Lake Tourouvre facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Lake Tourouvre |
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 Lake Tourouvre
Location in Quebec
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| Location | Mauricie, Quebec |
| Coordinates | 47°45′50″N 72°54′00″W / 47.764°N 72.900°W |
| Type | Artificial lake |
| Primary inflows | Saint-Maurice River, River Trenche |
| Primary outflows | Saint-Maurice River |
| Basin countries | Canada |
Lake Tourouvre is a special lake in Quebec, Canada. It was made by people in 1950. They built a big wall, called a dam, across the Saint-Maurice River. This dam created the lake! The dam is part of the La Trenche Generating Station, which makes electricity.
The lake is located in a beautiful area, surrounded by forests and mountains. It's a great spot for fun activities like boating, fishing, and even hunting. The lake covers a large area, about 1,448 hectares.
Where is Lake Tourouvre?
Lake Tourouvre gets its water from two rivers. The River Trenche flows into the lake from the northeast. It enters through a long, narrow waterway that is about 4 km long. The Saint-Maurice River also flows into the lake from the west side.
The lake itself is about 4 km wide. It stretches for about 8.4 km, if you include the narrow part where the Trenche River enters.
The La Trenche Dam
The dam that created Lake Tourouvre is called the "La Trenche Generating Station" dam. It's a very large concrete dam. It stands 53 meters (about 174 feet) tall and is 442 meters (about 1,450 feet) long. This dam holds back a huge amount of water. It can hold about 6 million cubic meters of water!
The dam is located north of La Tuque. It's about 11.2 km upstream from where the Vermillon River (La Tuque) joins the Saint-Maurice River.
How to Get There
You can reach Lake Tourouvre by road. From the town of La Tuque, it's about a 48.7 km drive. You would take a road called "Rivière Croche" (Crooked River) and then a forest road. This forest road even crosses the Saint-Maurice River right at the La Trenche Generating Station dam.
There's also a small community called "Trenche" located near the dam. It's on the west side of the Saint-Maurice River. A forest road helps people get to this small hamlet.
What's in a Name?
Before it was called Lake Tourouvre, this lake had other names. Some people used to call it "Beaver Lake." Others knew it as "Lake Trenche."
The name "Tourouvre" comes from a town in France. This French town, also called Tourouvre, is in a region called Perche. In the 1600s, many people from this French town moved to Canada.
A famous French geographer named Reclus once said that Tourouvre, France, was "the place in Europe that contributed to the most part, the settlement of the New World." To remember this history, a special museum was opened in Tourouvre, France, on October 1, 2006. It's called the House of French Emigration to Canada.
The name "Lake Tourouvre" became official on December 5, 1968. It was registered by the Commission de toponymie du Québec, which is like the official naming board for places in Quebec.
