Hey Folks,
First, to clear up some old business. Remember the butterflies from my last travelog? Turns out they're Viceroy butterflies. They only look like Monarchs! The reason they look like Monarchs is because of a little thing in the natural world called mimicry. This is where one animal makes itself look like another in order to protect itself from predators. Its a little like the chubby government beaurocrat who dresses up in black leather and rides a Harley on the weekends. He looks big and bad but deep inside he's just another marshmallow. In the case of the butterflies, the Viceroys make themselves look like Monarchs because the Monarchs are poisonous. Their diets make them that way. Because Viceroys look like their poisonous cousins, predators avoid them. Good thing it was a Viceroy butterfly I bit into, and not its poisonous bretheren, eh!
These last ten days, or so, I'm sad to admit, have been something less than exciting, and have not involved much movement at all. You see, here in the Slocan Valley the spring rains have set in. Fortunately, I've been able to get in out of the rain the whole time, and have avoided what may well have been a disastrous camping experience. It has rained, and rained, and rained, and then it has rained some more.
The good news is: as the full moon grows and prepares to wane, the blossoms have come out on the trees and the nights are slowly warming. Gone is the hoar frost of a week ago, and on comes a greening of the grass and a flowering of the trees. It is quite something to see the silver pink blossoms of the Japanese Cherry trees set against the sparkling white new snow on the mountain tops.
I've not been entirely inactive these days. In fact I've taken several side trips, including one up to the old Alamo Concentrator on Carpenter Creek, high above New Denver off the Galena Trail. Some of you will remember I visited this place back in 1999. It was there, after crossing the cable car and hauling my luggage up the short hill, to where the concentrator is in a heap of bleached wooden rubble, that I was greeted by a very large man on an equally large Chestnut mare. He'd said to me, "Tough hill, eh!", and I'd responded with a: "sure is!", before realizing that there was no mare, and no man, and I'd seen a ghost, the Ghost of Cunningham!
Cunningham had owned the mines back in the middle part of the 20th century, and had gone bust with them when mining died out here. He was last seen, for real, back in the 1950s, riding his Chestnut mare along the trails near the concentrator. Of course, I knew none of this that day in '99 when I'd encountered his ghost. For me, there was actually a man on a horse, who spoke to me. It wasn't until some minutes later, when I could find no sign of the man, his horse, or of any horse hooves, that I spooked and rode out of there like my ass was afire! Weeks later I saw a picture, in the Kaslo museum, of Cunningham and his mare. It was then I realized what had happened.
This time my trip to the concentrator was a little spooky but there were no aparitions. The Galena Trail is good for a day's side trip but I would not reccomend it for travelling over with a load, even though it offers a less strenuous grade up to the Kaslo-New Denver pass. The path is rough in places, washed out in others, and has many wooden walkways and narrow ledges. Still, its good for a site-see, and the odd ghostly adrenalin rush.
I also managed to ride the other direction on the Galena Trail, out to Roseberry. This part of the trail is much easier to ride, and cuts out a few hills for those heading north towards Nakusp. Unfortunately this part of the trail can be problematic for distance touring with a load. Parts of the path are blockaded by stone gates that prevent motorcycles from using the path, but are also too narrow to fit a loaded bicycle through. The trail continues all the way to Nakusp, from Roseberry, but there are a couple rough patches, one where you must forde a stream after climbing down into a gulley, and another where a private residence is patrolled by a rather mean Rotwieller that is unchained. This dog will chase you!
One day last week, amid all the spring rains, I managed to get up to Nakusp for a visit to my old pal Mary Ellen. Well, she's not old, but I've known her a long time. We had a lovely little visit, and I got to do a little sightseeing around town. There's a lovely walk along the lake overlooking Saddleback Mountain, some gardens, and the town's picked up a lot over the past few years. Its the only place in the northern Slocan with a good grocery store and a travellers hostel. So its a good place for cyclists. In the summer there's a big rock'n'roll festival there, and the numerous hot springs that dot the countryside around the town are always a big draw.
Much of the rest of my time has been passed with my hostess and her extended family, my favourite being her grandaughter Kiera, who had her first birthday earlier this week. She's a sparkling cherub, who is just learning to talk and walk. One of her favourite things to do is load a basket full of stones, then try to walk whilst carrying it. This girl not only wants to learn to walk, she wants to do it while carrying a load. She's a future hitchhiker for sure. Now, if I can only get her interested in riding a bike!
Kiera's other big hobby is music and sound. She just loves to ring bells and play percussion instruments. The other day she had an empty cardboard box she discovered had an echo in it. For a good hour she busied herself sticking her head in the box, making humming noises, and listening to them echo. Then she'd pull her head out of the box and give everyone a big happy smile.
My host, by the way, if a very interesting character, and well known in these parts, in some circles ridiculed, in others cherished. She's my age and has been through a lot. Way back in the '70s, as a young farm girl from Quebec, she joined an overseas relief agency and went off, with her younger sister, to Cambodia, where they set up an orphange for abandoned Viet Namese children. My friend was there when President Nixon ordered the bombing of Cambodia, and she took on the chore of evacuating the children, while American bombs obliterated the countryside. She, and the orphans, were among the last to be evacuated before the firestorm.
Her efforts were rewarded with news stories, and international awards, she was even interviewed by Walter Concrite, but her 15 minutes of fame elapsed, and her story has become something of a fogotten footnote. But I'll tell ya, I was alive during Viet Nam, and there is no way you would have got me to go to Cambodia!
Anyone with that kind of hutzpah, in my opinion, deserves not only a medal, but a damn good pension. Because she was not a soldier, she gets nothing, not even recognition, although she continues to be outspoken about things like water rights, the environment, the wars. This world needs more people like her, even if her opinions today face marginalization and she lives somewhat off the grid and out of the spotlight's glow.
As I said earlier, with the rain come the blossoms. Back during the Second World War many people of Japanese descent were interned here in New Denver, and in other nearby towns. They planted many gardens and a whole orchards of cherries. Today many of the Cherry trees still exist, and at this time of year add a spectacular array of colour and light to the village. It is a favourite past time of many locals to wander the streets after a rain looking at the blossoms.
Of course there are other blooms underway. The daisies are up, so are the violets and a myriad of other flowers. New leaves form on the willows, and some of the fruit trees, apples and pears mostly, are also coming into bloom.
Right now a full moon brings on the rain, but the good news is the moon will soon ebb and take the rain with it. The forcast is for sun by the weekend, which means I will finally be able to push on. Its Friday morning and the sky is breaking.
I'll ride in the morning, heading south again, back through Winlaw and the Slocan, around to Nelson, and then east across the big lake.
Talk to you more when I get there.
Will
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