100 Km Chateauguay Valley ride

Sunday I went back to the nearby Chateauguay Valley for what I thought would be a relaxing flatland ride after the Laurentian hills of Saturday.

Recovery. Recuperation. I'd just take it easy.

And then the big winds arrived, just as I got the bike ready to ride.

The ride was a shortened version of the complete chateauguay valley loop I did a couple of weeks ago.

I cut out the extreme eastern part of the ride. This means I went east from Ormstown along Tullochgorum road. THis was with the glorious wind.

I took the first road south: Bryson (Brysonville) side road. This goes theough the unique geological area known as "The Rock." It is bedrock that scraped clean at the last ice age. It's still rock!

I toon bryson all the way to St-Antoine Abbé. The longer version I did previously included Aubrey, St-Chrysostome, and Havelock, and the always-fun (colline) Covey hill.

Todays I followed some main road to Franklin. Usually I avoid this stretch of road, but today I had a big ride to do and didn't want to finish after sunset. At Franklin I rode uphill and stopped the "the big view of Montreal." It is excellent, there are two spots on this ride where you must turn around and look at the view behind you. This is one of them.

Shortly after Franklin, I rejoined one of my favorite roads: the first road north of the US-Canada border. The "First Concession."

This road goes west forever. Unfortunately the direction it went in was the direction that the wind was coming from. Winds gusting to 40 Km/h.

This was not good. But it was a beautiful early spring day, warm enough for shorts, and the natural world was coming back to life after winter.

There were great views north towards and across the St-Laurence. I could see Rigaud and Deux Montagnes in the distance.


Eventually I arrived at the Powerscourt covered bridge.

Rest stop!

I always like spending time here at Quebec's oldest covered bridge. Today I enjoyed the view of the high-water Chateauguay river.

Then I continued and eventually reached the intersection with the Rt 138. (link) at Trout River. This is "the other river" of the Chateauguay valley. It is windy and twisty and quite scenic. In spring time it floods.

The Rt 138 starts a mile from this intersection at the Trout River Customs US-Canada border. From here it goes east a long, long way. It ends a thousand miles to the east. Quebec is a big place.

Transport Quebec says it ends 1362 km later in Natashquan (quite a long way past Sept Isles). Transport Quebec also says that I could drive it in 15 hour and 37 minutes. That would be a one tough drive. I drove Sept Isles-Montreal in ten hours once, and that was a challenge.

Anyway, at this point, I changed direction. No longer following the border westward into the wind, now I turned east and rode with the wind on my back.

My cruising speed was frequently over 40, and life was good.

After a short spell on the 138 (new road with good shoulders), turned at the turn for Cazaville.

Here I briefly headed into the wind again. After five minutes I stopped and looked behind. It was my first view of the Adirondacks and it made me gasp... It's a quite good view. This is that other place on the ride to stop and look behind you.

I was close to the corner and soon turned on to the very scenic Ridge Road (i.e. the first road north of the 138).

It has lots of great views of the Adirondack foothills.

Then some minor zigzagging eastwards and I am riding through some protected wetlands.

Finally I reach the Seigneural side road. This is the end of this segment, it's only a couple of legs to go.

After a few little hills in the road I am entering tiny Dewittville - the last village before home.

I crossed the bridge over the chateauguay and I take the Island Road back to Ormstown. The Island Road is a lot smaller than the ex-highway Rt 138A that is normally used for this section. I enjoyed the change. It had some nice views of the Chateauguay.

Piste cyclable St-Donat-Ste-Agathe

Red dots: my GUESS where the new off road trail fromSt-Donat to Ste-Agathe)
Blue dots: Road cycling super-road (St-Donat to Tremblant/Parc entrance)
Green dots: P'tit train de Nord - Ste-Agathe to Tremblant section

I just discovered an off-road bike trail from Sainte-Agathe to Saint-Donat. It's 40 km, and that's a 50 mile round trip. Just the thing to get some real endurance in the mountain bike saddle, without having to go on-road. I am checking this out soon.

Here is the news from the town of Saint-Donat website (link):

Nouveau Sentier l'Inter-Vals

Depuis le 24 juin 2005, la nouvelle piste cyclable pour vélo de montagne reliant Saint-Donat à la Gare du P'tit train du nord sur la Route Verte à Sainte-Agathe est ouverte.

Ce nouveau circuit débute dans le stationnement du Parc des pionniers. Il est d'une longueur totale de 38,7 kilomètres. Les 12 premiers kilomètres nous conduiront à la Base de plein air L'Interval et on comptera 24,3 kilomètres rendu à l'église de Sainte-Lucie. Une carte montrant le tracé et les dénivellations devrait être disponible sous peu.

Here's another link to information about this off road bicycle trail. (link)

This is a nice addition to the on-road and bike path trails.

The tourist information office in St-Donat has a hand-copied map of the route.

This is one more reason why you should come and spend your vacation in Quebec.

In other news I visited the amazing cycling road (the locals call it the "chemin cyclist") from Saint-Donat to Lac Superieur (in the Tremblant area it's called chemin de Nordet) which has 32 of the finest kilometers of road cycling in Quebec. A completely new road that opened in 2003, full wide shoulders and several big mountains climbs. This is one of the best roads in the east for the hill-loving cyclist. It is marked on the map in blue dots.

The third trail on the map is the P'tit train de Nord cycling path that goes from St-Jerome to Mont Laurier. I marked the Ste-Agathe to Tremblant section on the map. This is a pay trail, but quie a trail, some parts are nicer than others, and the northern 100 km are paved.. ooohhh yeah! Scenic-wise I like Ste-Adele to Val David.

New Bike Path for the Mercier Bridge

If you are wondering when the Pont Mercier Bridge is getting a bike path to replace the extremely dangerous sidewalk, it's in the next two years. Major repair work has been announced for the Pont Mercier bridge and a bike path is part of the plan.

Évalués à 100 millions, les travaux devraient se terminer à l'automne 2009. Le tablier du pont et les structures d'acier seront réparés, et une piste cyclable sera ajoutée.

I did not make this up! Click here for the link

This will open the south shore and the Chateauguay valley and the Mohawk city of Kahnawake to the list of possible cycling destinations for montreal cyclists. The Mercier Bridge is located very close to the western side of the Lachine Canal.

This is big news.

Here is video of biking the existing Mercier Bridge unprotected and scary sidewalk.

Pont Jacques Cartier in Longueuil - Helpful Directions

The bike path along the Pont Jacques Cartier Bridge ends in Longueuil. There is no map, no painted on road bike path marks, and there are no direction signs. You're on your own! Here's the Cycle Fun Montreal guide to the three directions you can go in.

Note: sorry this is a bit "information dense" but there's a lot of riding opportunities on the south shore, and several loop-ride circuits back to Montreal.

The Pont Jacques Cartier bridge is really great, until you get to Longueuil, where the bike path suddenly narrows into a width exactly 2.01 bikes wide, and constructed from 6 foot long cement sidewalk. Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity BumpityBumpity Bumpity BumpityBumpity Bumpity Bumpity Bumpity, well you get the picture. It's better if you keep your speed under 20 km/h.

Note: This route info takes the west (upriver / downtown) side of the Pont Jacques Cartier bridge, it starts from corner of Papineau and rue Lafontaine (one street south of Ontario), Two streets south of Parc Lafontaine (i.e. this is your access from the Rachel bike path). Then it crosses the busy Papineau north-bound car entrance, follows the sidewalk (bumpy & unmarked) to the bridge bike-path entrance. At this point you see that the bridge has a bike path access. It is from the bike path along Rene Levesque near the Radio Canada building.

It's a long bridge, I think it's 5 km long. It's really quite impressive, it crosses the mighty Saint Laurence river, and it's two islands: Ile Ste-Helene, where you can take an exit to some nice riding, some new public swimming pools, the major montreal icon the giant geodesic dome from Expo 67, or even do a loop back home via Pont de la concorde and Old Montreal) . The other island, seen from above, is Ile Notre Dame, home of the amazing Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. This is a Formula One racing circuit, and it is a bike magnet. Where else can you ride a closed road race course? Incredible. Plus you can leave this island by another bike path, which follows the Saint Laurence Seaway (ship canal) for 15 car free kilometers on a wide road in a natural riverside setting. You can ride the Estacade back to Montreal Island via Nuns Island (Ile des Soeurs) through Verdun to the Lachine Canal bike path (at Atwater) .

Anyway, back to our story.

Arriving at street level, you probably are looking for bike path markings on the road, or a direction sign indicating where to go next, or perhaps a map of the longueuil bike path network.

Yes, you would be looking for these things. But you wouldn't be finding them. There's nothing here at all. Zip. Rien. You're shit outa luck. Fortunately you are reading Cycle Fun Montreal, and we got lost so you don't have to. (That's better than it sounds.). There are three principal directions you'll want to be going in:

SOUTH/EAST - Direction to Spiral bike path overpass and the Route Verte bike path to Chambly and many cycling options (some short but with over 2000 km of bike path possibilities!). rom the end of of the Pont Jacques Cartier Bridge bike path (PJCBBP) turn left, go under the underpass, and immediately turn left, then immediately turn right, on to Lasalle. This takes you to (becomes) the bike path that, with a few zigs and zags, takes you to the Spiral Overpass to Saint Hubert/Chambly. There is a shortcut to the Spiral Overpass in a couple of miles, but that's another story.

Here's my video of the spiral bike overpass.

EAST/NORTH - Direction along the bike path beside the south shore of the Saint Laurence river, a dedicated bike path between the autoroute and the river. From the end of of the Pont Jacques Cartier Bridge bike path (PJCBBP) turn left, go under the underpass, and immediately turn left, (same as South/East) but stay on this road. Follow it to XXXX, where you will turn left (direction of river/autoroute) and there will be a bicycle overpass for you. Once across the autoroute and on the river side, you can turn left and return via road (2 km) and then the rest of the way on the riverside bike path (You'll do a wide U-turn under the autoroute in a couple of miles) to return to the PJCB and the south/west access. Or, if you turn right, you are on the bike path to Boucherville and beyond. The dock for the ferry boat back to Montreal is not too far along this. And there is a provincial park: Parc des Iles de Boucherville, a nature park on islands in the Saint Laurence. Canoes and Kayaks are available for rent.

SOUTH/WEST - Direction to follow the Saint Laurence river south and west as it passes under Montreal Island. You can take to the Saint Lambert Locks, where you can cross to the seaway path, or back to Montreal via Ile Notre Dame (Parc Drapeau) and Pont de La COncorde, or crossing Ile Ste-Helene back to PJCB). From the end of of the Pont Jacques Cartier Bridge bike path (PJCBBP) turn right, then take the first street left. This takes you to TIFFEN, which is part of the actual official bike path access to the Saint Laurence river-side bike path south and east. This ends in in about 25 or 50 km in Saint Catherine where you can take the Seaway bike path back to Montreal. When you cross over to the seaway path you can take an oiptional side trip turning left into a summer riverside park with great views of Montreal and the Lachine Rapids. Or turn right, and you are on a carless paced road along the Saint Laurence across from downtown Montreal, totally scenic.

Well, that's a summary of some of the many possibilities at the southern end of the Pont Jacques Cartier bridge. Now you know where to go, and most importantly, how to get back.

Have Fun!

Resources: There are some excellent bike maps for this area. There are two maps for the Monteregie:

La Monteregie - Circuits Routiere (Bike rides on the open road away from the bike path network)
La Monteregie - Pistes Cyclable (All the bike paths on the south shore and the larger Monteregie area

These maps are given out freely, often at a bike-tourist kiosk on the Bike path south/west
There is a tourist office on Chemin Chambly, accessible if you take the directions for EAST/NORTH - From the end of of the Pont Jacques Cartier Bridge bike path (PJCBBP) turn left, go under the underpass, and immediately turn left, (same as South/East) but stay on this road. RIde past XXXX to Chemin Chambly. Ten minutes? Turn left, and look for the dicsretely marked tourist office, it has a zebra outside to help you find it.