Jacques-Cartier

This steep creek in the Laurentian Mountains of Quebec is one of the more popular Class-V runs in eastern Canada.

The first of the many wonderful sections of the Jacques-Cartier; this section is the most difficult and remote. Fifteen miles long with over 20 difficult rapids, the majority of them class V, and some of them very long. This entire section runs thru the remote wilderness of Jacques-Cartier Provincial Park, one of the most beautiful in Eastern Canada. If you are up to the challenge you are in for a wonderful and wild time.

Logistically this is a difficult river. The river is very inaccessible for most of this section; all the roads and bridges date from the logging era. The shuttle is very long—fifty (50) miles, the majority of it over dirt roads. Expect the shuttle to take at least three hours. Generally running this river is a two-day event. Many paddlers shuttle cars to the take-out a day ahead of time. This allows for an early start on the river, which is advised due to its length and large number of rapids.

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Another option is to camp in the park close to (or at) the take-out, or put-in. Some paddlers also opt to backpack camping gear to a half-way point allowing them to stop in the middle of the run and spend the night.

First-timers are also advised to travel with a guide who knows the river and can show you the proper lines thru all the drops since you won't have time to scout them all.

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Alden Bird wrote in the Northeast Paddlers' Massage Board:

'The Taureau is awesome. I mean, since I ran it this summer I have done lots of runs that had more concentrated fury -- Upper Blackwater, Green Narrows, Big Branch, etc. But the Taureau is completely different. I've never run a river that was so isolated and so long and so hard for so long. The Big Branch is like running a mile - you can definitely gut it out if you've got the skills. On the Green you can pick and portage and take your time. But you can't bl

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