Nature stays | Finding balance, the Feral way

(Lac-Supérieur) A northern farm, whose crops are served at the café. Next to which are beautiful shelters available for rent, a few steps from the peaceful Diable River. The wheel turns peacefully at Farouche, a new place for stays in nature, nestled at the foot of the Laurentian mountains, in Lac-Supérieur.

Valerie Simard
The Press

The place was baptized Farouche as in the Latin word “forasticus” which means “from the outside”, from the outside. “We are fierce by choice,” they say on their website. And they don’t lie. Former professionals – she a lawyer, he an urban planner – living in Montreal, Geneviève Côté and Jonathan Casaubon chose to leave the city five years ago to settle in Sainte-Adèle, in the Laurentians, with their three children. It was before the pandemic and its massive exodus to the countryside.

Motivated urban gardeners, they cherished the dream of starting a vegetable farm and living off their crops. That day came sooner than expected when the opportunity to acquire 100 acres of land near the entrance to Mont-Tremblant National Park presented itself.

“We imagined a farm here, in the Devil’s Valley, surrounded by mountains,” recalls Jonathan Casaubon. A kind of landscape where you would never see a farm. In fact, for the agronomist called to the scene, it was, he says, the worst place to cultivate. A very acid soil in which no vegetable had ever grown.

“It was sapinage, with sphagnum moss, blueberries, adds Geneviève Côté. It used to be a pasture in the 1970s. The vegetation had grown back. »

Nevertheless, they dug, cleared stumps, prepared the soil, applied the agronomist’s recommendations and put into practice the teachings of market gardener Jean-Martin Fortin. From the first summer, last year, the harvests exceeded their expectations, even allowing them to sell baskets of organic vegetables. This year, tomatoes, eggplant, cucumbers, mesclun, squash, garlic and edible flowers, among others, are growing in abundance.

A corner of nature to share

The entire Farouche recreational tourism project, launched last July, starts from the farm, located on the other side of the road. Looking for a way to sell their production, they thought of a place that could serve as both a farmer’s market and a café where people from the village, outdoor enthusiasts on their way to the national park, amateurs paddle boards descending the Diable River and, in winter, skiers after a day on the slopes.

Superbly designed by Atelier L’Abri, the building is trendy with its light wood walls and long terrazzo counter. The glazed rear facade allows you to admire the surrounding mountains, including the well-known Mont Tremblant. From Thursday to Monday, during the day, the couple (and their children aged 10, 12 and 14 who also get their hands dirty) sell their vegetables there as well as some local products. It serves coffee, meals cooked for lunch – the menu changes regularly to follow the harvests – and boards for the aperitif.

Near the cafe are four triangular cabins with king-size beds (king) can accommodate up to two adults and one child. Each includes a mini-fridge, a gas stove for the winter, a mini outdoor barbecue and a space for the fire. Each cabin has a private bathroom, located in the cafe building.

Projects in sight

A few hammock tents are also available for rental on the site, which has retained its wild state. On site, accommodation customers have access to a charming white sand beach on the banks of the peaceful and winding Diable River. You can also rent a paddle board to go upstream to Mont-Tremblant Park.

Geneviève Côté and Jonathan Casaubon have many other projects (adding shelters, building compact ecological chalets in the mountains with hiking trails, expanding the farm, planting fruit trees), but they also want to give themselves time to grow quietly. .

“Since July 15, we have been learning 12 new trades,” says Jonathan. We are baristas, farmers, innkeepers. We’re not bored. »

Achieving balance is also part of their plans. “If we don’t achieve it, we will have failed,” he says. Because at Farouche, balance is the basis of everything. In life, as in nature.