A press release from Quebec brings sad news of a friend to snowmobilers in the Northeast. Laurent Caouette was a familiar face at SAM’s Snowmobile Expo every October and to anyone who rode in Quebec along the Maine border. He was recently featured in a SAM story about riding in Quebec.
The Chaudière-Appalaches: The Chaudière-Appalaches and Québec Tourist Industry Loses a Pioneer. It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Mr. Laurent Caouette on December 23 at the Centre hospitalier de Saint-Georges-de-Beauce after a lengthy illness. Mr. Caouette will be remembered as a trailblazer who for 40 years contributed to developing snowmobiling and snowmobile clubs.
Mr. Caouette worked for over 40 years as a volunteer for snowmobile clubs in the Chaudière-Appalaches region, including Club Linière-Marlow in Beauce, where he was founding president in 1973 and whose territory neighbors that of Maine.
Elected in 1999 as the Chaudière-Appalaches “tourism personality of the year,” he served for over 25 years on many boards of directors, including the Office du tourisme et des congrès de Beauce in St-Georges, the CLD de Beauce-Sartigan, Tourisme Chaudière-Appalaches and the Fédération des clubs de motoneigistes du Québec.
In addition to taking part every year in a number of snowmobiling shows in the United States with Tourisme Chaudière-Appalaches, including one recently in early December, Mr. Caouette helped raise the profile of snowmobiling in Québec by representing the province during several media and promotional tours with the Ministère du Tourisme. He not only received, at the beginning of 2010, an award of excellence from the Ministère du Transport recognizing his volunteer work, he also recently received the 2011 Excellence Award for Outstanding Snowmobiler, an honor bestowed by the Canadian Council of Snowmobile Organizations (CCSO).
Managers François Cloutier and Richard Moreau of Tourisme Chaudière-Appalaches have also lost a friend. “He was a model volunteer and pioneer. He wanted us to continue the work undertaken to develop the regions and this activity that is part and parcel of our leisure and culture. Laurent, you can count on us.”
Snowmobile clubs in the Chaudière-Appalaches region have petitioned the Ministère des transports in Québec to name a trail in his honor. As a result, trail No. 75 running from the frontier of Maine through Chaudière-Appalaches up to the Québec region would become the Laurent Caouette trail.
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