Burke’s coin landed on Quebec for the November training block this year. We reserved condos in Stoneham, and with snow iffy just put our heads down and drove. The first morning we drove up to Le Foret Motnmorency and I scouted while the team ran on the roads around Laval University’s Pavillion. Not far from the lodge I found a sweet, short loop of man-made and carefully groomed snow. Short. 500 meters. Classic and skate.  The post-run head count came up one short and visions of holes in the ice or the dripping fangs that populate the North woods sinking in to hapless Vermont flesh launched a brief and succesful search. After that we headed back to the condos to get ready for the next day’s training on snow.

It was a near thing. When we arrived this morning and I was busily setting up the wax bench, one of our French speakers came running out ot tell me we were being told “Non.” Understandable. The loop is indeed…short. It won’t tolerate too many people and give anyone quality, and much of the cost had been borne by the University so wanting to save it for guests of the lodge was reasonable. We gently persevered with our cause and as we waited in came the cancellation from UVM! We were in. Thanks, Paul! Hope it is great over in NY.

Skiing is good. Both skating and classic tracks are well groomed and hard. No rocks. Flat enough to keep a nice gentle pace and work on getting back to the game. The crew at the Foret have done a great job with very little resoursce. It won’t take much snow to open up a lot more terrain but for now, were here and we’re skiing. “You can’t always get want you want, but if you try sometimes you just might find…”. We may get dizzy but we’ve got what we need.

the old fish 

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