We knew rain was forecast to begin in the morning with the bulk of it early then tapering to an amount that isn’t terrible to ride in – at least that what’s the forecast said.
It turned out that we should have been riding from 7am to 10 because when we arrived in Prévost as 10 it had just started raining, and the forecast showed a lot of rain between 10 and 11, tapering off after that to about 1mm an hour, which I find rideable. So we went for a hike.
We couldn’t tell from the sign how long the hike was, but the local woman we spoke to yesterday said the stairs led up the mountain to a lake and that it is a nice hike. After hiking for 10 minutes and facing a grade of 50% on wet leaves with the rain increasing, I used Strava to see how far we had come. It seemed we were less than a third of the way to the lake so we turned around and headed for the local boulangerie.
At this point our thought was that the rain would taper off while we drank coffee and ate an apple fritter, then we would ride. We had hoped to ride to Saint-Jerome, 14km to the south, and the end of the non-urban section of the trail. South of there it continues in a more urban form for another 35km, but not on the rail line as that part of the railroad is still in use for trains.
After sitting for about an hour and re-checking the forecast we decided to drive to Saint-Sauveur, à ski town with a lot of shops and outlets. There were few people walking in the town as we drove through, but many driving. We decided to park behind the church and go for a walk. There was an astonishing amount of free parking right in town. There are many shops, restaurants, and bars. We had a look around Atmosphere, and then headed back to the car.
We decided to avoid the highway on the way back. It was very picturesque. The P’Tit Train du Nord seems to be about the only relatively level way to travel around here. The roads roll up and down and curve around the mountains.
We had lunch back at the auberge and then went swimming, followed by a whirlpool and sauna. It was very relaxing.
Then we walked around the resort. It really is quite pretty, even in the fog and rain.
There are quite a few vineyards around the property.
We decided to go to Shawbridge, a microbrewery in Prévost, for dinner . We made a reservation for indoors as it was still raining. How busy could it be on a Thursday night in a small town, we thought? Very busy, it turned out. But, only one other group was sitting on the enclosed patio, which was warmed by overhead heaters, so we sat out there, potentially safer from Covid, and also a bit quieter.
Everything looked red because of the heaters. The food was good, and we stayed comfortably warm. Walking to Couche-tard to buy teabags after was quite chilling.
It was a very foggy drive back to the auberge along a dark, narrow, twisty road, but Cindy handled it with aplomb.
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