walks whenever I can and mostly in the morning on the weekends to just relax. Its definitely been pretty good although I’m thinking of planning out a longer route than what I’ve been doing the past month. I think that all the walking did prepare me for the 2 hikes that we did throughout the month. I do plan to get back to running and biking at some point this summer..hopefully soon!

Hiking: Mont Hereford

As Quebec and Montreal starts deconfining, the restrictions lifted on crossing regions and then we got our first dose of vaccinations so finally managed to go to hiking again. The first hike of the year was a relatively light one but it still was considered an intermediate trail. It had a decent amount of viewpoints (7 maybe) although some of them were a little obstructed by the wilderness. We did have a hilarious encounter with some bird that looked like a smaller turkey that came bursting through the brush in fury. It was definitely a memory.

New Glasses

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Picked up my new glasses this month as well! I’m a little too self-conscious lately to do selfies so this will do. My normal frames are bigger than my last ones so it took a little time to get used to. However, I’m liking them quite a bit and going to use the sunglasses for hiking as it has anti-slip on the nose part which I’m hoping will be helpful during hiking.

Hiking: Mount Scotch Cap

The second hike was to probably one of the furthest points in terms of day trips in the Eastern Townships near Mont- Megantic (which we have gone before). Yet, it was a little further from there in Piopolis. This one is an easy one which was pretty good as it wasn’t hot but the humidity was making the air very heavy. The hike is a constant upward climb. Its definitely a popular one in the area also as we went across a good few groups of people. The views are pretty good though.

Sunday Outing: Uniqlo, Yinji Rice Noodle Rolls & Chef Lee

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I went out for a Sunday morning downtown run to pick up some clothes from Uniqlo and then go some lunch takeout at some new restaurants. Uniqlo in Montreal opened during the pandemic so I never bothered to go until now. The control is done well though as someone monitors that you disinfect hands, checks our temperature and keeps up with the counter so that the capacity is respected. I don’t have a whole lot to share about what I bought there as it was more undergarments, discount hoodie and some lounge shorts and a sports bra. Their new line of sports bra are awesome so check it out if you ever are looking, I’m actually thinking of going back to get 2 more.

The original plan was to get takeout from Yin Ji Chang Fen which are all about the rice noodle rolls, basically Chinese breakfast/lunch food. On the way, we saw across the street had Chef Lee, which is also relatively new and they sell pan-fried pork buns (which I love). We got an order of that as well. Both of these restaurants are pretty good. At Yin Ji, it was mostly for the dough stick rice noodle rolls which were pretty good and probably would have been best eating on location but still, it still tasted good after the trip home. I would want to check out other stuff from of them. I also got the veggie rice noodle rolls which was good that it was pretty plain overall as its supposed to be eaten with soy sauce so that balances it out.

For Chef Lee, it was a taste testing buy if anything which was pretty good. I think the pricing is a little expensive for the amount you get but the flavors are there so I probably will still go back to get some more at one point or another.

Cute Kitty Pic

That’s it for this June Adventures!
What have you been up to?

My November Adventures

November was a bit of a mess of a month. I was close to a burn-out after back to back film festival coverages and its why it took a while to wrap up the remaining films for those festivals. Luckily, that’s all done. With work also being an explosion of work, its been quite the crazy ride. I don’t foresee December being a lot better but at least, the slowed down posting schedule got my focus back on writing posts. With that said, not a really exciting month overall but still a few things to talk about plus at the end, there’s some December plans.

Not talking about any new projects until December’s wrap-up or January’s beginning of the year post as I have some final decisions to make on some possible changes or a new project/segment.

Blood in the Snow Festival

The ranking for the feature films (with the except of one Parallel Minds that I didn’t see):

1. Come True (Review)
2. For The Sake of Vicious (Review)
3. Anything For Jackson (Review)
4. The Return (Review)
5. Hall (Review)
6. Bloodthirsty (Review)
7. Bleed With Me (Review)
8. Shall We Play? (Review)

Overall, Blood in the Snow Festival was a good one. There were some really fun discoveries and some good direction on the stories that were being told. All the reviews for the feature films are up. I usually do something for short films but it already took so long to get this batch done that I haven’t had time to do that. I might still go back and highlight a few that I thought were rather unique and entertaining.

New Restaurant

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New restaurant opened up yet and its a Hong Kong style noodle shop who has both curries but even more for the fish soup base that they have for their noodle soup. The noodle soup is ordered similar to what you’d do for Japanese ramen where you get to pick the base, the type of noodle and then 2 toppings. The soup itself actually has quite a bit of extra ingredients added in. I had the combo which included a drink and mine was the lemon ribena which is something very much part of the Hong Kong landscape. Can’t go back to visit in this current landscape but at least there’s food to make me feel more connected, right?

New Spices & Masks

The husband had some company coupon codes sort of deal so we went ahead and took a look at the catalogue. I have some fun candles on the way that didn’t make it on this post but we ordered the spices kit from Gourmet Inspirations. So far, we’ve only tried the Veggie Fusion which adds a nice kick to the veggies.

As for the masks, the Instagram posts says it all. I’ve tried a few companies that make masks and Hop La Gogosses is by far my favorite so I’ve returned a few times. Not to mention, they are close so when I have time, I usually try to do a pick-up instead of getting it delivered. They have these custom ones so you get to choose the front and back from a range of choices.

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Black Friday Haul

• Best Buy: Chromecast
• Google Play: The Almost Gone, Very Little Nightmares
• Cineplex: Rental: Guns Akimbo
• Steam: Gnog, Jenny LeClue Detectivu, Celeste, Transference, Sea of Solitude, The Missing: J.J. Macfield and the Island of Memories
• Xbox Ultimate Game Pass

Black Friday has pretty much mostly been an online deal even before the whole pandemic landscape so seeing as I did overall spend less this year, I ended up picking up on some of the sweet deals online for games and such. The only physical item I got was a new Chromecast. Our old Chromecast was starting really casting some things really well and was starting to get a little tempermental so we changed it and it seems to work better.

Everything else was mostly gaming related. Xbox Ultimate Game Pass for PC was dropped to $1/month and that’s great since I had a few games to catch up on so my next month of gaming is pretty much sort out since when I cut my subscription 2 months ago, I still had a few games that I hadn’t tried out yet.

As for Cineplex, there was some good rentals but the one that I’ve been meaning to watch is Guns Akimbo so that’s going to be done soon.

Christmas Marathon & Upcoming Plans

End of November means that its time to welcome in the Christmas Marathon! Christmas movies have been fairly slim pickings but thanks to Netflix releasing an immense amount of Christmas movies (whether good or bad), there’s a little more selection. Hopefully enough to fill out these few weeks leading to Christmas. It should start tomorrow December 1st if all things go well.

A quick mention on December plans while we’re at it. I’m trying to work out all the backlog and releasing some more current release stuff, mostly TV (Netflix and Chinese Drama TV binges). I’m going to blend it all in this month while catching up with some 2020 TV series that I’ve missed or didn’t finish. Fingers crossed that I can work on as much as possible.

That’s it November Adventures!
Nothing too exciting and just a lot of spending overall.
What have you been up to?

Hiking: La Montée du Dragon (Parc National du Mont-Mégantic – Secteur Franceville)

Our monthly Friday off came around and the weather worked very much to our favor with the temperature being much cooler and comfortable for hiking. We decided to go back to Mont Mégantic National Park, that we went to two years ago HERE, except this time, we went to the other sector called Franceville to check out other trails. We did an easy to intermediate trail La Montée du Dragon plus a little extra viewpoint. You can find the link to Mont-Megantic National Park HERE.

• Parc National du Mont Mégantic

As with many of these trails, this one is not too clear on the map as its a different name. However, it passes through two different trails and stops at two viewpoints (maybe three if you count one of them as one).

Promenade du Ruisseau

Promenade du Ruisseau

Promenade du Ruisseau is a short and easy trail that is absolutely relaxing and beautiful as the trail runs along a stream the entire way and has very little elevation. Its about the most calming type of trail with a lot of green ferns and lush plants all around. Its a pleasant little trail that leads out to connect to Sentier Des Cimes, which is where we do part of the trail.

Sentier des Cimes

Sentier des Cimes – Parc National du Mont-Megantic

We only did a part of the Sentier des Cimes. Its an intermediate trail since it has a lot of gradual elevation. Its also very beautiful so its a nice little adventure. Since its a SEPAQ, there is an obvious difference in maintenance of the trail compared to the other trail network that we had done for the previous trails this year. We even got to see some leaves starting to change colors.

Viewpoint: Repos Du Dragon

Repos du Dragon

The first viewpoint is Repos du Dragon which would mark the end of the Montée du Dragon trail. It has a little bit of obstruction with the trees and such so the view from the camera doesn’t look too good. However, it is a pretty nice view overall.

Viewpoint: Gardien des Méandres

Gardien des Méandres

Our final destination was one viewpoint over to Garden des Méandres which is almost one kilometre further. The view is a little more open than the previous one and a nice little spot to take a break before deciding to head back.

Halte du Vieux-Barrage

Before cutting back before the connecting point between Sentier des Cimes and Promenade du Ruisseau, there’s a little path over a bridge to the other trail (Sentier des Escarpements, I think) and it should be the Halte du Vieux-Barrage, which has this lovely little path over the stream. Its a nice little spot that we took a few pictures before heading back on the Promenade du Ruisseau to head back to the parking lot.

Overall, Our trail came to about 6 kms altogether and took a little about 2.5 hours. Mont Megantic National Park offers some fabulous trails. The observatory is still closed due to the pandemic, I believe however, the trails whether in that sector or this one has a lot to offer. We already have plans to go back and finish the Sentier des Cimes and some of the other trails when we’re a little more in shape to tackle the intermediate and difficult trails. This area is full of beautiful viewpoints and lush green trails.

Hiking: Colline du Lac Trousers (Bolton, Quebec)

Unlike a lot of people, I didn’t have any time off during this hectic times so with the current landscape I’ve been working on taking random day offs to have some breathing space instead of going on long vacations. The first day that I took was last Friday and it was given to doing a morning to early afternoon hike in the Eastern Townships.

This year’s main focus for hiking destination has been the Les Sentiers de l’Estrie hiking networks. We went to a closer area in the Bolton zone of the network and chose the Colline du Lac Trousers which is a 9km round-trip trail. The trail itself is a bit vague. It actually gives you the parking not the closest to Lac Trousers but actually on the Missisquoi-Nord trail which leads on to Lac Libbey in the first leg and walks a portion on a road before heading into another stretch of road for a quite a distance before turning into a road that leads to another trail to the final summit spot. The last leg has a constant upwards trek with the final 100m being mostly steep upwards climb up to the summit. That’s a quick rundown of how the trail works. I’ll have a detail description below. You can check out the details of the trail HERE.

This is the start of trail which is part of the Missisquoi-Nord trail. This picture is looking back at where we come from by the parking. The parking spot is actually down a road where you walk towards this park where its a Sentier Mise en Forme meant for workout stations along a trail. There’s a park and marshland at the beginning and its full of a lot of weeds and wild flowers. The first part of the Missisquoi-Nord towards Lac Libbey is fairly flat. If anything, the beginning portion is either flat or going downhill for most of it with very little uphill until it goes to Lac Libbey which is a fairly flat road by some very pretty houses. You can get a peek of Lac Libbey from afar. There should be a trail around Lac Libbey but we didn’t notice it. At the end of the road is the entrance to the next part of the trail.

Its also part of the Missisquoi-Nord trail for this portion to the next road area. In reality, there isn’t much of difference in the whole way. Missisquoi-Nord trail goes to the next road area where it changes to the orange trail of Les Sentiers de L’Estrie sector which is following a little left turn into a road. The next road around is actually fairly calm and a few houses along the way but mostly forest on both side. As you go into the next section, its the final trek upwards.

The final trek upwards is pretty much the last 100 meters or so if I remember correctly. It starts off like this with rocks as steps and gradually increases in steepness going up and up. You can tell that its a more narrow path with little paths between trees and rocks and such and needs a lot more attention even if they have two blue ropes aligning the trail all the way up for extra safety.

After that trek, we get to the summit. There was quite a few people there so in order to respect social distancing rules, we just slipped into the higher rocks to get the view and then we left. Although the trail in general is pretty much just wildflowers and weeds and tall grass and shrubs and trees and just this one viewpoint, the summit view is still rather pretty.

Overall, Colline du Lac Trousers was an average trail. It does fulfill the easy trail element but it also doesn’t have a whole lot to see since its one where its very much based on your own focus and patience for the one payoff of a beautiful scenery. If we knew that, we might have done the closer parking spot instead. The entire trail averages around 3 hours going and return but we did it in around 3.5 hours or so. Its definitely one of the longer trails we did this past year or so.

Hiking: La Boucle du Mont des Trois-Lacs (Brompton, QC)

After a few weeks of rain and heat wave, we finally managed to get out for another hiking trip. This time, we went back to the same area as the previous hike to do the other trail in Brompton part of the Les Sentiers de L’Estrie. You can see the previous hiking recap HERE.

Brompton: La Boucle du Mont des Trois-Lacs

This trail is a fairly decent length at 4.8 km. Although its ranked Easy, its still pretty much our second hike of the year in heavy humidity weather. Luckily, we did go fairly early so the heat hadn’t hit and it was mostly cloudy as it was getting ready to rain. The hike itself is easy although its a lot of constant steep elevation. A lot of the path is like above where its climbing up steep rocky paths. Its a nice challenge as a second hike and didn’t feel too long. There are three lookout points along the path.

The first lookout point was pretty rewarding as it marked a good part of the beginning which was almost all uphill and was quite exhausting as the warm-up stretch. The view is a bit obstructed but still, the lake is visible and while its hard to capture on the camera well, the view was pretty decent.

The second viewpoint was heading towards the peak at the turn. There’s a pretty intense section going towards this point as well. Its some narrow paths and such. The view is a bit lackluster as this one took a lot of moving along different rocks on the slop to catch this view. We were a bit worried that this was the peak and the view that we were going to have to deal with as it left us wondering where the three lakes were.

Of course, after another fairly exhausting trail around the mountain moving uphill, we get to this final lookout point at the second half of the trail with a roped off boundary to look out at this view with its three lakes. If you look far enough, there’s even a fourth lake in the far distance.

The trail itself is rather surprising that it is an Easy level trail since there was such constant uphill trek and a few steep areas to go up and down on. The path is however fairly straight forward. Its mostly a forest trail with just bushes, trees and shrubs and not a lot of flowers or colorful plants. Its mostly just greenery .

For us, we’re trying to hike closer to home so the Eastern Townships is a good spot for us. I’m not sure if we’ll be coming back to Brompton area for this network of hiking trails since there’s only one more trail here that we haven’t done. I’m thinking we’ll move onto another area for the next one but not sure which one yet.

Hiking: Marais du Kingsbury & Mont Cathedrale

As Montreal starts reopening gradually (well, a lot of stuff is reopened at this point, except for a few things), the things we were looking forward to reopen the most is obviously the parks for hiking and such. Due to weather and the current situation, not all the parks are open but we did find quite a few to choose from. The husband decided that our best chance was to head further from the downtown area to the Eastern Townships to check out a trail part of Les Sentiers de L’Estrie. We’ve done a few other trails from that network before but this year, we’ve been thinking of getting the pass which would pretty much get back its worth if we do three more trails in the network and that sounds like a good deal (and doable, provided the reopening doesn’t launch a second wave of the pandemic).

First Stop: Kingsbury, Le Boucle de la Riviere

Kingsbury

The hiking plans didn’t quite go as we planned even if we did head out the time that we intended, early in the morning. Our first stop as planned was to go to Kingsbury and do a 7.2 km hike. However, the instructions weren’t too good and we soon realized 30 mins in that there was a sign saying that the suspension bridge had collapsed. This trail is pretty much a trail by the water and marshlands. Uncertain of whether there was a detour or not, we decided to go back to the car and head to the next location.

Collapsed suspension bridge

And we were off to the next location pretty much spontaneously. I suggested to go to the next hiking area in this network heading back the way we came so that at least we’ll start later on the actual trail for the day but lower the travel time back a little bit.

Second stop: Brompton – Le Mont Cathedrale

Things not going to plan was apparently the theme of our first hike as we had intended on doing another trail but got mislead to believe we were on the right trail when it wasn’t. Oh well..these things happen and we ended up doing a fairly decent intermediate level hike (not what we had planned since we’re obviously not in that great of shape with the lockdown and such). I’m not quite sure how long the trail actually was but it was quick elevation to Mont Cathedrale so it was rather tiring to do, plus the scene was really lovely.

If you look at the actual website, this trail is supposed to start at another parking location and then not only do the mountain but also a “Ruisseau Ely”, which we saw signs for but didn’t pursue it.

Overall, its a decent trail, in both cases. I’m going to say that this is one of the times where its less maintained than we’ve experienced before. I think its just the current times and the parks and the later than usual opening to not have addressed these things. We had a few hiccups in our plans but still, it was a decent few hours of hiking that we got out of it. Les Sentiers de l’Estrie has had a few places that we’ve done before like, Mont Chapman last year (that also had pretty confusing directions). That’s it for this hiking adventure! We’re looking up the next hike right now and will check in with the next one soon (hopefully).

 

Wine Recap: November 2019

Its the November Wine Recap! November saw us having a week off from work on a little staycation and we managed to pick up some nice wines and then chilled out a lot just watching movies and relaxing a little so this time has a few more wines that we were able to try! Let’s check it out!

Domaine Le Grand Saint-Charles Duo de Frontenac 2017

Producer: Domaine Le Grand Saint-Charles
Alcohol Content: 12.5%
Location: Quebec, Canada
Taste Tag: N/A

Le Grand Saint-Charles is a winery that I want to get behind so much because of its creative wine combinations. This one mixes two Frontenacs together: Frontenac Gris and Frontenac. We’re not exactly a huge fan of either of these wines but we do always like to try new mixes to hopefully have one that surprises us. This one actually was pretty alright compared to the other white wine varieties that we’ve tried from Le Grand Saint-Charles. Its not quite as acidic or extra-dry. This one was rather delicate and light. It still was leaning onto the semi-dry taste palette but there was also a well-enough balance to make it enjoyable.

Inniskillin Late Autumn Riesling 2016

Producer: Inniskillin Wines Inc.
Alcohol Content: 12%
Location: Niagara-on-the-Lake, Canada
Taste Tag: Fruity and Sweet

Inniksillin is a winery that is pretty well-known. They have some fantastic ice ciders and my husband has been wanting to try out the wines, so here we are giving the Late Autumn Riesling a try. As expected, the safe area of Riesling didn’t disappoint at all. It was a pleasant one and rather rich in flavor because of the Late Autumn element that actually gives it a more reserve sort of status. This one is definitely in the fruity and sweet taste tag and one that is very easy to like a lot.

Le Grand Ballon Val de Loire Chardonnay

Producer: Sarl Joel Delaunay
Alcohol Content: 12%
Location: Centre-Ouest, France
Taste Tag: Delicate and Light

From my memory, this is the second time that we’ve tried a wine from Val de Loire. French wines have so many territories and each have their distinctive elements and taste that its truly hard to remember all of it. I did remember the last one that we tried from Val de Loire was more on the dry side and that applies to Le Grand Ballon’s Chardonnay as well. Its more of  semi-dry taste with has a bit of light-bodied elements and fruity elements as well. The dryness does hit harder on the first sip but it does have a refreshing taste down the throat.

Slow Press Chardonnay Monterey County

Producer: The Wine Group
Alcohol Content: 13.5%
Location: Monterey, California, United States
Taste Tag: Aromatic and Mellow

I’m not going to lie that my initial draw to Slow Press was its classy bottle label and the color choice. It had this oaked and aged wine sort of look to it plus it had the aromatic and mellow taste tag which always has this surprisingly sophisticated taste to it. Slow Press is actually quite good. It is a little dry but it has a nice finish, just like most of the wines in this taste tag category. Its why we always go back to it as its not exactly a fruity and fun deal but one that is a little more elevated and has more depth in its taste.

Growers Honeycrisp Apple

Producer: Arterra Wines Canada Inc.
Alcohol Content: 5%
Location: Ontario, Canada
Taste Tag: Sweet & Fruity

Ontario ciders are rather different from Quebec ciders. I’ve tried a good few Ontario ciders to this point and I’ve become quite picky on what stands out for me. A lot of them actually are very similar probably because of the apples they choose. What makes Growers Cider different is that it uses Honeycrisp Apples and it adds this tartness to their cider that actually balances really well with the apple sweetness. Its a rather unique cider taste and has quite a delightful experience.

That’s it for this November Wine Recap!
Some really neat discoveries this time around!

Hiking: CIME Haut-Richelieu (Mont St-Gregoire, Quebec)

This post has been a long time in the making as the hike took place before all the festivals in probably early October. With that said, we did get two hikes in during October as a final hurrah to the season unless the weather holds up and we end up finding some year-round trails that we can still hike on. Its a research currently in progress.

CIME Haut-Richelieu was a rather spontaneous choice on a random morning that we wanted to go somewhere but didn’t quite know where and then I remembered that near an Arbraska in Mont St-Gregoire that I had gone a few years back that there were hiking trails nearby and after some quick research, voila!

Sentier Le Panorama

CIME Haut-Richelieu is a small network of trails. We started out on Le Panorama (blue trail) that took us to a few little landings. It started out relatively gentle but the elevation we climbed in a short distance went up relatively quickly as within 1km of Le Panorama reached the 250m high of its summit at the end of this trail that circled to another trail that looped back to the reception centre. The trail included a lot of steps like these or other ones that were actual steep wooden stairs.

Le Panorama wasn’t especially long but it did link off to some other trails. The first was a little clearing on the trail Les Arenes which had a little view and some spot where a fixture used to be there but was since removed with some info.

It had somewhat of more obstructed view and then there was a little lookout platform as well. However, the yellow path also branches out for a 220m steep walk to its Petit Sommet trail (aka small summit). There had a pretty nice view of the surrounding area.

As you make your way back, you have to double back onto the blue trail which are the other side of some stone steps divided by a barrier. Its important to look carefully at the markers to make sure you are on the right trail path. Of course, its time to reach the top of the summit which also marks the end of this trail. The view has boards on each side that give a distance to other mountains around and in which direction and other information of elevation which is pretty great.

Trail La Carriere (green)

Coming back, we take a slightly longer trail which is 1.4 km long but also gives a little less in elevation which is nice. Its a fairly easy path with some different vegetation. The beginning portion circles around a rather panoramic view of the summit to get out and has one lookout point  on the other side that is fairly nice. It goes through some historic spots and a rocky area where some machinery  used to be there as the info card mentioned.

What is pretty cool about the trail coming back is that in the ending parts of the trail, it has little stations that shows different machinery from back in the day for display. It doesn’t have clear information cards on what its purpose was but still, its a nifty little thing that my husband particularly included as he likes history and mechanics/machinery things. The ending trail pretty much goes through a forest trail.

CIME Haut-Richelieu is a nice little spot to go. We skipped through some of the trails in detail like Les Arenes which was something of a shortcut path as well as La Raccourci which connects in one part the blue and green trails  but we opted to do the whole thing is in full we ended up doing a decent hike of 2.6 kms which is relatively short for our usual hike but as one after a month and a half of break, it felt like a shorter one but still challenging with the quick elevation change, plus, it had some nice scenery.

CIME Haut-Richelieu has winter trails and such, I believe so you can always check it out if you’d like on their website HERE. Plus they have entrance fees so you can check that out as well.

Wine Recap – October 2019

Welcome to the Wine Recap for October 2019. With all the festivals and overtime going on, it was an obvious progression of events that drinking anything alcoholic was not going to as abundant seeing as everything needs a clear mind to write or work. With that said, this month’s recap is much shorter than usual and actually probably is more average as well. Nothing amazing but nothing that we hated either.

Let’s check it out!

La Vieille Ferme Rosé Recolte 2018

Producer: Perrin et Fils SA
Alcohol Content: 13%
Location: Vallee du Rhone, France
Taste Tag: Fruity and Medium-bodied

A very rare taste tag that we usually choose from for this one. While that usually doesn’t say too much to us, this one was rather fruity in the more acidic range and definitely was drier than our usual wines. However, La Vieille Ferme for its taste tag actually was fairly mild. It had a nice smooth taste especially as its end notes. However, its first sips are rather in the dry range and a little more than what we are accustomed to. For those who do like drier wines, this one is a pretty decent option especially as it is the Recolte 2018 which is a little more special than the normal.

Kim Crawford Chardonnay 2018

Producer: Kim Crawford Wines
Alcohol Content: 13%
Location: South Island, New Zealand
Taste Tag: Aromatic and Mellow

We’ve seen the Kim Crawford wines around quite a bit and never actually tried it before. While Chardonnay is not exactly our go-to white wine variety, we wanted to give this one a go as it fell into some other wine taste tags that we’ve tried before that had a lot of depth in its beginning sips to its end notes. Kim Crawford is pretty good as well. Its well-balanced and not too dry. There was a slightly more acidic finish to this one.

Petit et Fils Rose Sparkling Cider

Producer: Verger Petit et Fils
Alcohol Content: 6.5%
Location: Quebec, Canada
Taste Tag: Fruity and Sweet

A nice sparkling rose cider which is lighter than our normal wines and deliberately so as this was in the middle of the huge rush and more meant as a fun little cider to just relax. Petit  & Fils is rather good and we had bought it a few years back (if I remember correctly) and it didn’t disappoint so we were excited to give it a try again. As expected, it was not quite as refined to our palette as we had remembered it but as a sparkling rose cider, it still was rather fruity and sweet but leaned a little closer to the medium-bodied.

That’s it for this round of Wine Recap!
Short and sweet for October with some decent choices!

What have you been drinking lately?