Anticosti

Anticosti didn’t make UNESCO’s list because of its moose or its beaches. It made the list in 2023 because the limestone cliffs ringing this island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence contain the best-preserved fossil record on the planet of the first mass extinction in Earth’s history, a die-off 445 to 443 million years ago that wiped out roughly 85 percent of marine species. More than 1,400 fossil species have been catalogued in the rock here, and the sedimentary layers stack up so cleanly that scientists treat the island as a natural timeline you can walk along. That’s the real headline. Everything else, the deer, the canyons, the total absence of crowds, is a bonus on top of a genuinely important geological site.

An island shaped by one obsessive Frenchman

Before it was a UNESCO site, Anticosti was the private fiefdom of Henri Menier, the French chocolate magnate who bought the entire 7,900-square-kilometer island in 1895 and ran it as a personal hunting reserve. Menier is the reason the island has white-tailed deer at all: he introduced roughly 220 of them in the 1890s, and with no natural predators and abundant forage, the population exploded to well over 150,000 today, giving Anticosti one of the highest deer densities anywhere in North America. He’s also the reason for the French place names scattered across an English-mapped gulf, including Vauréal Falls, which he named after his estate back in France. Port-Menier, the island’s only real settlement, still carries his name and is home to nearly the entire year-round population of under 200 people.

What to actually go see

Chute Vauréal is the single best day trip on the island: a waterfall dropping about 70 meters into a canyon carved through limestone shelves that are themselves packed with 400-million-year-old fossils, meaning you’re looking at ancient sea life while standing in a gorge taller than Niagara Falls. The trail down is short but genuinely steep in places, not a casual stroll, and the payoff is a viewpoint over the falls plus a rocky canyon floor scattered with visible brachiopod and coral fossils if you know where to look.

The Sépaq national park, which covers a large swath of the island’s eastern half, is the easiest starting point for structured hiking, canyon walks, and ranger-led interpretation of the fossil beds, and it’s also where most formal accommodation and vehicle rental is organized. Beyond the park, expect long stretches of nothing: boreal forest, gravel roads, and coastline where you’re more likely to see a deer bound across the road than another vehicle.

Getting there is the actual adventure

There is no bridge, and there’s no year-round ferry running a simple point-to-point route from a single mainland town. The seasonal option is the Bella Desgagnés, a combined passenger and cargo ferry that runs from Rimouski up Quebec’s North Shore between roughly April and October, stopping at Port-Menier along its route to Sept-Îles, Havre-Saint-Pierre, and points further along the Lower North Shore. Depending on where you board, the crossing runs anywhere from about 5 hours from Havre-Saint-Pierre to over 20 hours from Rimouski, so check the actual routing before assuming a quick hop.

Flying is faster and, for most visitors, the more realistic option. Small regional carriers operate scheduled flights into Port-Menier’s airport (code YPN, not the code some old guides list) from Montreal, Quebec City, Mont-Joli, Sept-Îles, and Havre-Saint-Pierre, with flight time from Montreal running around two hours. Seats are limited and prices reflect it, so book well ahead, especially in hunting season from September through November when outfitter clients fill planes fast.

Money, permits, and the road reality

Sépaq packages bundling lodging, meals, and transport commonly run into the thousands of dollars per person for a multi-night stay, which surprises people expecting a budget wilderness trip. If you’re arranging your own logistics rather than an outfitter package, renting a truck locally costs roughly 200 dollars a day plus fuel, and a truck is not optional advice, it’s a practical requirement. Nearly every road on the island, including the main Transanticostienne spine road connecting Port-Menier to the park, is unpaved gravel, and a low-clearance rental sedan will struggle. All visitors are required to register at the reception office in Port-Menier on arrival, a rule that exists because search and rescue on an island this size and this remote is not a quick operation.

The hunting economy you’ll notice immediately

Roughly 8,000 hunters visit the island annually chasing that oversized deer herd, and hunting revenue, worth an estimated 10 million dollars a year to the island’s economy, is the reason Anticosti has any tourism infrastructure at all. Five outfitters, including Sépaq itself, hold rights across most of the island’s territory. If you’re visiting outside hunting season for the fossils and the falls, this barely affects you, but if you’re booking a fall trip, expect lodges to prioritize hunting packages and confirm early that non-hunting travelers are welcome on your dates.

When to go

Summer, roughly June through September, is the only period when ferry service, most lodging, and the park’s trail network are reliably open, and it’s also when the fossil-rich canyon floors are safest to access without ice or snowmelt runoff. Early autumn brings good weather and thinner crowds than July and August, though “crowds” on Anticosti is a relative term; this remains one of the least-visited UNESCO sites in North America, and that solitude, more than any single waterfall or fossil bed, might be the real reason to come.