Discovering the Cité de l’Or

This week, with the gentle warmth enveloping Abitibi-Témiscamingue, I was craving something cool. It’s true that, at first, I thought of the great outdoors, lakes, and forests. While looking for a refreshing activity to do, I then thought of the Cité de l’Or and its underground tour of the old Lamaque gold mine. Follow me—I’m taking you 300 feet (91 meters) underground!

Wednesday, July 10, 28 degrees in Val-d’Or

Summers in Abitibi-Témiscamingue are beautiful and warm, but that doesn’t mean we don’t want to cool off every now and then. Visiting the Cité de l’Or and the Ancienne-Mine-Lamaque might not be the first option that comes to mind, but… an underground tour is a great way to cool off while enjoying a unique experience and learning more about the region’s history.

The tour of the Cité de l’Or begins at 10:00 a.m. sharp

It’s exactly 10 a.m. when our two guides for the day meet us at the reception desk of the Cité de l’Or. I follow them with great curiosity to begin the tour of the Lamaque Mine. I’ve chosen the 2.5-hour underground tour. The guides start with a brief history of the mine and explain how American prospector Robert C. Clark and his Algonquin guide, Gabriel Commanda, discovered this gold deposit, which was then mined from 1935 to 1985.

The part of the tour I’m most looking forward to is when our guides take us to the drying room—the room where miners used to get dressed to go down into the mine and where they would later dry their work uniforms. I grab a hook from which the outfit I’ll wear to go down into the mine is hanging from the ceiling. It’s already a lot of fun to choose your outfit, take it down from the ceiling yourself, and put it on!

Dressed in overalls and with a hard hat firmly on my head, here we go!

With our mining gear on and helmets firmly secured, the guides fit us with headlamps, their batteries clipped to our belts. It’s time. The group hurries to board genuine mining vehicles that will take us down into the Ancienne-Mine-Lamaque.

Two vehicles are enough to take the group 300 feet (91 meters) underground. As we approach the mine entrance, everyone turns on their headlamp. The descent has barely begun, and we can already feel the coolness and dampness of the underground gold mine. The temperature underground is 8 degrees Celsius. I told you we were going to cool off!

If you’re nervous about going so deep underground, don’t panic—the descent is done in two stages so the guide can make sure everyone is comfortable. Once everyone gives the go-ahead, the vehicle starts up again and we begin the second part of the descent.

That's it—we're 300 feet underground!

The vehicles come to a stop. Here we are, right in the thick of it, in the heart of the old gold mine! The group gets out and follows the guides into the main tunnel. Through various stations, they show us what the miners’ work has been like from the mine’s early days up to, more or less, the present day. We learn about different techniques and different machines… It’s impressive and fascinating. All that work just to get gold… it’s crazy! We learn more about the incidents that can occur during the miners’ shifts (which last 10 hours!) and the safety procedures. I have to say, it’s pretty intimidating.

I'm not even afraid of the dark!

The guides then invite us to experience total darkness. Everyone takes turns turning off their headlamps. It’s dark, but not the kind of darkness where your eyes can adjust and eventually make out shadows… it’s total darkness! Like a child, I even try to quickly bring my hand up to my face, right in front of my eyes, but nothing—I can’t see a thing.

This is the first time I’ve ever experienced total darkness. It’s truly impressive! One of our guides explains that if a miner’s lamp were to go out and he found himself in absolute darkness, just as we’ve just experienced, he had to sit where he was and wait for his foreman to come by on his safety rounds (which take place twice per shift). Why? Simply because it has happened in the past that miners followed the walls of the tunnel and fell into a shaft used to dispose of rock waste.

End of the underground tour and tour of the labs

It’s time to get back into the mine vehicles that will take us back to the surface. I’ve completely lost track of time and have no idea how long we’ve been underground, or what time it might be.

Once we’re out of the mine, we’re greeted by the warmth of this beautiful summer day, and it feels good. Our eyes also have to readjust to the daylight. I see that it’s noon and that we’ve spent a good hour and a half underground. Wow! I wouldn’t have imagined that so much time had passed!

The vehicles take us back to the building housing the drying room where we had geared up before going down. We undress, hang our coveralls on hooks, and follow the guides to the laboratory. There, they explain the entire (long and complex) process used to recover the gold (if there is any!) from the ore brought up from the mine.

The tour ends with the weighing of a replica 50-pound gold brick. Currently, they extract two gold bricks of this same size per week from the active mine. All that work, those material and—above all—human resources for something that seems so small… Truly impressive!

In short…

Having experienced it myself, I can assure you that a visit to the Cité de l’Or and a tour of the Ancienne-Mine-Lamaque is a must-do in the Abitibi-Témiscamingue region! It’s an extraordinary experience worth having at least once! Plus, you’ll score big points with your kids with this kind of activity!

To round out the visit, you can also explore the Bourlamaque Mining Village (which you pass through on your way to the Cité de l’Or).

Be sure to book your visit in advance and have fun!