Early in the morning of mid-October 2015, I was hiking up a trail leading to a viewpoint dominating the St-Donat de Montcalm region. Well worth the effort, I arrived at the spot and was amazed by the vast carpet of color intertwined with multiple small lakes set off by the mountains in the background. Sunrise was at 07:06.

I installed my tripod and my wide-angle lens (24 mm), and at 07:00, I captured this image. I was unable to capture the full effect of the panoramic view as it was too wide. To view the other part of the landscape, keeping the same tripod placement, I turned the camera roughly 90 degrees to the right. At 07:03, I took another image, which had already been published in my LPM portfolio.

The boreal forest of Quebec has a wide variety of species offering marvellous colors in the fall. Once again, getting up early to hike into this viewpoint was well worth the effort. This magical period in autumn does not last long. As soon as the weather gets cooler, the rains, accompanied by strong winds, blow the leaves off the trees. Winter is coming; the oranges, reds and golds disappear, and we dream of next year!