The hotel concierge gave us a breathless endorsement of Parc Omega as a place to visit while in Montebello, QC. He enumerated all of the Canadian animals we could see there. Although we’re usually skeptical about animal drive-in parks, the endorsement combined with the desire to see indigenous animals that we weren’t readily going to see from the water provided the impetus for us to take the bikes up the hill to the Parc.
Google maps provided an alternative route to Parc Omega – rather than taking Route 323 heading directly north. At first we went past the historic Manoir Papineau (named for a leading Patriote politician of the 19th century) just outside the hotel grounds, then the town of Montebello, then out through some pastures, then up into the hills where the sign said only in French that it was a cul-de-sac and the road was unmaintained. We continued in our faith in Google navigation nonetheless as the road got steeper – but were rewarded with a ride on a dirt road through what appeared to be minimally inhabited woods. That is – until we hit a stretch of water spilling from a swamp over the road, which gave us muddy wet feet – and then a half mile later found the main road and the Parc Omega. Only took an hour in total – three times as long as the Google maps estimate!
Parc Omega was well worth the ride up in that it had animals you hardly ever see in the wild or in zoos for that matter. On the African high plains, like the Serengeti and the Masai Mara, you see elephants, giraffe and zebra all munching grass side by side. In North America, wild animals are much harder to spot unless they are eating your garbage at night or as road kill on the highway.
Parc Entrance; Wild Boar; Elk
The Parc, of course did not let us use bicycles to visit, but allowed us to rent a caged jeep and buy carrots to feed some of the animals. The array of beasts in this place comprised from red deer, white tail deer, elk, moose, black wolves, black bears, bison, coyotes, wild boar and a number of others.
Black Wolf; Musk Ox; Bison
The cage was actually more conducive to contact with the animals as we could nearly freely feed any animal that approached whereas most of the other park vistors in air-conditioned sedans were only able to crack their windows open a bit.
Elk; White-tail Deer; Coyotes
Black Bears
The ride back on the main road 323 was nearly all downhill and took all of 12 minutes - faster than the 20 minutes Google predicted. The grounds of the hotel, the Chateau de Montebello, where our marina is located was one of the last remaining royal land grants made during the colonization of New France – la seigneurie de la Petite-Nation(referring to the local Algonquin tribe). The seigneurial system was instituted by Cardinal Richelieu in 1627 – a semi-feudal system of land ownership which oddly made claims for rents and manorial payments in parts of Canada well into the 20th century.
The hotel itself is not nearly that old. It is one of the largest log cabin structures in North America – the 1930’s creation of a Swiss entrepreneur. The structure served as the Seigniory Club until the 1970’s and has played host to meetings such as the G7 Summit in 1981 and many heads of state have stayed here over the years.