Mid February and a time when all young lovers and husbands think of something special for their sweeties and what is more special than Gwen and Richards picnic in the Parc. Of course it would be a big lunch bag let down if the sweetie had something more romantic in mind, still the picnic is kind of special. Tremblant parc, secteur de la Diable was in wonderful condition, so much so many had ambitious plans and 
broke loose from their shackles before the allotted time causing confusion and consternation in the ranks. Now when I was a lad everybody was on the Poisson, but not any longer, it has to be the Mallard, or L’Ouse, with Poisson now a distant third. Anyhow back to the Mallard, with the Ninja hares let loose the hounds were soon baying to be in pursuit and they were off, Thomas the Tank engine and Mickey the Quick raced off eventually passing all but one of the Mallard team. Strange I thought the idea was for the hounds to catch the hares and kill them, we are definitely becoming a soft society, where is the fun in that! And the one that got away, Loopy of course, intend on satisfying her uncontrollable desire for more loops. Well what about the rest, they all seemed to have very enjoyable skis, Poison was conquered by Linda S and party, L’Ours was picked off by Linda H and gang, too many Linda’s in this club. Sadly one of Linda’s gang had a disastrous day when her thumbs went completely out of control having discovered her phone had been left behind at home. Hope you are feeling better now JC. Another group enjoyed the pleasures of Bois Franc, especially the outhouse at Refuge de la Hutte, also at this point Nancy appear skiing across Lac Boivin from out of nowhere. Strange….
Eventually everyone was back at the parking lot loading up supplies to ferry to the Refuge de la Renardiére. It is amazing but the trail to the hut always seems 1 km further than you thought, but eventually we were there. Gwen and Richards wonderful spread was laid out and eventually we filled the cabin with 38 , yes 38 club members and two American visitors from Chicago. They probably thought Canadians are crazy, who else would hold a picnic in mid February miles from anywhere, but they were too polite to say so. Just look at the photos on the photo gallery to enjoy the atmosphere of the event and of course the humidity. Gwen and Richard , we are so grateful to you guys for all the hard work you put in to make this event so successful, oh yes Gwen we forgive the fancy boots. Finally people cleared up and skied back to their cars.
Definitely not a picnic
I do not think I mentioned it had been snowing most of the day, so as we left between 3.30pm and 4.00pm the roads were pretty well covered and as soon as we joined the highway at the ski centre Mont Blanc it was clear it wouldn’t be a picnic. Traffic was heavy and slow moving, one or two spin offs but mainly just slippy roads. It took most people over 4 hours to get home unless of course you lived in Vankleek Hill. However nothing will erase from our memories the superb skiing and wonderful picnic.