The Portneuf municipality is half way between Trois-Rivières and Quebec cities, on the north side of the St. Lawrence river. A bit north of them lies the Saint-Alban village and there is the natural park, Parc Naturel de Portneuf. And two wonderful caves, the Grotte le Trou du Diable and Grotte aux Cascatelles. The first one is a Quebec speleological society's organized touring cave, a wet wading cave. I was not able to do this tour, since it was out of the season. In any case, summer would probably be a nicer time to be deep in the water. The second one is cave by the gorge-like river Sainte-Anne, where a small stream has carved a cave to short-cut the gorge walls.
The Grotte le Trou du Diable has (at least) three openings, in coordinates N 46.677038 W 72.094314, N 46.675057 W 72.091979 and N 46.674699 W 72.091523. The first one is accessible by climbing down the steep river walls of a small contributory to Sainte-Anne, the one coming from the cave. The other two are accessible through the society's grounds. The society's hut is here, subject to opening hours etc.
This cave is extremely dangerous if you don't know what you are doing and are coming with the guide from the society, given the amount of water in it. It is also tight from what I can see.
Some photos of this cave below, the first entrance here pictures below. There's actually two entrances here, one dry and one with flowing water:
Map of the cave Diable cave, as described by the society:
The other cave, Grotte aux Cascatelles, was hard to find. All the coordinates in Grotto Center and Wikipedia appeared to be incorrect, pointing to a swampy plains above and north of Sainte-Anne. I criss-crossed this area for an hour but did not see anything. And I didn't think there couldn't even be anything given the flat and and muddy landscape. But there's a cave that matches roughly what the cave map in Wikipedia shows, with two holes and a stream entrance from the top, and exit at the bottom of a cliff. The right coordinates are, I think, N 46.709885 W 72.079825.
It is hard/dangerous to access, though. The river is subject to sudden flooding from the dam just few hundred meters upstream. And while there are stairs down to the river bank from a bit nearer the dam, they have been marked as closed due to collapse dangers. Double danger!
Some pictures of this cave:
The environment in the park near the cave:
More information about Grotte du Diable can be found on the QC Speleo site and Portneuf Tourism site, and from Grotte Aux Cascatelles at the Grotto Center, a map from Wikipedia is here.
This article has also been published at Planetcaver.net here. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, urban exploration stories from theurbanexplorer.net, and other underground stories from planetcaver.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot, TGR. Photos and text (c) 2025 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.
No comments:
Post a Comment