Our neighbor province is beautiful from all aspects starting from its natural beauty, rich French culture, and fascinating cuisine. For me, being in Ottawa it’s just crossing the Ottawa river and enter to that province. I didn’t want to miss a chance to see the fall colors in Quebec during a weekend last fall. After a quick search, we booked a beautiful chalet through AirBnB near Lac-Supérieur in the first week of October. The plan was to reach the chalet by Friday evening and to spend the weekend exploring the beautiful location of Lac Superieur. As usual as being an IT professional, the last minute office obligations forced us to start late from Ottawa. We informed the host about our late arrival.
A two and half hours drive from Ottawa to the chalet was nothing exceptional but a straight forward drive. We didn’t waste much time that night as we wanted to explore the area from the morning.

The morning started with quite a disappointment. The dawn welcomes us with the overcast sky and very windy weather. We had our breakfast really quick and started to explore the location. The place was covered by the thick foliage of autumn color. Instead of roaming endlessly, I started towards those locations which I noted down from my location search homework.

It was one bend of the road where a stream was flowing through the midst of the colorful forest. We stopped for some time to take some pictures.

Stream in Quebec

 

After spending some time at this beautiful place, I started again and went towards one end of the Lac Superieur. The lake was quite big and the road went through numerous bends and curves. In one such curves, I found one place to park my car and this time I flew my DJI Phantom to try some aerial perspective of the place. The advantage of aerial photography is that “Auto Exposure” mode of DJI camera can auto correct the dull lighting condition due to the overcast weather and can provide a perfectly exposed image. This exactly happened when the drone flew up and the camera tilted to get the bird-eye-view. The view from above was fantastic and the feel of observing the beauty of the fall color from above was just like flying by helicopter.

Lac Superieur – Scenic Drive Through Fall Colors

 

Lac Superieur – Scenic Drive Through Fall Colors

I only realized that the watch was ticking towards afternoon when I suddenly felt very hungry. So it was time to take a break and also to recharge the Drone battery.

A quick google search helped to find a nearby restaurant and we rushed to have some food. There was no way to have a leisure lunch as the time was very little and we wanted to explore the place as much as possible. Post lunch we started driving again in search of some good locations and found a quiet beach place where we stopped for another photo session. The drone flew as I wished and captured some aerial pictures.

After this break, we started again for some new destinations and I was endlessly looking for some interesting spot while driving. In this endeavor, I found one small sandy beach by the side of a small stream which I consider one of the best spots we found during this trip. There was a small stream went through the forest while a bridge helped us to park exactly entrance of the beach and the view was awesome from there.

The Parking Spot

By that time a wireless charger helped me to recharge my drone battery completely so I knew I can fly it at least for 20 minutes. I didn’t want to waste much time as the lighting condition was not favorable since morning and this was the only window I got on the entire trip with some good light.

After parking the car, I walked far from the tourist spot to respect the local laws. Here, the local law says you can not fly a drone near the people. I was sure the nobody wouldn’t mind if I did so, as the fellow travelers here in Canada are very peaceful and are welcoming. Still, I did a solitary walk towards an empty area where I found the drone flying could be safe and be compliant with the local laws.

When the flying machine went up and started streaming me the live view of the surroundings it was amazingly beautiful. I found the entire valley is burning with rioting colors. The spiral view of the stream through this autumn foliage was amazingly beautiful. In the next 30 mins, I took a few pictures of this place before the machine started sending me the low battery signal and forced me to land the flying machine.

Here are some pictures of this voyage.

Aerial View

 

The Lonely Canoe

 

The Lake and the Fall Foliage The Beautiful Stream – This picture later published in Canada Geographic 2018 Media Kit

 

Some Travelling Tips:

Where to Go:

Lac-Supérieur – Lac-Supérieur is a municipality in the Canadian province Québec, set within the Laurentian Mountains, northwest of Montréal. This place is very famous for ski in winter, hiking, biking, canoeing, and other activities during summer and in Falls.

How to Go:

Lac-Supérieur, Quebec is around 2.5 hours drive from Ottawa and little extra than 2 hours from Montreal. The best way to travel there is to drive.

Where to Stay:

Lac Superieur and nearby Mont Tremblant have many hotels, resorts, chalets, and Air BnBs. A Google search can reveal all these options. There are different options depends on the budget.

The best way to explore this place is to book a hotel / Air BnB and then explore that area by cars, bike, etc.

What to Do:

This place has lots in her offering starting from biking, hiking, golfing, canoeing or just a relaxing holiday.

When to Go:

Select the season as per your activities. If you wish to travel and enjoy the natural beauty then summer to fall is the ideal window. Hiking, biking, Kayaking, and other summer activities are very popular at this time. Winter is famous for its winter activities like snowboarding, skiing.