Halifax and Gaspésie, part 11: Mont Xalibu

We were already chuffed about our accomodations at the Gîte du Mont-Albert, but the next morning, the entire experience reached another level of greatness with a very good all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet. It was the kind of buffet that has a dedicated build-your-own-fruit-salad station, which neither of us actually patronized but which lent the entire thing a sense of seriousness. Sure, the mini croissants were suboptimal and the crepes were downright rubbery, but the smoked fish was very good, the scrambled eggs were light and fluffy, and the french toast (the star of the show) was tender and flavourful.

Energized by the food, we hopped in the car for one last day of hiking. Our destination, the trailhead at Lac-aux-Américains, was just ten minutes away. An easy gravel trail gave us a false sense of confidence as we arrived at the lake, which sat in a stunning bowl surrounded by green hills on all sides. From there, the trail took a turn, both literally and metaphorically, heading up to the top of Mont Xalibu.

It was only a few kilometres to the summit, but they were steep and got rockier every minute. We passed a noisy falling stream and plenty of caribou scat as we moved from tall bustling forests up onto rockier slopes with shorter and shorter evergreens.

The birdsong fell off entirely in the last few hundred metres of elevation. At the tree line, we came out onto a spot with a stunning overview of a valley on one side of the mountain, with a long series of waterfalls running down from the plateau ahead of us.

From there, it was another short but gruelling walk to the summit itself, which gave us an extraordinary 360-degree view, from the plateau with its lakes and (somewhere hidden from sight) protected herds of caribou, down cliffs and waterfalls on either side to the valley we'd started in. (Click here for the scrollable panorama.) We took shelter from the whipping wind in one of the cubbies made out of piled rocks and ate our packed lunches in the warm sun — simple food, but it tasted incredible.

After stopping to listen to the croaking frogs in the lake, we headed back to our hotel to rest our now very tired legs. For dinner, we went back to the restaurant for a fancy dinner, since (as described in our last post) we are now very fancy people. L had quail with a chocolate-coffee sauce, and B had fresh, flaky halibut in a hollandaise sauce.