Thoughts From a "Lost Canadian" About Forillon National Park

Today I want to let you know about the first National Park in Quebec, Forillon National Park. While this park was preceded by the removal of 225 families through expropriation, on February 14, 2011, the House of Commons adopted a motion which issued an official apology to the people whose properties were expropriated to create Forillon Park. I am saddened by the behavior of the firm which forced the First Nations people out of their land, but am encouraged by how the Canadian government told the truth about what happened and took responsibility for it.

• Forillon National Park is located at the outer tip of the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec and covers 244 km² (94 sq mi).
• The word, "Forillon" was used by explorers and early cartographers to describe an offshore "sea stack" or "flowerpot island"—a distinct, pillar-like rock formation separated from the main cliff by erosion, which has since collapsed.
• Created in 1970, Forillon was the first national park in Quebec. The park includes forests, sea coast, salt marshes, sand dunes, cliffs, and the Eastern End of the Appalachians. 
• The area was a traditional summer hunting and fishing ground for the Mi'kmaq and Haudenosaunee people.
• This national park includes nesting colonies of sea birds and whales, and seals as well as woodland mammalian species which are red fox, black bear, moose, lynx, mink, coyote, woodchuck, porcupine, snowshoe hare, beaver, and ermine.
• Raptors which inhabit this park are great horned owls, northern harriers, peregrine falcons, kestrels, bald eagles, rough-legged hawks, and ospreys.
• Forillon encloses the site of Fort Péninsule, near the Penouille beach. This fortification was built during World War II to protect the Gaspé bay, as was Fort Prével on the other side of the bay; had Germany conquered all of Europe, these forts would have sheltered British warships seeking refuge from German submarines. Visitors today can enter a tunnel to see cannon in place since that time.

You will find out more about Forillon National Park at this link.