• Eurail
Across Europe
From Bulgaria to Ireland and everything in between, Eurail is the wandering soul’s key to the continent. The number of countries and length of travel determine which rail ticket is best suited to the individual — though with every stop an invitation to explore a new culture, the comprehensive Global Pass is the most tempting option.

 • Great Southern Rail
Sydney to Perth, Australia (The Indian Pacific)
Winding through the eucalyptus-filled Blue Mountains to the arid Nullarbor Desert, this three-night journey down the world’s longest straight stretch of railway track (478 km) showcases Australia’s startling contrasts — from vantage points up to 1,000 metres above sea level. Keep an eye out for the wedge-tailed eagle. The massive avian is the Indian Pacific Railway’s official mascot. 

Snow-capped Rockies, golden Prairies and thundering Niagara Falls — Canada’s natural landmarks are best explored by rail.Courtesy the Rocky Mountaineer

• The Rocky Mountaineer/VIA Rail
Vancouver to Toronto, Canada (Trans-Canada Rail Adventure)
Snow-capped Rockies, golden Prairies and thundering Niagara Falls — Canada’s natural landmarks are best explored by rail. And this 13-day, cross-country exploration includes motorcoach and helicopter tours, national park passes and nine-nights’ hotel accommodation.

• Trans-Siberian Railway
Moscow, Russia, to Beijing, China (Trans-Siberian line)
The longest rail line ever constructed, the Trans-Siberian crosses one-third of the globe and spans more than seven time zones. Four routes connect Russia to the Far East, and though the landscape is spectacular, it’s the eclectic mix of passengers that makes the journey unforgettable.

• Chihuahua-Pacific Railroad
Chihuahua to Los Mochis, Mexico
Known to the locals as Ferrocarril Chihuahua al Pacifico, or El Chepe, this refurbished train follows what is reputed to be one of the world’s most scenic rail routes. Highlights include the vast Copper Canyon, seven times larger than the Grand Canyon; a series of rustic, off-the-path villages; and a visit with the swift-of-foot Tarahumara tribe.

• The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway
New Jalpaiguri to Darjeeling, West Bengal, India
One of the few railways that is also a World Heritage Site, the Darjeeling’s century-old engineering allows for sharp, spiralling ascents over Himalayan terrain. Passing through the soaring Mahaldirum Range and over the rushing Mahanadi River, this half-day tour is so breathtaking, Mark Twain is said to have called his DHR experience the most enjoyable day of his life.

• Shangri-La Express
Beijing/Xian, China, to Goldmund/Lhasa, Tibet
According to locals, “Shangri-La” is a mythic paradise hidden beyond the Himalayas — and that’s exactly what this 12-night rail trip seeks. Two possible routes venture to the “roof of the world,” Tibet, with the highest altitude reached topping 5,000 metres (oxygen is pumped aboard). Stops include Beijing’s Forbidden City and the Dalai Lama’s Summer Palace in Lhasa. 

Empire Builder at Havre Station, Mont. Courtesy Amtrak

• Amtrak
Chicago, Seattle or Portland to Montana, U.S. (Empire Builder Train)
The U.S. is known for its national parks, and this 14-day pioneer-themed journey explores five of the most scenic: Glacier, Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Arches and Canyonlands. The route follows portions of Lewis and Clark’s famous trail, with such notable sights as the lazy Mississippi, temperamental Old Faithful and other geological, natural and wildlife marvels of the American West.

• Rovos Rail
Cape Town to Pretoria, South Africa
The five-star luxury of this refurbished 19th-century “cruise train,” which may be hauled by steam, diesel or electric locomotives throughout the journey, is ideal for experiencing exotic South Africa. History reigns supreme: as the train trundles across centuries-old veldt and past ancient towns, its period décor, after-dinner champagne and traditional white-glove service recall the glamour of a bygone era.

• The Royal Scotsman
Scotland tour
Sparkling lochs, sprawling moors and overnights in ancient castles are just a taste of the itinerary offered by this travelling luxury hotel. On-board meals reflect seasonal Scottish specialties (guests have the option of donning kilts at dinner); evening entertainment includes Highlanders regaling passengers with tales of life in old Scotland. 

Recommended: Purchase rail tickets prior to departure, as many countries offer substantial discounts on advance bookings.

>> 4 of the World’s Top 25 Rail Journeys 

>> The World’s Top 25 Rail Journeys (2009)

Lead photo courtesy Great Southern Rail

by Jim Sutherland

1. Movement toward mininalism is … minimal

Last spring Westworld magazine published an article I wrote on the minimalist movement in golf design — the trend toward rougher-hewn courses more reminiscent of Scottish links than the suburban country club style popular in North America. Prominent examples include Oregon’s Bandon Dunes, Tacoma’s Chambers Bay and Richard Zokol’s new Sagebrush, near Merritt. However, it appears golfers will have to wait awhile for other B.C. examples, which have been sideswiped by the current slowdown as well as more specific issues. It will be two or three years at least before anyone gets to play Union Bay Golf Links, south of Comox, designed by Gil Hanse (Golf magazine’s current designer of the year); and the design of Blackstone, near Fernie, appears to have been shifted to Greg Norman’s firm from that of David McLay Kidd (Bandon Dunes). There is a flipside to all this, however. Zokol’s Sagebrush was originally intended to be exclusive. But last summer, and again this year, he opened it up to “invitees” (which means anyone who asks). The course is just up the hill from the Quilchena Hotel, B.C.’s oldest, which offers basic but very characterful accommodation at a reasonable price. Playing Sagebrush is a treat, and the deals ain’t bad either, all things considered.

2. Clip those coupons, name that price

Over the winter, through judicious coupon clipping and by sticking to twilight golf, I averaged about $10 per round. Obviously no-one can pull that off during the summer, but operators are getting more and more aggressive with pricing and discounting, especially during off-peak hours and when the weather is poor. One I spoke to for the BC Business article told me “If you want to play golf, we will try to find a time and a price to suit,” which practically invites haggling.

3. Competition from south of the border

One reason operators here have to be flexible is the situation in Bellingham, where the economy is poor, the courses are emptier and the cost to play not much more than half of the norm on our side, given the strong dollar. If border waits don’t intervene, the parking lots at courses like Shuksan, Semiahmoo and Avalon will be crowded with B.C. plates this summer.

4. The environmental imperative

Sustainability hasn’t exactly been a buzzword in the golf industry, and indeed there are more than a few golfers who like the idea that their footprint is bigger than yours. But change is in the air. All the operators I spoke to for the BC Business article wanted to talk about the little things they were doing to make their courses more environmentally benign, though none of them mentioned the much bigger things that are just around the corner. Especially in the U.S., there’s a new mantra, currently being promoted by USGA president Jim Hyler: “Brown is the new green.” Courses are being urged to cut back dramatically on the use of water and chemical inputs, a movement that has the triple-threat advantage of saving money, promoting sustainability and making the game more fun to play, thanks to those fast, firm fairways. Golf Digest magazine has even just changed its course ranking criteria to reward exactly those kinds of playing conditions, in effect penalizing courses that are too lush and overwatered. Golfers: do us all a favour and complain about the conditions the next time you arrive somewhere to find the fairways all manicured and weedless.

Read my lips: No new courses

That’s right. As far as I could determine, not a single brand new course is certain to open in B.C. this year. There are several in the works, mostly in the Interior, and a couple might be playable later in the year, but developers are going slow — very slow — as money is tight and prospects are poor. That said, so many courses have opened in recent years that no-one touring B.C. will feel deprived of fresh experiences. My own list of favourites includes Sagebrush (see above), Kelowna’s Tower Ranch, Salmon Arm’s Canoe Creek and Rossland’s Redstone.

Lead photo courtesy Jim Sutherland.

Is Amtrak’s Vancouver to Seattle No. 2 a train worth fighting for?

by Rob Howatson

Amtrak passenger trains have been running between Vancouver and Seattle since 1995, offering a scenic roll across the border. But it is only in the past six months that the service has become truly practical for British Columbians looking for a daytrip or weekend in Space Needle Town.

The original schedule had Vancouverites boarding at 5:45 p.m. and arriving in Seattle just in time to check into a hotel for the night. The next day, the only train home left at dawn, unless travellers settled for a bus or a second night in the Emerald City. But a new, second Amtrak Cascades train means Canadians can now arrive at King Street Station before noon, enjoy a ball game at Safeco Field or cruise the malls, then choo-choo home at 6:50 p.m. Better yet, rail lovers can overnight in Seattle and enjoy brunch the next day at Pike Place Market before  even thinking of heading home.

Photo: Cascades at Titlow Beach, WA/courtesy Amtrak

Also read: Vancouver to Seattle the Amtrak Special

Breaking bread with B.C.’s culinary queen

Notes toward a screenplay based on the life of Kathy McAree (think the book Eat, Pray, Love, as directed by Alfred Hitchcock): In 2001, while recuperating from surgery after a car accident, a 33-year-old woman spends a few weeks as a slow-food traveller in Europe. What happens while she’s there – the tour of Spain’s Basque region with the Texan chef, the armed man on the French night train, the 9/11 attacks, the Puglia cooking school in Italy – changes her life forever.

In an area roughly the size of Belgium, Vancouver Island has more than two dozen wineries, five artisan cheese-makers, two Old World ciderhouses, wild seafood galore and farm-raised everything: beef, chicken, duck, lamb, water buffalo, even emu. Courtesy Tourism Vancouver Island/ ChrisCheadle.com

Fast forward almost a decade and McAree is head of Travel with Taste, B.C.’s first culinary tour operator – leading locals and international travellers into the West Coast food culture of Vancouver Island. Her specialties: walking tours in her home city of Victoria (“urban foraging,” as she calls it) and longer treks to the farms, wineries and under-the-radar restaurants of Salt Spring Island and the Cowichan Valley. As founder of the Victoria Taste Festival and director of the B.C. Culinary Tourism Society, she is also helping give B.C.’s west coast its status among food lovers – one formerly reserved for Europe – as a gourmet wonderland of wine, cheese, meat and seafood. “Kathy’s one of our pioneers,” says Eric Pateman, founder of Edible B.C., the largest culinary tour operator in Canada. “She’s definitely been one of the most visible forces in promoting culinary tourism and local food.”

Julia Child is back in people’s minds because of the book and film Julie and Julia. And Child is a wonderful example of taking something you love, something you’re good at, and making a career out of it.”  –Kathy McAree

So how did a former Winnipegger and Kellogg’s multinational employee land such a tasty career?

The idea for Travel with Taste came while McAree was using up her banked vacation on that trip across Europe. “It may have been a red-wine-induced moment,” she admits with a laugh. But, inspired by the foodie joys of the Basque country, she sketched an itinerary of wineries, cheesemakers and restaurants back home on southern Vancouver Island and showed it to the tour leader. The Texas chef, however, scoffed at the notion of B.C. as a destination for travelling gourmets. “I’ll never forget it. He took one look and handed it back, saying, ‘You should just do this yourself.’ I walked away thinking, ‘Fine, I will.’ ”

After Spain, three more events convinced her to seize the day. The first was an encounter with an armed stranger on the night train to Nice, a man she thought was going to gun her down. Another was the 9/11 attacks, which cast a mood of solemn self-reflection over the entire world. Then in Italy she received news about the death of a friend “who was only in his early 40s. I remember climbing the steps on the Amalfi Coast, thinking, ‘Wow. Life is really short.’” And after a week of cooking lessons on an Italian farm, she returned to B.C. in fall 2001 and saw it, as converts do, with new eyes: as a food-lover’s paradise.

As most of us can attest, eating well while we travel – near or far – is on the rise. Research by the International Culinary Tourism Association (ICTA) confirms that sampling local wines, beers and cuisine is consistently one of travellers’ top-three activities, with memorable meals topping best-experience lists. Courtesy Tourism Vancouver Island/ Boomer Jerritt

As most of us can attest, eating well while we travel – near or far – is on the rise. Research by the International Culinary Tourism Association (ICTA) confirms that sampling local wines, beers and cuisine is consistently one of travellers’ top-three activities, with memorable meals topping best-experience lists. One Tourism B.C. report shows that over a two-year period, 11 million travellers to the province – half of them Canadian, half American – took part in some kind of gourmet experience, whether at a winery, restaurant or artisan farm.

“Eating regional foods is how we get to know a place, how we really experience local culture,” explains McAree. When she uncorks the terroir of the West Coast for clients, for example, they meet local chefs and tour specialty farms while sampling everything from local Auxerrois Pinot Blanc and ash-ripened chèvre to fresh Fanny Bay oysters and seaweed salad. Victoria is second only to San Francisco in restaurants per capita, she notes. In an area roughly the size of Belgium, Vancouver Island has more than two dozen wineries, five artisan cheese-makers, two Old World ciderhouses, wild seafood galore and farm-raised everything: beef, chicken, duck, lamb, water buffalo, even emu. “I get to show this whole other world that most people never get to see, even people who live here, because they don’t know it exists.”

>>Victoria Taste Kathy McAree’s July festival of local foods (updates on 2010 tastings and events at victoriataste.com)  >>More Island noshing  >>10 top B.C. foodie treks  >>Edible B.C. foodie tour giveaway (Winner to be announced March 2010)

Get Mobilized

Travel with Taste Tours from $89. 250-385-1527

• Walking tours of Victoria (pâtés made from local ingredients at Choux Choux Charcuterie, teas blended with local lavender or, if you dare, seaweed).

• Daytrips to Salt Spring Island (renowned for its organic lamb/other specialties).

• The Saanich Peninsula (chat with the chef at Butchart Gardens) and the CowichanValley (guided vineyard tours, including a three-course lunch paired with local wines).

See also: Top 10 B.C. Foodie Treks, Mywestworld.com Giveaway, Swallow Tail Tours

Wave makers: the return of the small-scale wooden boat

by Rob Howatson

The Fraser River is the historical lifeline of B.C., and wooden boats the primary mode of transport used to navigate it until the turn of the last century. How fitting then that New Westminster’s newly expanded river interpretive centre has found the perfect way to merge and explore the mythology of these two icons.

The Fraser River Discovery Centre’s Build-a-Boat program (February 6 to May 15) offers the chance to help construct a 12-foot, flat-bottomed, wooden dinghy called a Fraser River skiff, with volunteer coaches from the Vancouver Wooden Boat Society (FRDC) assisting aspiring mariners in shaping and joining the marine plywood and Douglas fir parts. The FRDC will use the vessel for community events and may even mount it atop a parade float.   604-521-8401

Getting involved: The Fraser River Discovery Centre’s new exhibit, “The Ripple Effect,” documents river-activist-turned-MP Fin Donnelly’s two epic Fraser swims, the changing health of the Fraser waterway and tips on how to help save the river from pollution and overdevelopment.

Photo courtesy Dana Montgomery

OLYMPICS UPDATE

What every volunteer Olympic ambassador needs to know

by Rob Howatson

As a lifelong Vancouverite, I love this city and accept that it is my civic duty to wear an Ask Me! button during the 2010 Games, but it is with some trepidation that I don the pin. It’s not that the buttons themselves look goofy. The City of Vancouver’s Ask Me! Happy to Help button has a pleasing, blue gradient background with an Olympic logo on it. Whistler has the Ask Me I’m a Local button which features an eco-trendy splash of green, fitting for the grassroots campaign started by Sea-to-Sky resident Janis McKenzie and ski tourist Dan Perdue.

And then there is the red button that I will be wearing. It is a harmless smiley face with the eyes replaced by the words: Ask Me. My wife brought two home from work. Her office got them from Translink which is distributing them through its Employer Pass Program, a green initiative that offers discounted transit passes to companies with 25 or more staffers pledging to use public transit.

My concern is that as I move about the city, with this red beacon on my chest, some disoriented tourist may ask me a question that I can’t field, and I will have failed as an ad hoc ambassador. So in preparation for my role as self-appointed, street concierge, here are some tough questions I’ve studied up on in advance.

Q: Where can I get a great bannockwich?
A: At the Four Host First Nations’ 2010 Aboriginal Pavilion, located at Georgia and Hamilton Streets.

Courtesy Purdy's Chocolates

Q: (from a visitor with a stutter) How do I get to the corner of Duke-Duke-Duke-Duke and Earles?
A: Get off at 29th Avenue Skytrain station, walk east to Earles Street and go five blocks south. Pause briefly at Duke and Earles to hum the 1962 Gene Chandler doo-wop hit, then keep going to Kingsway, where you will find Vancouver’s beloved Purdy’s chocolate factory. Purdy’s is the city’s oldest chocolatier, and the small retail store attached to the factory is a great place to get fresh-from-the-copper-kettle delectables such as truffles infused with luscious Mission Hill Vidal Icewine ($12.95) or Olympic souvenir boxes packed with hedgehogs and maple melties ($12.95).

Q: I wish to shake my booty? Any suggestions?

Courtesy Ellie O'Day/Boca del Lupo

A: Dance Marathon is an immersive and competitive theatre performance where you compete against other audience members in an actual dance marathon. Warning: If you are a good booty shaker, you and your partner may be out on the floor for up to four hours. Wear sensible shoes. February 9, 10, 11 and 13, 7 p.m. at the Roundhouse Community Centre (at Davie & Pacific). Tix $30

Q: Where can I see my name in lights?
A: Not sure about your name, but you can certainly see your aim in lights. Go to vectorialvancouver.net. Participate in Rafael Lozano-Hemmer’s interactive light sculpture project, which runs until February 28. Twenty robotic searchlights have been positioned around English Bay. You can program a short dance for them online. Once you are happy with your proposed choreography,  submit it together with your name, location and dedication. Every night from dusk to dawn, new designs are activated from the website’s queue. The project automatically creates a personal webpage for each participant, documenting his or her contribution with views from four project webcams.

Q: How y’all gonna pay for this little sports tourney?
A: (Silently remove English Ask Me button and replace with Farsi one. Then smile, shrug and pray that this inquisitive tourist doesn’t speak Persian. (The City of Vancouver Ask Me buttons are available in 24 different languages.)

I’m not a religious person, but I go to church – sporting a helmet, shin pads and goggles

by Andrew Findlay

Whenever I get bogged down with a piece of writing and tire of the computer screen, I hop on a mountain bike and pedal out my backyard to the Puntledge River and the head of a trail called Twisted Sister. This is my church. Instead of a preacher, pulpit and pews, there is the rush of the river, the throaty squawk of a raven echoing through hemlocks and red cedars festooned in wolf lichen and old man’s beard, and a ribbon of dirt winding through the forest. I know each log, rock and bridge intimately because I attend mass frequently.

A few years ago I adopted this trail, which had fallen into disuse since being scratched out of the forest by someone else. I cleared deadfall, carved out switchbacks where needed, raised bridges over small tributary creeks and built new sections of trail. I enjoyed being in the woods alone, doing something physical with my hands. In the years since, Twisted Sister has also been adopted by the “River Rats,” a group of Comox Valley retirees who happen to be biking fanatics who love building trail. They do a beautiful job of it, and Twisted Sister is an obvious beneficiary of their skills.

That’s one of the things I love about riding a mountain bike, beyond the buzz and adrenalin – the anarchic nature of the community that grows up around the sport. 

That’s one of the things I love about riding a mountain bike, beyond the buzz and adrenalin – the anarchic nature of the community that grows up around the sport. When mountain bikers want a new trail, they gather friends, some tools and head out to build one. They generally don’t ask permission, because doing so invites discussions about liability and legality. (I’m not advocating disrespect for the land or private property rights, here, just simply acknowledging that, for better or worse, volunteers building renegade trails is traditionally how communities develop a mountain biking scene.) Which is why Vancouver Island’s Comox Valley is now such a riding destination – along with Cumberland’s extensive network of trails splayed across the Cumberland Community Forest, a 60-hectare chunk of land purchased through donations and dogged fundraising efforts back in 2005, and the Island’s Forbidden Plateau and Comox Lake’s labyrinth of technical single track.

Several years ago, the B.C. government finally woke up to the fact that the province is riddled with a treasure-trove of world class mountain bike trails; albeit most of them illegitimate, making it difficult to market them as a tourism product. Surprisingly, countries such as the United Kingdom are paving the way when it comes to promoting off-road riding. The forestry commission of Great Britain, for example, has already established the “7 stanes” in southern Scotland, a series of mountain bike parks serviced by trailhead shops and cafes. But the good news for riders here is that B.C. has taken note of these efforts and is following suit with its Provincial Trails Strategy, an effort by B.C.’s tourism, culture and arts ministry to develop protocols around new trail development and legitimize existing ones. And to this end, pilot projects are now underway in a number of B.C. communities, including Williams Lake, Squamish and Nelson.

Of course, as with most things involving government, the Provincial Trails Strategy is bureaucratic and a kind of anathema to the anarchic spirit of the sport. But it’s also a progressive attempt to better harness the tourism potential of mountain biking.

Of course, as with most things involving government, the Provincial Trails Strategy is bureaucratic and a kind of anathema to the anarchic spirit of the sport. But it’s also a progressive attempt to better harness the tourism potential of mountain biking, and similar initiatives will likely follow suit. In concert with the Trails Strategy, for example, the Vancouver-based Western Canada Mountain Bike Tourism Associations is launching a provincial marketing strategy designed to help B.C. become “the next big thing in mountain bike tourism.” Meanwhile, renegade trailsmiths will continue their work, in their quiet unassuming way, building trails such as “Twisted Sister” and the foundation of the sport in B.C.

by Kerry Banks

Each February, a band of hardy (some would say foolhardy) mushers compete in the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race, following historic gold rush and mail delivery sled dog routes from the turn of the 20th Century. Contested during the depths of the Arctic winter over 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometres) of wild and hazardous terrain between Whitehorse in the Yukon and Fairbanks, Alaska, the race is a true torture test. Teams are limited to 14 dogs and one musher. Once they leave the starting chute, both the mushers and their dogs are on their own for the entire race, relying on a combination of toughness and skill, the commitment and endurance of the animals and, sometimes, luck.

This past year, B.C. writer Masa Takei braved the frigid Arctic conditions to cover the race for Westworld magazine. After his retreat to the relatively tropical climes of Lotus Land,  he then sat down with me to answer a few questions about the experience.

MyWW: What makes the Yukon Quest a more challenging dog sled race than any other, including  the Iditarod?

MT: The Yukon Quest is said to be more challenging because the mushers travel for longer distances between checkpoints, often over rough terrain and in colder temperatures. Also, they receive no outside help from handlers except during the race’s mandatory 36-hour layover at Dawson City, nor can they substitute any dogs. The way I’ve heard it described, the Iditarod is about pure speed whereas the Quest is about self-reliance. Just think about Lance Mackey, who won both races in 2007, an unprecedented feat. At least it was until he did it again the next year.

MyWW: How did you end up covering the event – and racing yourself?

MT: I’d read Adam Killick’s book Racing the White Silence and became interested in the race. Even before then though, all the Jack London and Farley Mowat stories I’d read growing up put the bug in me to find an excuse to go up north. Then I got an assignment with the newspaper 24Hours to cover the race, and ended up covering the Inuit Games, as well. But spending some time out on the trails with Frank Turner’s kennel was a real highlight. Watching from the sidelines had its moments, but it’s hard to beat getting out onto the trail, even if it gives only a faint taste of what the racers experience.

MyWW: How much time do the competitors spend preparing for the race? How do they train?

MT: Each racer has his or her own approach to training, but I’m sure that getting in the mileage is critical for both mushers and dogs. When there’s no snow, mushers use a cart or an ATV in place of a sled for dry-land training. Some mushers also cross-train with cycling, running and cross-country skiing.

MyWW: Were you impressed by the dogs in the race? If so, why? And, do they all wear booties?

MT: To understand what supreme athletes these dogs are requires thinking about what they do, day in and day out, during the race. To the layperson’s eye, however, there’s often nothing particularly impressive about them. They actually look smaller than I’d expected. It’s probably equivalent to seeing some professional endurance athletes, such as marathoners, in person. They often don’t look physically impressive. And nothing about sled dogs standing still suggests any of their phenomenal abilities. As for booties, those are mandatory equipment and Quest racers are required to have at least eight booties for each dog at every checkpoint, though when to use them is a matter of judgment. I’ve also been told that there’s a protective sheath for the more sensitive body parts on male dogs, the tip of which doesn’t have any fur,  though these are needed only when it’s extremely cold. I didn’t see any during the race I was covering. Guess it didn’t get cold enough!

MyWW: Are mushers emotionally attached to their dogs?

MT: Although I certainly saw a lot of affection being passed between mushers and dogs, I think that it really depends on the individual racer. It’s hard to imagine that a strong bond wouldn’t develop between mushers and dogs after sharing so much trail time together, though each dog also has its own personality, some I’m sure more loving and loveable than others. On the other hand, the dogs aren’t like regular pets; there’s a professional dynamic to the relationship as well, not unlike the one that existed with the working dogs who made inhabiting the North possible a century ago. It’s expensive to keep dogs, for example, and if a race dog isn’t performing well, mushers face the decision of whether they can keep the animal or not. One mushing couple, Zoya DeNure and John Schandelmeier, at Crazy Dog Kennel, run a good number of rescue dogs – unwanted race dogs that are at risk of being culled. In fact, I believe that Schandelmeier now races exclusively with rescue dogs, even if that reduces his chances of placing with the top competitors. And I know that Frank Turner, who I interviewed, makes sure that all his dogs enjoy a blissful retirement, long after they are past the point of being able to pull a sled.

MyWW: Do the competitors race at night?

MT: The clock never stops, which means the mushers run any time of the day or night. In fact, mushers talk about falling asleep on their sleds for miles at a stretch.

MyWW: Which section of the Yukon Quest is toughest on the racers?

MT: Eagle Summit, a 1,100-metre peak infamous for its wind-scoured conditions, gets a lot of attention since that’s where racers and dogs have one of the greatest chances of getting hurt. During a mushers’ meeting in Dawson City, veteran racer William Kleedehn came out and called for rerouting that section of the race. He thought that the course was tough enough without introducing that wild card, where injuries could lead to a forfeited race or worse, and that more racers would enter without that notorious stretch.

MyWW: Had you ever been in such freezing temperatures before? Were you able to adjust?

MT: That was my first time camping out in -40 temperatures,  and my first visit to the Yukon. But with the right gear, it was surprisingly comfortable. I’ve felt colder getting soaked tree-planting in B.C.

MyWW: You tried your hand at running a team for a short distance. Was it difficult?

MT: We had the benefit of running empty sleds with about half the dogs that a Quest racer needs to manage. Turner had also tailored the temperament of each musher’s team so that no one got more dog than they could handle. The most difficult part of the mushing for me was holding up my end of the deal and not letting down the team. And there was a lot more “body English” necessary than I’d expected in order to negotiate some of those turns. The dogs can sense when they’re dealing with a “gumby,” too, though the ones I was running were pretty forgiving. When I got the hang of it, I could relax enough to enjoy the exhilarating sensation, something like swooping a mountain bike over fast flowing single-track, coupled with that particular thrill of having animals pull you. The experience sure kicks the pants off riding a snowmobile.

>>View the latest footage from this year’s Yukon Quest Test Run here.

>>Read Masa Takei’s personal account of trailing the Yukon Quest racers

Lead photo courtesy Pete Ryan.

by Masa Takei

In Peter Freuchen’s account of his 1924 journey across Canada’s far north, the Danish explorer recounts how, in a driving storm, his sled dogs refused to travel any farther. So Freuchen took refuge under his dogsled, overturned against the wind-side of a large boulder, but then awoke found himself entombed, his feet painfully frozen. Barely able to move, he clawed at the hardened snow. Finally he resorted to using the edge of a polar bear hide – stiffened with frozen saliva – as a chisel. He knew one foot had already succumbed to frostbite. Unless he freed himself soon, an icy crypt would be his final resting place.

Just 1,300 kilometres up the trail, the front-runner of the 24th annual Yukon Quest 1,000 Mile International Sled Dog Race is within a half-day’s hard travel of setting a new course record.

Almost a century later, I punch out of my down sleeping bag, gasping in the Yukon’s frigid February night air. On the tarp next to me, two Muktuk Adventure guides remain peacefully encased in their sleeping bags, a light dusting of frost coating their cocoons and only a fist-size breathing hole open above their noses. The moonlight is so bright I can make out the 35 sled dogs curled up in nearby flakes of hay. Several metres beyond: two canvas wall tents with wood-burning stoves shelter the rest of our party of nine. Everything is frozen in silence. Yet just 1,300 kilometres up the trail, the front-runner of the 24th annual Yukon Quest 1,000 Mile International Sled Dog Race is within a half-day’s hard travel of setting a new course record. We dogsledding tenderfoots, on the other hand, are days away from an entirely different kind of record. Our loose collection of cryophiles from three continents has signed on with Muktuk’s Quest adventure option for an inside look at the first leg of the race in progress, followed by several days of mushing in the racers’ wake. Our mission: to dogsled a 267-km loop along the Yukon’s historic Overland Trail.

It is the early hours of Day 3 of a six-day sledding expedition, which includes a 135-km stretch of the Yukon Quest Trail. Our loose collection of cryophiles from three continents has signed on with Muktuk’s Quest adventure option for an inside look at the first leg of the race in progress, followed by several days of mushing in the racers’ wake. Our mission: to dogsled a 267-km loop along the Yukon’s historic Overland Trail, north to the first Quest checkpoint at Braeburn, then south along Lake Laberge and back to Muktuk owner and Quest racer Frank Turner’s guest ranch on the Takhini River outside Whitehorse. But at the speed we’re going, a pace comparable to that of a tricycle trailing the Tour de France, the guides have already advised we’re possibly the slowest mushers in the kennel’s 15-year history. By the end of Day 6, they joke, we’ll be lucky to have made Braeburn Lodge, the biker-run roadhouse famous for its oversized cinnamon buns.

The Yukon Sled Dog Race: From the starting point

Alternating direction each year between Fairbanks, Alaska, and Whitehorse in the Yukon, the Quest is about as long as the 1,868-km Iditarod but with less than half as many checkpoints. Above:Booties protect against paw injury and ice buildup in -50 C temperatures.

The rough-and-tumble cousin of the better-known Iditarod, the 1,635-km Quest is billed as the toughest sled dog race on the planet. Back in 1983, its creators schemed over drinks in Fairbanks’ Bull’s Eye Saloon to forge a route that would reflect the original vision of the Iditarod – before all the media and commercial interests its now-celebrated status entails. Alternating direction each year between Fairbanks, Alaska, and Whitehorse in the Yukon, this means the Quest is about as long as the 1,868-km Iditarod but with less than half as many checkpoints.  (Translation:  long stretches of isolated mushing.) Racers must also traverse four mountain ranges with heavier sleds, fewer dogs and no substitutions, and without the assistance of non-racers, except at the halfway mark in Dawson City. As well, the race is held in colder weather (temperatures this February have dropped below -50?C), with endurance and self-sufficiency prized over pure speed. Still, at their essence, both races remain a celebration of the primal partnership between humans and dogs that made early survival in the North possible.

Ten days ago, our group joined the crowd of hardy spectators at the Whitehorse starting chute to cheer on the race’s 28 competitors, including Frank Turner, as they set off on their epic run. If anyone is the godfather of the Quest it is the bearded, bespectacled and deceptively diminutive 59-year-old, entered this year with 14 of his top dogs. Blessed with the energy of someone half his age, the 1995 Quest champion has competed every year since the race started in 1984, except in 2006, when his then-26-year-old son signed up. Now the former Toronto social worker is back from a very short retirement to do battle once more and perhaps better his course record, which has stood since he set it a decade ago.

Other favourites: Lance Mackey, a 36-year-old Alaskan often compared to that champion with the same first name from the cycling world. Since coming back from his own bout with cancer five years ago, Mackey has won the Quest for the past two years. If he wins again this February, he’ll be only the second musher ever to win three consecutive Quests. (The first, Hans Gatt, an amicable Austrian from Atlin, B.C., has come second to Mackey these past two years.) William Kleedehn, 47, an AC/DC-loving hard man, originally from Germany, is another strong competitor. Despite having a prosthetic leg, “Iron Bill” has placed amongst the top five finishers every year since 2001, with the exception of 2004, when he withdrew after breaking his leg. But it’s not just men who are favoured to win. Michelle Phillips is perhaps the strongest female competitor in the field, a Tagish, Yukon, native who is supported this year by her husband, Ed Hopkins, another long-time Quest racer.

As the black-and-white bib of the last musher disappeared down the ceremonial starting chute, our group took to the highway. We would journey by truck to successive checkpoints, following the racers’ progress and counting the days to our own backcountry adventure. Carmacks, population 426, several hundred kilometres along the course and the second checkpoint, marked the next time we would see Turner, a day and a half into the race. The town’s community centre looked like the rallying point for earthquake survivors, with computers and communication centres set up on folding tables and spectators and support staff sleeping on the gymnasium floor. A white board tracked which mushers were in, as handlers and media rushed to meet incoming teams. Out in the darkness, 14 sets of eyes reflected the blinding blur of camera lights as each caravan pulled up – panting and steaming like the Trans-Siberian coming into a station – before waiting officials. Rimed with ice and snow, along with every sled and its bleary-eyed driver, the dogs still had the energy to announce their arrival with a cacophony of barks and yelps before pirouetting onto straw beds.

But the most enduring glimpse of the race came on its fourth day when, in the dark hours linking night to morning, we pulled the truck over at a rare section of the route that shadows the highway. The wilderness diorama was frozen in absolute stillness, the only sound the huh, huh panting of dogs and the swishing of a single set of sled runners over crisp snow. Overhead, the northern lights cut a green swath across the night sky as the lone musher raised a fur-mittened hand in silent greeting and veered back into the woods. Piling back into the truck, we continued on in subdued silence.

By the time we rolled into Dawson City, the mushers’ last stop before the Alaska border, it was Day 5 of the race and several teams had scratched or withdrawn, including Turner’s. Hard-packed snow makes for fast running but also more wrist and shoulder strains amongst the dogs. Turner had already dropped two, and his lead, Carter, had begun showing signs of serious tendon injury. An unfortunate turn of events, but it meant the Quest legend would now be on hand to impart a few last pointers before seeing us off on our own sledding epic, just as we’d seen him off a week earlier.

"The toughest sled dog race on the planet": Rimed with ice and snow, along with every sled and its bleary-eyed driver, the dogs still had the energy to announce their arrival with a cacophony of barks and yelps before pirouetting onto straw beds.

The Quest’s leading mushers were some 1,200 km into the race the next morning when we pulled into Muktuk Adventures’ command central. An off-the-grid outpost built with massive Sitka timbers shipped from Haines, Alaska, the main lodge sits a kilometre in from the highway on 41 hectares, along with five cabins and 108 dogs. Doddering old-timer huskies who have paid their race dues are free to wander and doze; the rest are kept tethered to their respective kennels. As we unhitched a few for a practice run, the sight of dogs freed from their perches brought on a bout of baying reminiscent of hounds on the hunt after a prison break.

By the time we set off at 5 a.m. the next day, we were trammelling eight days behind the world’s mushing elite. We focused on smoothing out the kinks: learning to set up, break camp, care for the dogs, care for ourselves. The Takhini River lay wide open before us, like a highway – broad, blue sky overhead. Then we turned into the forest and onto the Overland Trail, to camp on our second night at the old site of the Little River Roadhouse. The clearing seemed like a good spot to catch sight of the northern lights; I opted to sleep out with the guides, al fresco.

And we’re off . . . in the wake of the Yukon Quest racers

After falling back asleep the next morning, I awake to hysterical laughter. Cynthia, our pretty young guide from Victoriaville, Quebec, is doubled over, gasping for breath. The zipper on fellow guide Travis’s sleeping bag is frozen shut. But instead of helping, she is having a giggling fit as he struggles to melt the iced-up zipper with his bare thumb and forefinger, the only parts of him visible.

This time last year, Travis was guiding 12,000 km away in Tasmania, Australia, in temperatures 80 degrees hotter. Even in the early morning hours it was near impossible to walk on exposed rock in bare feet; a Therm-a-Rest sleeping pad would delaminate in the extreme heat and balloon into a cylindrical sausage. For similar reasons, we aren’t using Therm-a-Rests here, either. In inflating them our breath would freeze the layers together. I’ve already made a similar mistake with the lens on my camera, now frosted over; though no matter, the batteries are dead. Turner had warned us to keep them, and our toothpaste, next to our bodies, and I’ve followed the latter part of his advice (guarding my contact solution as well). Still, no matter how long I keep a bar of dark chocolate snug in my inner pocket, it retains the consistency of candle wax.

Like the locals, none of us feel the need to reference wind chill to hype the reality; instead we note how at -45°C the properties of things change. Metal becomes sticky. Plastic becomes brittle. Humans succumb to inertia.

Celsius or Fahrenheit, -40 is cold. Certainly, like the locals, none of us feel the need to include wind chill to hype the reality; instead we note how at -45°C the properties of things change. Metal becomes sticky. Plastic becomes brittle. Humans succumb to inertia. But as Turner advised us earlier, the cold can be a motivator during days out racing. Sleeping in his emptied sled, he makes sure not to get too comfortable so that he wakes shaking. Too cold to stay in his bag, he then rallies and heads back out. Mushers typically race for four to six hours at a stretch before letting their dogs rest for the same amount of time. But once a team is fed and bedded down, only a few hours remain for the musher to sleep before it’s time to pack up and get the dogs back on the gangline.

We, on the other hand, journey at an altogether different pace. The first order of business each morning is to get the fire started. Anyone who has read Jack London’s To Build a Fire has some appreciation of the urgency this art can have in the north. Happily, we are not in any danger of losing life or limb. But we are hungry, and with a brick-sized box of wooden matches, a large

"Husky hotel" at the mandatory 36-hour layover in Dawson City, where the first racer into town wins four ounces of placer gold.

tube of fire gel and a pile of deadfall we soon get a fire roaring. It’s so cold that even when the parts of us facing the flames feel unbearably hot, the halves turned away are icy. Or as Travis puts it, “You can tell how cold it is by how close you can get to the fire and still have your ass frozen.” The solution would seem to be to sit in the middle of the blaze, Sam McGee style. Instead, we gather as close as possible without scorching the toes of our white-rubber bunny boots while Travis reads the Robert Service tale, set on nearby Lake Laberge.

Turner, for one, has lost three teeth over the years while racing, mostly due to the frozen granola bars that can make up the bulk of a racer’s trail diet.

The literary classic is the perfect complement to the aroma of caribou sausages grilled over open flame and omelettes sizzling in a wok – thawing in the shape of the Ziploc bags they were stored in. Along with the comfort of sleeping in tents with wood stoves, we’re eating a whole lot better than the racing mushers ahead of us. But even with breakfast well underway, the dogs come first. The animals need up to 10,000 calories a day (about three times the amount devoured by us, despite the fact they are a third of our weight), so we melt snow for coffee and the moistening of frozen dog kibble. Meanwhile they have no problem devouring the frozen turkey skins we throw them, hard as hockey pucks – a trick the mushers themselves sometimes try to emulate. Turner, for one, has lost three teeth over the years while racing, mostly due to the frozen granola bars that can make up the bulk of a racer’s trail diet.

Finally we’re ready. We kneel in the snow, wrestling to get booties, harnesses and coats on the dogs and rub arnica oil on sore paws (“No feet, no dogs,” is the musher’s aphorism). Swaddled in balaclavas, insulated bib pants and down parkas over multiple layers, we move as if we have no necks. But from the way he’s hunched over, I can tell that Art’s back is bothering him. The six-foot-five retired Boeing engineer will later clip his head on a low branch, and his dogs will run back into camp without him. But he’s no rookie, having dogsledded in Sweden and Alaska and climbed some of the taller mountains in North America. On this outing, he has bonded with a fellow Shitsu owner, Elmer, a retired electrical engineer from Farmville, Virginia. Big, bushy white beard, a southern drawl (particularly when playing Waylon Jennings on his guitar), Elmer comes across a bit like Uncle Jesse from the Dukes of Hazzard, but that could just be the beard. Further down the line are Bettina, a bespectacled chemist from Brehnen, Germany, and Jen, a twice-widowed grandmother of seven from Sydney, Australia, who has never been in snow before. Her last vacation was spent whitewater rafting on the Zambezi River.

Our time spent on our knees, wrestling with our furry colleagues, is consistent with what Turner and the guides have drilled into us: mushing is a team sport. The dogsledder is merely the enabler for a team of elite endurance athletes, each with its own personality and position in the pack. Racing dogs are capable of running 160 km in a day while pulling a 100-kilogram sled and a driver – then doing it again the next day and the next, and so on. The average household pet has as much in common with these dogs as a Ford Pinto has with a Ferrari. To earn the privilege of running with such champions, we’re expected to fulfill our end of the deal.

Multiple Quest champion Lance Mackey – often compared to that champion with the same first name from the cycling world.

Swooping down a section of winding single track through aspen, I discover this means more than just slipping on the right booties and throwing down some kibble. Besides steering the sled wide of trees, leaning and shifting one’s body weight between the runners, a driver ensures that lines are appropriately tight – slowing the sled down either by standing on a patch of snowmobile tread hanging off the back or standing on a clawed brake bar so that it bites into the snow. And on the uphills, mushers get off the runners and push. Fail to do so quickly enough and team members look back over their shoulders, an ear or two flopped over, eyes looking askance.

So, I run and push. Despite the sub-arctic temperatures, I’m sweating in my wool long-underwear. I drop the coyote-fur-ruffed hood on my Canada Goose parka, though the neoprene facemask stays on, since I already feel windburned on one cheekbone. Topping another rise, I jump back onto the runners in what I hope is a fluid motion, but judging from the looks cast my way, I need practice. On a straight section, I see Art – ahead of me with his team – step on the brake, kicking up a plume of snow. Must be a steep drop or tight curve coming up. I stomp on the drag and, when the trail falls away, drop into a half-crouch while shifting more heavily onto one runner and leaning off the handlebar. The sled is light and responsive. Even so I narrowly evade clipping a snow-draped tree with my brushbow. I make a mental note to focus on picking wider lines into the turns. As I pass Art, he has his sled down on its side and has dropped a snow hook to secure his team while he sorts out a tangled line.

With our sleds empty of all gear except a thermos and some dried fruit, we roam free like cowboys, agile if not speedy. It’s a unique kind of exhilaration. And it’s easy to understand why racers get addicted – arranging their lives around the sport and competing at great personal expense.

Our mushers are now separated by speed of travel. Those building a solid relationship with their dogs, or who have more dog-power hitched to their lines, speed behind Travis where he breaks trail with a snowmobile. The still-tentative have Cynthia riding sweep, ready to jump off her Ski-doo and lend a hand. With our sleds empty of all gear except a thermos and some dried fruit, we roam free like cowboys, agile if not speedy. It’s a unique kind of exhilaration. And it’s easy to understand why racers get addicted – arranging their lives around the sport and competing at great personal expense.

The dogs – which need up to 10,000 calories a day (about three times the amount devoured by mushers, despite the fact they are a third of our weight) – always come first.

At the other end of the spectrum of speed and self-reliance, the Quest racers – both human and canine – are doubtlessly losing weight. I can’t even imagine the toll the physical effort must be taking as, heading into Day 9 of the race, they tackle Eagle Summit. The 1,100-metre peak is infamous for wind-scoured conditions and a particularly steep climb followed by an even steeper drop,  a place more than any other – on a course filled with open water, overflows (water running over river ice), glare ice and side hills – where mushers and dogs are in danger. As a CBC correspondent quoted one race official as saying, “It’s where dreams are lost and promises to God made.”

Last year, Turner’s son Saul was one of five racers trapped on Eagle Summit, pinned down by an Arctic storm. “It went from dogsled race to Apocalypse Now, just like that,” he had told us, back at the ranch. Meanwhile, the older Turner, waiting on the sidelines, could hear but not see two Hercules C130 aircraft and a Black Hawk helicopter thumping their way overhead through the blizzard. In 22 years of racing the Quest, he had never witnessed such an onslaught of weather and military hardware.

As if the trail wants to ensure that we won’t get off too easily, either, Bettina awakens us later that night to a tent filled with thick, black smoke. Ejected from our shelter by a clogged stovepipe, we briefly join the guides who are already out sleeping in -52°C conditions. The next morning a tree doesn’t move out of the way fast enough and one of the mushers ends her trip with a smashed sled. But when we finally limp back into Braeburn, Turner is there to greet us.

Most of the Quest racers, he confirms, have already crossed the finish line. Mackey won the race a few days earlier by a wide margin, in 10 days, two hours, 37 minutes, beating Turner’s old record by almost 14 hours. (“Records are made to be broken,” Turner says, “and I’m glad it was Lance.”) Gatt has again come in second. Kleedehn has placed in the top five once more, edged out of third place by a mere three minutes. Michelle Phillips missed a top five placing by just over half an hour, and six racers have scratched. But there are a few others still out racing. (The “red lantern,” or last finishing racer, won’t cross the finish line for another two days, spending almost 15 days out on the course.)

Settling in for a burger and a beer – and a behemoth cinnamon bun – at the Braeburn Lodge, we drink a toast to the official racers before congratulating ourselves on our own modest success. We’ve ventured forth in the unforgiving cold: man, woman and dog. All have returned with no loss of life or limb. And though we’ve mushed less than a tenth of the distance the Quest racers ultimately cover, I contend we’ve had twice the fun, in half the time.

Keep  track of the current Race standings here

Track the Race LIVE

Learn more about the Mushers and sled dogs

Read Kerry Banks’s interview with the author, Masa Takei, here

See also: Sled Dog Races a Mushing Success

Photos courtesy Richard Hartmier

by Andrew Findlay

Somewhere in the primordial recesses of a skier’s mind is the memory of a ramshackle operation where the lifts barely limp from one day to the next. There are no double de-caf lattes whipped up by young baristas with Australian accents; instead, hearty bowls of chile con carne are served by a swarthy woman in a white apron who looks like she fells old-growth Douglas firs in her spare time. In other words: this place hasn’t been branded into some generic, four-season destination of over-inflated real estate with slick high-speed lifts whisking skiers to the top of runs as manicured as pressed corduroy slacks. And believe it or not, it exists.

Whenever I need to ground myself with the soul of skiing, I head north 120 km Campbell River to Mount Cain – tucked into the rugged folds of Vancouver Island. Run by a non-profit society, Cain has a total complement of one glove-shredding rope tow and two T-bars. And it’s here at 10 a.m. one morning this week that I stand with my cohorts: Guy, a pilot, and Jan, a local mountain guide, at the “golf clubs ” – a knob of rock that’s a short bootpack above the top T-bar. Snow ghost trees are laden with fresh snow. Below us, the west bowl is a tantalizing sight, unblemished by a single track. Soon familiar faces join us: Tod, Song and a few other bushy-bearded folks with duct tape holding their gloves together, skiing enthusiasts I meet only when I go to Cain.  One by one we drop into a narrow chute funneling into the bowl. Calf-deep snow curls from ski tips, frosting our faces. And together we relish in the shared euphoria of a ski hill that is too far from anywhere to be of interest to real estate speculators. This is where the soul of skiing still dwells.

B.C.’s BEST AutoObesity program receives its first “car donation” – while the donor hopes to lose his “afternoon-coffee-hour gut”

by Steve Beck

Since BEST – B.C.’s Better Environment, Sustainability and Transportation centre – launched its AutoObesity program in December 2009, it has had hundreds of inquiries, such as “How does the program work?” and “Who can participate?” And Drew Lemen’s recent AutoObesity experience not only answers most of these questions, it’s a great case study of a family that has taken the plunge and gone from being a two-car to a one-car household. We interviewed Lemen (pictured below), a retired public servant, at his home in south Richmond, B.C. – after he realized that with two cars for just two people, his household had one more vehicle than necessary. The result: Lemen has donated one of them to BEST.

MyWW: How do you donate a car?

DL: I just called up BEST and they met me at my condo and explained how AutoObesity works. As I was already committed to making a change, I didn’t need convincing as much as some help making the change, which is what the AutoObesity program is about.

MyWW: Did you get anything in return?

DL: A charitable tax receipt, based on my car’s fair market value (less the value of any benefits); plus a “BEST Mode Shift Membership” for transportation planning. I also get other assistance for making the switch, such as a Car Co-op and/or Zipcar membership, bicycle rain gear or safety gear if I need it, safe-cycling courses, a discount on an ecycle and transit passes. I haven’t decided yet exactly what help I need, but I have 30 days from the time of my donation to figure it out, given that the AutoObesity program is tailored specifically to the family or household making the car donation.

MyWW: It’s not easy giving up the extra wheels, eh?

"The average car costs between $8000 and $10,000 per year to own and operate, taking into account insurance, licensing, financing, maintenance, fuel and depreciation of value. So anything that saves me that much money is worth looking into." –Drew Lemen

DL: Actually, the decision was fairly simple. Having my own car is convenient, but it also has its downside. I’d really like to lose this afternoon-coffee-hour gut, for example, and cycling and walking regularly will help me do that.

MyWW:Any other payoffs?

DL: Even eliminating just one car helps reduce traffic and noise outside our apartment. I’d like the neighbourhood to be more livable, and this is a step toward that, something I can do myself. It’s hard to see so much of the public space around here dedicated solely to cars – without the same consideration for  walkers, cyclists, skateboarders and rollerbladers. Giving up my car will help make the streets a little friendlier. It also helps make the air cleaner. I want to do my bit to fight climate change and reduce my GHG footprint.

MyWW: And the cost savings aren’t too shabby, either, right?

That was one of my prime motivations. In fact, it was the cost-breakdown analysis of car ownership on the AutoObesity website (based on data from the CAA 2009 Driving Costs pamphlet) that eventually convinced me to give up my car altogether and start biking and taking transit. The average car costs between $8,000 and $10,000 per year to own and operate, taking into account insurance, licensing, financing, maintenance, fuel and depreciation. Anything that saves me that much money is worth looking into, and I’m definitely looking forward to saving that money every year. Plus, it’s a lot easier to donate my vehicle and do some good, rather than deal with the hassle and uncertainty of trying to sell it on my own.

MyWW: So how’s the “gut-reduction” program going?

Ha! Well, I’m still commuting twice a week to Kitsilano and once a week to Burnaby to tutor English to ESL high-school students, which is about  100 km per week. But now I’m using transit or cycling and walking. So it’s different, definitely. Still, I’m enjoying getting more fresh air and exercise, without having to drive to the beach or the gym. I also like how my travel options have actually increased. When people become car dependent, they tend to see their vehicle as the only viable option for doing chores, going to appointments, commuting, going out to dinner, for everything. Now I’ve got more flexibility. So yeah, “it’s hard to let go.” But after taking a couple of weeks to “say goodbye” to the old wheels, I’ve let ‘em go.

Photos courtesy Martin Gunst, BEST AutoObesity program coordinator

by Dave Quinn

Kicking Horse Resort's big-mountain triathlon: Wrangle the Chute, February 6 and 7.

Not only do competitors have to style their way down some of Kicking Horse’s extreme, leg-burning chutes, they then face a massive terrain park where the sky is literally the limit for spins and tricks. After that, competitors gear up for the final and most gruelling challenge of this big-mountain triathlon – the bucking bronco. And you can be sure that at a resort with a name like Kicking Horse, this is no easy ride.

To view the huckin’ and buckin’ action in person, get yerself to Heaven’s Door Yurt in Crystal Bowl at high noon on February 6 and 7. And if all that skiin’ and bronc’ ridin’, live DJ’s and western-style bar-b-q don’t tucker you out and fill you up, you can always hit the Texas Hold’em poker contest at the Day Lodge, starting at 6 p.m. 

Yippee Kai-yai-yay!

Photos courtesy Andrew Wheelhouse Photos: moonrakerphotography.com

by Graeme McLaughlin

Recent publicity surrounding Toyota’s recall of vehicles with faulty accelerator pedals is a good reminder of how important it is to know what to do if your accelerator pedal ever gets stuck or your vehicle accelerates for no apparent reason. If you ever find yourself in that situation, experts recommend the following:

Gas pedal stuck? Stay calm, but act quickly

1. Keep looking at the road ahead. Looking away from the road to see what’s wrong with the pedal greatly increases your chances of crashing.
2. Be sure your foot is completely off the accelerator. Some crashes caused by stuck accelerators have later been found to be the result of an honest mistake (i.e., drivers thought they were pushing on the brake).
3. Put the vehicle’s transmission in neutral or, if the vehicle has a standard transmission, depress the clutch. Do not turn off the engine. Doing so will cause the power assist to the steering and braking to disengage – and make it difficult or impossible to steer and harder to brake. Plus, turning the key too far could possibly lock the steering wheel.
4. Steer the car to a safe place and stop, then turn off the engine.
5. If stopped by the side of a road, turn on emergency flashers and put out reflective triangles. If you’re unable to get the vehicle off the roadway, allow it to come to a stop and turn on emergency flashers.
6. Do not restart the vehicle.
7. Call for help using a cell phone, or wave down a passing vehicle, if safe to do so.

Sticky gas pedals: Prevening the problem

Vehicle owners need to check regularly for any floor mats and/or loose wiring that may be interfering with pedal action (accelerator, brake or clutchpedals). And drivers who experience rapid or unwanted acceleration while driving should have the vehicle checked immediately by a qualified auto technician. Owners of recalled vehicles need to also adhere to any notices as soon as possible to ensure the safe operation of their vehicles.

B.C.’s BCAA and other transportation experts emphasize that drivers who choose to operate a recalled vehicle and notice problems with its accelerator pedal (i.e., hard to depress, slow to return, inconsistent operation) should pull over immediately at the nearest safe location, shut off the engine and contact their dealership. Alternatively, those motorists with roadside assistance memberships, including BCAA members, can telephone for immediate roadside or towing assistance.

Most of  have heard of Cirque du Soleil. But what about the smaller – yet equally astonishing – Cirque Sublime? The Toronto-based acrobatic troupe relies not only on athletic prowess to pull off breathtaking performances, but also incorporates vibrant costumes and makeup, visually stunning sets and a heart-pounding score. Shows feature fire, dance and death-defying acrobats for an experience that stimulates the mind as well as the senses. The end result: one of those rare performances that leaves audience members gasping, “Did you see that!?”

Vernon, February 7. Ticket info: 416-935-0037

DUNCAN  February 6, 2010 – Bigleaf Maple Syrup Festival

DUNCAN The B.C. Forest Discovery Centre's now-annual tribute to Canada’s iconic sweet stuff: the Bigleaf Maple Syrup Festival. Courtesy Gary Backlund

Time to slap on the beaver hat and break out the red-and-white attire – for the B.C. Forest Discovery Centre’s  now-annual tribute to Canada’s iconic sweet stuff: the Bigleaf Maple Syrup Festival. The curious can master the art of tapping, sit in on cooking demonstrations and compete for the Best Maple Syrup prize in a contest judged by Vancouver Island celebrity chefs. Highlights: live music and a scenic trundle aboard the B.C. Forest Museum train. (Admission includes train rides and food samples.)

Info and tickets purchases: 250-715-1113

VICTORIA  February 13-14, 2010 – Victoria Tea Festival

Henry Fielding had it right when he declared: “Love and scandal are the best sweeteners of tea.” For socializing over a cup of steaming brew is a tradition revered the world over; there’s something universally soothing about cradling a warm mug and indulging in a hearty chat. And every year, B.C.’s Victoria Tea Festival pays homage to the mighty tea leaf by inviting enthusiasts to sample exotic flavours from around the world, with representatives from tea houses, bakeries, chocolate shops and restaurants on hand to answer questions about pairings and provide sips and nibbles. Bonus: a crash course in Chinese tea ceremonies (courtesy of Victoria’s Silk Road), a silent auction and reflective readings by author Earlene Grey.

Weekend passes: $20 in advance, $25 at the door. 250-370-4888

Further reading: An Educated Sip; Silk Road Reverie

VANCOUVER Gearing up for Canada's third Olympic Games, with 600-plus free and ticketed performances and exhibitions. Photo courtesy VANOC-COVAN

VANCOUVER  February 12-18, 2010 – Winter Olympic Games

The anticipation has reached fever pitch, now that the countdown to Vancouver 2010 is on the home stretch – with Canada gearing up to host its third Olympic Games. After the opening ceremonies (February 12, 6 p.m. at Vancouver’s B.C. Place), more than 5,000 athletes from nations around the world will go on to represent their home countries in 15 winter sporting events – cheered on by lucky fans who have managed to snag seats. However, even those without event tickets can take part in the festivities: Vancouver, Whistler and Richmond are presenting 600-plus free and ticketed performances and exhibitions, and cities across the province are getting into the spirit with their own community-oriented entertainment. Bonus: the Vancouver Art Gallery is offering free admission for the duration of the Games.

Detailed list of entertainment options and venues: Cultural Olympiad 2010 Program Guide, at community centres and cultural venues throughout Vancouver.

Tickets, transportation, accommodation and athlete info: 1-800-842-5387

GRANVILLE ISLAND, VANCOUVER  February 19-27, 2010: Winterruption Festival

VANCOUVER Granville Island’s annual Winterruption Festival celebrates the city's vibrant arts culture – including kids' workshops on musical instrument-making. Photo courtesy Granville Island

Granville Island’s annual Winterruption Festival celebrates the city’s vibrant arts culture with free musical and theatre spectacles, brewery jigs, workshops, jugglers, stilt-walkers and kids’ events (including sessions on crafting musical instruments) – fuelled by  savoury wares and foodie seminars. Bonus: free Theatresports matinees.

604-666-5784.

INTERNATIONAL PICK: NEW YORK CITY  February 26-28: New York Times Travel Show

The New York Times hosts the mother of all travel shows, and in the process provides would-be jetsetters with hundreds of ways to answer the question, “Where should I go next?” The main attraction: 500 exhibitors highlight the world’s top destinations, cruises and hotels/resorts, with experts answering questions and offering insider travel advice. Plus: travel seminars held by industry heavyweights, including guidebook gurus Arthur and Pauline Frommer and Patricia Schultz, author of 1,000 Places to See Before You Die. Not to be missed: international stage performances and culinary presentations focus on foods and flavours from around the globe. And bring the kids along: instructors will be on hand to teach scuba diving and rock-climbing skills, while animal-lovers can sit in on the Busch Gardens’ live show.

Tickets and info: 1-800-322-9332

Lead photo courtesy VANOC-COVAN

So what does it feel like to carry the torch? Expectations exceeded – vastly

by Bernice Paul

I was eager to sit down with Jessica Langelaan to hear about her Olympic Torch-bearing experience this past December. Throughout the holidays, I had caught bits of wall comments and photos on Facebook, even a video that her uncle posted. And there were many expressions of encouragement and congratulations. But these were followed by words of condolence and sorrow . . . I soon found out why.

On December 18, 2009, the day before Langelaan was to carry the torch in Oakville, Ontario, her grandfather, Keith Acton, passed away. Age 81, he had succumbed to complications associated with kidney failure. But it was his attitude toward life that kept Langelaan from unravelling. As she told me when we at last connected: He often said, “There are two days in every week that we have no control over –  yesterday and tomorrow. Today is the only day we can change.”

Langelaan was buoyed by the swell of support and emotion throughout her 300-metre journey – which, surprisingly, felt “decently long.”

So on the day of the relay, Langelaan concentrated on making every moment meaningful. Cheered on by the hundreds of onlookers lining the street, and surrounded by friends and family, including her great-aunt Jeanette Acton (her grandfather’s sister,  who travelled from Port Perry, Ontario, for the occasion), Langelaan was buoyed by the swell of support and emotion throughout her 300-metre journey – which, surprisingly, felt “decently long.”

The run

On the bus ride to the starting point of their leg, 15 torchbearers chatted in nervous anticipation. “I was unusually quiet,” says Langelaan. “I was thinking about my grandfather and at the same time I felt inspired by the group on the bus, which included a set of twins in their 80s who between them had missed two chances to complete in the Olympics (in ’44 due to the war and in ’48 due to injury).”

The orchestrated efficiency of the relay, from the vehicle convoy to the security team, left just enough room for a little creativity and individualism to come through during the official “torch kiss” – the passing off of the torch from one torchbearer to the next. Langelaan and her preceding bearer worked out a jaunty doe-see-doe high-five routine, as captured in this video shot by her uncle:

The 300 metres probably lasted just a minute or two, so Langelaan was surprised to feel tired by the end. I wager she was carrying a lot more than just the torch.

The fanfare

“Last time you and I talked, we focused on the ‘me and my opportunity’ aspect of carrying the torch,” Langelaan reflects. “I didn’t anticipate the impact of the experiences of others during those 300 metres.”

Oakville, Ontario celebrants: As Langelaan puts it, “For most Canadians, the torch relay is as close as they’ll get to the Olympic experience.”

It sounds cliché to say that the flame is the symbol of the Olympic spirit, but hearing it from Langelaan’s perspective and seeing it through her eyes, the symbol seems more real,  its spirit  alive and well. As Langelaan puts it: “For most Canadians, the torch relay is as close as they’ll get to the Olympic experience.”

“So many people wanted to take their picture with her, even if they didn’t know her,” notes Langelaan’s husband, Mark, “it was that special to be next to a torchbearer.”

At the end of the Oakville leg, the crowds then gathered at the local public library, where folks could finally interact more closely. “So I took my time taking pictures with people,” says Langelaan. “From the looks on their faces, you could tell they just wanted to hold the torch. I was literally spreading the spirit; sharing the Olympic experience.”

Passing of the torch

A coworker asked if she could purchase Langelaan’s torch as a gift for a close friend, Corrine Hunt, co-designer of the Olympic medals. That particular hand-off took place in early January.

So what became of Langelaan’s torch? All 12,000 of this year’s Olympic Games torchbearers are given the option to purchase their torches or return them to VANOC. But a third option was also presented to Langelaan. A coworker asked if she could purchase Langelaan’s torch as a gift for a close friend, Corrine Hunt, co-designer of the Olympic medals. And that particular hand-off took place in early January (more pictures can be found on Corrine Hunt’s website).

And now, as an employee of Offsetters, Langelaan is pounding the pavement pretty hard  on behalf of the Games. And as she and her husband have just purchased a home in Port Moody, where they’re moving at the end of March, I anticipate her next day off will be sometime in mid-May. Still, Langelaan is remarkably settled while telling me of the past several weeks, focused as she is on the task at hand. Her grandfather’s commitment to living in the present must run in the family.

>>Follow the full journey of the 2010 Olympic flame at:  Vancouver 2010 website

>>For more info about Corrine Hunt: website

Lead image, ‘Torch Kiss’, courtesty Jessica Langelaan

And you thought the Olympics were all about sports

by Jim Sutherland

Even given the performances of Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt, it’s possible the most enduring memories of Beijing’s 2008 Olympics won’t be athletic achievements at all, but rather architectural ones: the venues Phelps and Bolt excelled in, especially the Water Cube and Bird’s Nest Stadium.

VANCOUVER CONVENTION CENTRE EXPANSION Not entirely a thing of beauty from the street? But a beautiful solution to the problem of where to put a convention centre? Photo courtesy DA Architects/Planners

Yet with its 2010 Olympics, Vancouver hasn’t been going for architectural gold; there have been no competitions and no big-name international architects. Still, the result is several impressive facilities that, if not quite world-beating, absolutely warrant inspection. The annoying irony is, until long after the Olympics are over, there will be no way to see many of them except from a distance. Try to sneak in for a look at the athletes village or convention centre expansion this February and the interior you’ll be checking out instead might be the local equivalent of Guantanamo.

That’s where a Vancouver show that opens February 8 comes in. The little gallery attached to the offices of the Architectural Institute of British Columbia is almost always an interesting place, but its “Bien Venue: 2010 Games Architecture” is shaping up to be something of a blockbuster. The biggest show the gallery has ever mounted highlights 20 competition and non-competition venues and the role of B.C. architects in designing them. There are drawings, models and photographs. And after viewing the exhibit people will be able to make their own, entirely subjective, picks of the Games’ most important venues, as I’ve done below:

Top 5 Architecture Medallists, Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games

1. The Athletes’ Village Among the most environmentally sustainable communities on the planet, Vancouver’s Athletes’ Village is designed to achieve “net zero,” meaning it will produce as much energy as it consumes. (For the sake of their future tax bills, Vancouverites hope the bailed-out development also achieves net zero in terms of the money invested.) Curious what the buildings look like inside? Stop into the adjacent sales centre, pretend you’re interested in a $1,000-a-square-foot condo, and tour the display suites.

Photographer Hubert Kang / Courtesy of Cannon Design

2. Richmond Speed Skating Oval With that amazing arched roof made from pine-beetle-damaged wood, it’s as much an engineering marvel as an architectural one.

3. The Woodwards complex Okay, this isn’t an Olympics venue (though it might not have happened had the Games not landed here, in Vancouver) and it’s not part of the AIBC show, but it’s only a block away so walk over and check it out — particularly the Stan Douglas photo installation in the main courtyard. Keep in mind that less than five years ago, the derelict department store centred what was virtually a no-go zone, and prepare to be stunned at the transformation both on site and in the surrounding neighbourhood.

4. Vancouver Convention Centre Expansion (media centre) Some feel it’s not entirely a thing of beauty from the street, but it’s a beautiful solution to the problem of where to put a convention centre and quite a sight – both inside, where wood is the star, and from above, with that vast green roof.

FOUR HOST FIRST NATIONS PAVILION The most ambitious of the 2010 Olympic Games' temporary pavilions? Photo courtesy Hotson Bakker Boniface Haden Architects/Urbanistes

5. Four Host First Nations Pavilion The most ambitious of the temporary pavilions and a prime example of the innovative work Hotson Bakker Boniface Haden Architects has been doing for First Nations clients.

6. A bonus selection that’s even farther offside than Woodwards, the Millenium Line: I know, it’s the Canada Line that was built for the Olympics, and it’s become an instant hit, with ridership much higher than expected. But stations on the turn-of-the-century Millenium Line are the precursor to all that creative and progressive use of wood seen in so many of the Olympic venues. Plus, unlike the mostly underground Canada Line, it’s a true Skytrain, travelling at rooftop level with great views of the snow-capped (we hope) North Shore mountains.

Historians remind us of the unsavoury origins of the Olympic Torch

by Kerry Banks

The Olympic torch relay is rapidly nearing the end of its 100-day journey across Canada. One of the most popular Olympic rituals, it is an ideal vehicle for media consumption and corporate sponsorship and, judging by the crowds of cheering and smiling celebrants now greeting its appearance prior to the 2010 Olympics and Paralympic Games, the torch also has an inspirational power. Ironically, according to historians this symbol of hope and friendship arose from very dark origins – origins that are, for obvious reasons, not well-publicized by VANOC, which states on its website that the birth of the torch relay can be traced to ancient Greece and that the first Olympic torch relay took place in Oslo, Norway, in 1952.

According to historical reports both statements are  a tad misleading. Experts note that the Olympic torch relay was actually invented by the Nazis in 1936 as a propaganda device to popularize fascism throughout Europe and within Germany. As author Tony Perrottet notes in his book The Naked Olympics: “The torch relay is so ingrained in the modern choreography that most people today assume it was a revival of a pagan tradition – unaware that it was actually concocted for Hitler’s Games in Berlin.”

A sacred flame did burn 24 hours a day at Olympia, and Greek runners did pass pass a torch to light a sacrificial cauldron at some ancient festivals. But the Greeks opened their Olympics by word of mouth, sending heralds – not torchbearers – racing through the streets. The tradition of carrying the Olympic torch to the main stadium at Olympic Games did not become a fixture of the Games until 1936, when a 12-day run opened the Summer Games in Berlin.

The idea for the torch relay came from German sports minister Carl Diem, who intended to link Nazism to the civilized glories of classical Greece (which the Reich’s academics were arguing had been an Aryan wonderland). But Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels envisioned it as something more: an opportunity to make a bold political statement. The 1936 relay, which took German runners through Greece, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Austria and Czechoslovakia (welcomed enroute by pro-Nazi demonstrations), was nothing less than a rehearsal of the Nazification of Europe. In fact, in an editorial at the time, the New York Times wrote that the relay was “a strategic highway that traced the line of the German Drang Nach Osten – the drive to the East that the Kaiser sought in the First World War,” and which Adolph Hitler was soon to put into practice.

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Hitler’s propaganda machine covered the torch relay in great detail,

broadcasting radio reports from every step of the route and filling the Games

with the iconographyof ancient Greek athletics.

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In fact, Hitler took personal interest in the ritual and pumped funds into its promotion. His propaganda machine covered the torch relay in great detail, broadcasting radio reports from every step of the route and filling the Games with the iconography of ancient Greek athletics. In Berlin, the flame was carried the last kilometre along the city’s main boulevard by a runner named Siegfried Eifrig, who was watched by hundreds of thousands as he transferred the flame to a cauldron on an altar surrounded by huge flags adorned with swastikas. And despite its political overtones, the event was an unqualified success for the organizers and was immortalized by director Leni Riefenstahl in her 1938 film Olympia.

Diem and Riefenstahl were also responsible for popularizing the five interlocking rings as the symbol of the Games. The ring symbol had been designed in 1913 to symbolize the first five Olympics, but nobody made any use of it until the Nazis in 1936. And for the opening segment of Riefenstahl’s film, Diem had the Olympic rings carved into the sides of a stone altar at the ancient Greek city of Delphi, thus spawning the myth that the symbol dated back more than two millennia. When visiting Delphi in the late 1950s, two British authors Lynn and Gray Poole then saw the stone and reported in their History of the Ancient Games that the Olympic rings-design came from ancient Greece. And so, with Hitler’s influence, the rings became part of the Nazi pageantry at Berlin, and have come to symbolize the Olympics ever since.

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Though America’s Avery Brundage was expelled from the America First

Committee for his Nazi sympathies, he was elected a vice-president of the International Olympic

Committee in 1945, and in 1952 became president, a position he would hold until 1972.

_______________________________________________________________________

Interestingly, Germany hosted both the Winter and Summer Olympics in 1936. It had been awarded the honour in 1931 as a means of welcoming the country back into the European fold, a gesture that backfired when Hitler came to power in 1933. As the racist and brutal policies of the Nazi regime became known, Jewish groups and others in the United States called for a boycott. But America’s own Avery Brundage, president of the U.S. Olympic Committee at the time, actively undermined the boycott campaign, dismissing the protest as a “Jewish-Communist conspiracy,” and succeeded in having the USOC reject it in a committee vote. (In 1941, Brundage was expelled from the America First Committee for his Nazi sympathies, though he remained a staunch defender of Germany during and after World War II. Even so, Brundage was elected a vice-president of the International Olympic Committee in 1945, and in 1952 became president, a position he would hold until 1972.) Meanwhile, in order to make the Games a success and legitimize Hitler’s regime in the eyes of the world, Germany in 1936 took great efforts to camouflage the evil nature of the Nazi regime. Anti-Jewish slogans were removed from walls and roadsides and every sign of racial, religious or political persecution was temporarily hidden. Though incredibly, the German Ministry of the Interior built a concentration camp scarcely a half-hour’s journey from the new Olympic Stadium, where it jailed 80,000 Jews, gypsies and socialists.

Germany would dominate the competition at the 1936 Summer Games, winning 89 medals (33 more than the second-place USA), though the greatest individual performance was turned in by Afro-American sprinter Jesse Owens. Debunking Hitler’s belief in Aryan supremacy, the 22-year-old claimed gold in the 100- and 200-metre dashes, the long jump and the 400-metre relay, with each victory greeted by loud applause from the crowd. Yet despite this setback, Hitler was pleased with the results. He ordered architect Albert Speer to draw up plans for a colossal, 400,000-seat stadium in Nuremburg, saying, “In 1940, the Olympic Games will take place in Tokyo. But thereafter they will take place in Germany for all time to come.”

Fortunately, this was one Nazi prediction that did not come true.

>>Interested in learning more?

Check out the current exhibit at the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre entitled “More Than Just Games: Canada and the 1936 Olympics.” Its display of photographs, documents and artifacts demonstrates how Hitler’s Third Reich turned the Games into a showcase for Nazi propaganda, and how Canadians became part of the spectacle.


Address: Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre: #50 – 950 West 41st Avenue, Vancouver, B.C.

Contact info: 604-264-0499; info@VHEC.org

>>Related reading:

As the entire Lower Mainland rumbles and hums with Olympic anticipation, my home town of Kimberley feels a long way off from all the hype and excitement of the world’s greatest winter sports extravaganza. Some 907 kilometres away, in fact.

courtesy Bruce Kirkby

This daunting distance from the Kimberley Nordic Trails to the Olympic Nordic Ski venue in the Callaghan Valley isn’t fazing a group of young Kimberley athletes, however. The cross-country skiers of the local Jackrabbits Track Attack Program are getting into the Olympic spirit by skiing 907 km on Kimberley’s world-class Nordic trail system. Aged nine to 12, the skiers have divided the daunting distance into 180-km sections and are charting their journey one kilometre at a time on the Kimberley Nordic Club’s warming-hut wall.

While they may not be front and centre as Olympic athletes from around the world cross the finish line at the Callaghan Valley Nordic events, these young athletes from the B.C. Interior embody the essence of the Olympic spirit, and are willing to ski nearly 1,000 km to celebrate it, one kick and glide at a time.

The lower mainland is caught up in medal fever. While the rest of us from “beyond Hope”, may not feel the impacts of the games directly, most of us feel strongly, one way or the other, about the Olympics. What are athletes/sports fans/artists in your community doing to celebrate the Olympics? Send me a tweet @KootenayDave to let me know.

Lead photo courtesy Bruce Kirkby.

OLYMPIC UPDATE

Red Mountain’s Canadian Freeskiing Championships, Rossland

Helmet?  Check.

Goggles clear, avalanche gear secure?  Check.

Red Mountain's Canadian Open Freeskiing Championships: The skier’s sole mission is to ski gnarly, cliff-riddled, hellish steep terrain normally reserved for mountain goats and birds – and not only survive but make it look good.

Run burned into memory? Drop in, carve hard right, drop speed for five-metre cliff, recover from choppy landing, head left, drop snow pillow-line next to broken tree, pick up speed for next hit, avoid thick trees below, head right again to fat cliff. Stomp landing you can’t see from above. Shred to bottom of run.  Ok.

Heart pounding. Ski tips hang over an airy drop-in, and the entire world drops away from this ridge-top perch to a vertiginous world of white. 3-2-1… Dropping!

This is what freeskiers and spectators alike expected at the 9th annual Canadian Open Freeskiing Championships at Rossland’s Red Mountain Resort this last weekend: January 23 to 24, when the skier’s sole mission was to ski gnarly, cliff-riddled, hellish steep terrain normally reserved for mountain goats and birds – and not only survive but make it look good.

While you’re there, ski a line and raise a glass to Captain Jack Carey, a Red Mountain local and long-time director of the Canadian Open Freeskiing Championships.

A panel of judges evaluated each skier, tallying scores based on style, flow, difficulty of line and any tricks they managed to squeeze into their extreme ski lines.

Sound like fun?  Head to Red Mountain February 21 to 23 to watch dozens of elite athletes from around the world, plus local favourites Alex Berg, Colston Villanueva-Beatson and Fernie’s Luke Nelson, fresh off a January 12th third-place finish at the Subaru Canadian Freeskiing Championships in Revelstoke, compete for $10,000 in total prizes.

While you’re there, ski a line and raise a glass to Captain Jack Carey, a Red Mountain local and long-time director of the Canadian Open Freeskiing Championship, who died this past year. Jack was one of the characters who make Kootenay Ski towns what they are.

Photos: Courtesy Red Mountain

On a dark and rainy Vancouver evening, I paid a visit to the trio behind the Clean Bin Project. Jenny Rustemeyer, Rhyannon O’Heron and Grant Baldwin are housemates who more than a year ago decided they’d simply had enough of  ”stuff.” They also realized that if they could cut down on all their stuff they could drastically reduce the amount of garbage they were sending to the landfill. And thus their Clean Bin Project was born.

The Clean Bin Project after one year: That's it, garbage-wise.

The challenge was this: produce zero landfill-bound waste for one year (or as close to zero as possible). With individually labelled bins, Rustemeyer, O’Heron and Baldwin would also compete for the honour of generating the least amount of garbage in their household.

Though this sounds like a simple challenge, if you were to pick apart your garbage and examine its origins, you’d see that the society we live in makes it rather difficult to truly achieve zero waste. So many of the things we buy are not compostable or readily recyclable. As well, certain types of recycling are not necessarily better for the environment.

Project Evolution

The Clean Bin Project, Vancouver, B.C.: Meticulous recycling.

The group knew from the beginning that recycling would not be the complete answer to the challenge. While they would meticulously separate recyclables (they’d even stash a bin for “metal bits” under their sink), the first “R” in waste management, Reduce, would be embraced as the guiding principle for the project. Soon, buying things – consumption – would come to a standstill; ground rules on consumption would be laid (food and personal hygiene necessities were exempt, for example); Rustemeyer would start a blog to share the group’s progress and Baldwin (a professional videographer) would document the experience on video.

Because of the project, Rustemeyer also became much more involved with food and food production. “Food packaging generates a lot of waste,” she notes, so she became a dedicated customer of farmer’s markets (where one can purchase unpackaged goods) and learned to can her own sauces and preserves. “Gardening also really took off,” says Rustemeyer. Cultivating just 70 square feet in their yard, she and O’Heron were able to harvest potatoes, garlic, onions, lettuce, kale, spinach, four varieties of tomatoes, beets, peas, cucumbers, zucchini, rhubarb, basil, oregano, thyme, mint, blood sorrel, lemon sorrel, parsley, chives, radishes, cilantro, carrots and sunchoke through the year. Oh – and berries were planted for next year.

O'Heron holds up her bin.

Friends and acquaintances were also educated on the project. Even so, receiving gifts turned out to be a challenge. The three would gladly give and accept gifts of experiences, such as dining or live entertainment, yet still took care to be gracious by accepting occasional material gifts. “Some get it and some don’t,” explains O’Heron, who, like her housemates, occasionally brings home “incidental” packaging to be properly disposed of. “We didn’t want to make people feel bad,” adds Rustemeyer. “This was a personal challenge for us; we didn’t want to preach.”

The Clean Bin challenge ended in July of 2009, but it would appear the behaviours have stuck. Once the systems and routines were put in place, it made sense to continue the low-consumption lifestyle, and their lives have been enriched for the better. Then and now, instead of buying stuff, “we do more. We go out; eat better. We go on bike trips on weekends.” Sounds like a decent trade off!

The Documentary

Baldwin had always wanted to film a documentary, and this was the perfect project. “We want to make it fun and entertaining; to inspire people,” says Baldwin, who acknowledges that the recent onslaught of environmental films may have alienated potential zero-waste converts. “There are so many issues: global warming, animal cruelty, eating local; we don’t want to tackle everything. We want to go after something tangible. This is something that people have control over.”

His and hers: Baldwin and Rustemeyer compare garbage.

And they’ve inspired their fair share, with engaged readers of the Clean Bin’s blog posting tips and advice on topics as varied as baking soda deodorant to recyclable toothbrush heads. Rustemeyer has even been informed of others starting their own zero-waste challenges.

So, in the end, who was the winner of the Clean Bin Project? I was told that the housemates averaged just four pounds of garbage each – for an entire year. But to find out who won, we’ll have to wait for the documentary, which comes out this summer. In the meantime, we can all get a little inspired by watching the trailer below.

Resources

The Clean Bin Project lists a number of recycling resources for things like soft plastics, scrap metals, and electronics. Here is a short list:

RCBC – Recycling Council of British Columbia

Pacific Mobile Depot

Happy Stan’s Recycling

Metro Vancouver Recycles

Lead image courtesy Jenny Rustemeyer

Heritage Vancouver has a knack for hosting weird events in wonderful locations. Or perhaps they are wonderful events in weird locations. All I know is that I always come away from their functions feeling giddy, having learned some new secret that helps me better understand the city, having accessed some place that few people get to visit now and having met people who know about Vancouver’s past because they were actually there.

Such was the case last Wednesday with one of the non-profit’s most popular fundraisers: An Evening at the Penthouse. (The event sold out so quickly that Heritage Vancouver has scheduled a don’t miss follow-up for January 27.)

A Brief History of The Penthouse Nightclub

The Penthouse Night Club was founded in 1947 by the Filippone brothers, Joe, Ross, Mickey and Jimmy. It quickly grew to become one of the city’s hottest supper clubs, attracting headliners such as Sammy Davis Jr, Nat King Cole and The Mills Brothers. Today the business is a strip club run by Ross’s son, Danny. And the 47-year-old impresario, looking down-to-earth chic in blue jeans and untucked dress shirt, seemed genuinely happy to host a crowd that was there more for the built heritage than the built hotties.

He gave us an extensive tour of the establishment, starting right out front on the sidewalk at 1019 Seymour near Nelson. Anyone who has been downtown at night has seen this pink-neon-trimmed, three-storey building with the red flashing arrow on its marquee, beaconing partiers to enter the chrome-quilted doors under the smiling visage of two show girl cut-outs affixed to the pansy-purple façade. But Danny wanted us to note the old house engulfed in the shadows next door. 1033 Seymour was purchased by Danny’s grandfather in 1932, and one of the last remaining single-family, detached homes in the neighbourhood, though “single-family” might be a bit of a misnomer. The narrow abode stretches back 120 feet, far enough to accommodate eight bedrooms and three kitchens.

It was in this house, in 1983, that Danny’s uncle Joe was shot and killed by a 25-year-old unemployed plumber from Ontario. The gunman was after the contents of Joe’s home office safe and he made off with $1,200 before being arrested at Hastings Park Racetrack a few days later. But Danny prefers to dwell on the good memories he has of 1033 Seymour. Such as launching Halloween fireworks from the property’s deeply sequestered courtyard and watching the police circle the block in a futile attempt to locate the source. Or discovering a hole in one of the home’s walls, reaching in and pulling out a small chest containing a stack of autographed celebrity photos — a who’s who of Penthouse visitors. To see the 8×10 glossies and hear the stories they represent, we follow our guide back into the iconic club.

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We tour abandoned rooms, such as the small

lounge with a baby grand that once serviced the ivory ticklers

of jazzlegend Duke Ellington.

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Danny leads us up to the building’s second and third floors, areas normally closed to the public. We tour abandoned rooms, such as a small lounge space with a baby grand piano that once serviced the ivory ticklers of jazz legend Duke Ellington. Down a hall and through another doorway, we encounter a derelict charbroiler in a room once called the Steak Loft. Customers chose their own cuts of meat, which were cooked and served on wooden platters. “This was,” Danny says proudly, “before Hy’s carved their space in the steak market.” (The club also claims to be the first in Vancouver to offer pizza by the slice.)

In the Green Room, named for its gaudy, green wallpaper, a small button on the wall is labeled Beverage Bell. VIPs such as Gary Cooper, Errol Flynn and heavyweight champ Max Baer would have used it to summon drinks.

And there was another buzzer system at work in the club. Prior to the Penthouse landing a liquor license in the mid-50s, Uncle Joe employed spotters on the roof to watch for police raids. If they saw cops approaching the entrance, they rang to alert wait staff, who in turn instructed patrons to hide their bottles under the tables. The police conducted deliberately feeble searches, perhaps because they were on the take or perhaps because, as drinkers themselves, they didn’t want to enforce B.C.’s bizarre liquor laws too heartily. When the authorities left, the festivities resumed – as they did for us on Wednesday night, when Danny led us back down into the functioning portion of the Penthouse, the Gold Room.

Tales of Oscar Peterson and Other Penthouse Regulars

The original red-and-gold curtain still backdrops the stage, but a 2001 facelift has contributed an impressive, glowing bar to one side of the room and a surprisingly understated glittery paint to the walls.

While Heritage Vancouver supporters queue for an Indian buffet arranged on the club’s pool table and redeem their martini vouchers, I table hop in search of stories. A diverse crowd is in attendance. The history buffs range from seniors who have come to reminisce about Vancouver’s night club glory years to young hipsters eager to learn about Rat Pack-era fashion trends. At a plush booth overlooking the stage, I encounter choreographer and B.C. Entertainment Hall of Fame inductee Jack Card. The soft- spoken, impeccably mannered gentleman stands to inspect a row of three photos along a wall. He then returns and announces quietly, “I worked with them all.”  The images are of singers Johnnie Ray, Harry Belafonte and Louis Armstrong. I nearly choke on my naan bread.

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B.C. Entertainment Hall of Fame-inductee Jack Card inspects

a row of photos:  of singers Johnnie Ray, Harry Belafonte and Louis

Armstrong. “I worked with them all.”  he says, quietly.

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Next up on the agenda, Helga Pakasaar, curator of North Van’s Presentation House Gallery, hosts a slide show exploring imagery from Vancouver’s nightclub golden years: the 1940s to 1960s. There are photos of feather-and-sequined burlesque dancers, of tux- and gown-attired guests in the snazzy Palomar Supper Club (which once stood at Burrard and Georgia) and, somewhat inexplicably, a portrait of a young Terry David Mulligan looking like a beatnik about to embrace full-on hippiedom. It’s an informal talk, periodically augmented by additional info from Danny, who had taken up a post near the bar. “God handed out cigars the day I was born,” shouts the club owner. He was referring to the comedian George Burns who played the title role in the 1977 film Oh, God! Burns was doing stand-up at the Penthouse the day Ross Filippone’s son arrived and, to celebrate, the Oscar winner passed round his signature stogies.

I relocate to another booth and meet Joanne Randle, who has brought her 81-year-old mother, Edna, to reminisce about the Penthouse’s early days as an after-hours hotbed of jazz super-jams. (Edna was one of the original six members of the New Jazz Society) has a sharp memory and recalls witnessing Canada’s two premiere jazz pianists, Oscar Peterson and Chris Gage go head to head for harmonic supremacy in the club circa 1950. A “carving session” she calls it.

________________________________________________

Today, of course, late night jazz sessions are a thing of the

past, So too are the Vegas showgirl-style dancers, who were

replaced by total-nudity exotic dancing in the 1970s.

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Today, of course, late night jazz sessions are a thing of the past at The Penthouse. So too are the Vegas showgirl style dancers, who were replaced by total-nudity exotic dancing in the 1970s. Also in that decade, the Penthouse was charged with conspiracy to live off the avails of prostitution, and  the club shut down for four years as the case dragged through the courts. But in the end, the Filippone brothers were able to fend off the accusations and the Penthouse re-opened. (Read coverage of this famous court case at the Penthouse website.)

Danny introduces the special entertainment of the evening: a scantily clad woman wearing Minnie Mouse ears who struts and writhes around a brass pole to the tune of “Hey, Mickey.” She has a walnut-size crystal lodged in her navel. I wonder what the strip club etiquette is should the gem stone pop out and roll across the stage into my drink? No worries. The rock holds.

________________________________________________

The Penthouse earns additional revenues as a film

location – for movie and TV shoots such as CBC’s Intelligence

and the upcoming Halle Berry flick Frankie and Alice.

______________________________________________

In a quieter corner, at the back of the room, I ask Danny about the Penthouse’s future. Giant condo towers are sprouting up all along Seymour. The land the club occupies must be valued in the double-digit millions, and the family has received offers. But Danny says, “As long as we’re making money, we’ll continue to operate.” (The business earns additional revenue by renting the building for film and TV shoots such as CBC’s Intelligence and the upcoming Halle Berry flick Frankie and Alice.)

A few hours later, I step out onto Seymour Street into the brisk, cold air. Eight-seven-year-old freelance writer Rudy Carlson, who has come alone all the way from North Vancouver to attend the event, is making his way slowly to the bus stop. I walk with him and he tells me his own Penthouse memory.

“I brought my father-in-law here in the ’60s when it was still a bottle club. We forgot to bring our own liquor so we gave $20 to a working girl in the room and she said she would head out to find us some booze. It was a wintry night like this one so my father-in-law, being a trusting guy from the Prairies, lent her his jacket. It was only after she was gone that he realized he had also given her his wallet – it was in is coat pocket and loaded with cash. There was a long, awkward wait, and she finally came back with the whiskey, the jacket and the wallet, intact. She was the hooker with the heart of gold,”says Carlson, “from the heart of the Gold Room.”

>>Do you have any glorious or notorious memories of the Penthouse in its pre-stripper days?

>>Do you think this building should be preserved as a prime example of Vancouver’s entertainment history?

Let us know.

Do you have any glorious or notorious memories of the Penthouse in its pre-stripper days or otherwise? Do you think this building should be preserved as a prime example of Vancouver’s entertainment history?

Lead photo courtesy Heritage Vancouver Society.

For some time now, bartenders at the trendiest saloons around British Columbia have been flavouring their drinks with syrups, infusions and bitters concocted from locally sourced herbs, fruits and woods. Yet only recently have they been able to slip locally distilled spirits into their gunbelts as well.

Vancouver Island winery, Winchester Cellers, spearheaded the arrival of micro-distilleries when its gleaming copper still brought forth Victoria Gin, an artisan liquor distilled from a long list of local, organic ingredients. (Most recently they’ve launched a house made lemon bitters). Next, Frank Deiter fired up his Okanagan Spirits distillery to make fragrant eau de vie from the abundant fruit crops to be found around Vernon.  Merridale Estate Cidery in Cowichan began their program with local brandy, and then in the summer of 2009, Tyler Schramm of Pemberton joined this spirited community by introducing British Columbia’s first commercially bottled, small-batch organic vodka.

The justification for placing a vodka distillery in the middle of traditional farm country was an obvious one.  After all, Schramm’s land was planted with acres of the liquor’s singular ingredient – potatoes. And not just any potatoes, but Pemberton potatoes!

For Schramm, the justification for placing a vodka distillery in the middle of traditional farm country was an obvious one. After all, his land was planted with acres of the liquor’s singular ingredient – potatoes. And not just any potatoes, but Pemberton potatoes! In agricultural circles, the Valley just north of Whistler has a reputation for having some of the most fertile growing conditions for spuds on the planet. All thanks to eons of geological activity by flooding rivers, shifting mountains, and yes, melting glaciers – the benefactor that other vodka companies point to when they are only discussing the purity of their water.

Considering these ideal conditions, if the alchemy of turning prime tubers and clean mountain water into potato vodka has not been attempted before now, B.C.’s archaic liquor laws may have been to blame. All alcohol produced in the province is subject to such heavy sales taxes that their weight tends to crush the life out of entrepreneurial incentive. However, with the demand for locally produced food products on the increase, Schramm could see the potential for a made-in-B.C. alcohol. So he took to the idea in spades, so to speak.

Today’s Jeopardy Question: How Many Kilos of Potatoes Are Needed to Make One 750-mL Bottle of Vodka?

Dusting off his university science degree, Tyler enrolled at the Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh in order to notch up his skills in brewing and distilling. Once armed with this new expertise, he and his two brothers then set forth on a long winter’s march toward production – selecting appropriate land, constructing a distillery, buying essential equipment from Europe and ordering truckloads of potatoes from local organic farmers (it takes seven kilos of potatoes to make one 750 mL bottle of vodka), not to mention waging many frustrating and arduous battles with bureaucratic red tape and licensing delays. But finally, in July 2009, the Schramm brothers’ first potato vodka was ready for bottling and distribution to markets throughout western Canada.

David Wolowydnik, bar manager at Vancouver’s West restaurant, feels Scramm’s vodka has the substance to hold its own against some of his spiciest cocktail recipes.

Consumers may be surprised by the result. Vodka made from potatoes exhibits a very different taste profile to that of the ubiquitous grain vodkas, which are often over distilled to the point of becoming flavourless and odourless. The potato version is marked by a distinct earthiness with a faint sweetness from the potato starch, and a mouthfeel that some may describe as “full-bodied character” and others might dismiss as “forward.” Schramm Vodka, in particular, has faint peppery, herbal-flavour notes, a melted-snow softness and a mineral edge that is appropriate for the label’s illustration of the Coast Mountains. David Wolowydnik, bar manager at Vancouver’s West restaurant, feels it has the substance to hold its own against some of his spiciest cocktail recipes, such as the Schramm “Old Tom” Gibson he makes with his own house-pickled, organic onions. You can view his recipe by clicking here.

Now that the company is distilling approximately 1,300 bottles a month, you can find Schramm Vodka in creative bars and restaurants around the province. At the retail level it sells for $49.99 and is widely available at BC Liquor Distribution branches.

Link to cityfood.com.

Photo courtesy Schramm Vodka

Nestled between the Monashee and Selkirk mountains, Revelstoke was once known as the capital of Canada’s Alps – so it comes as no surprise that its Revelstoke Mountain Resort was selected to host of one of the world’s most popular skiing events. The Canadian Freeskiing Championships is a new addition to Subaru’s Freeskiing World Tour – the longest-running Big Mountain freeskiing tour in the history of the sport and one that attracts the sport’s top athletes on a global circuit that includes stops in Chile, Colorado and California. Revelstoke’s 200,000-hectare mountain playground should satisfy even the most veteran skiers, however, while the site showcases Canada’s glorious outdoors – just in time for February’s Olympic games. 1-866-373-4754

VICTORIA January 7-23, 2010 – History Boys

History, sex and anarchy – welcome to grammar school. Courtesy Langham Court Theatre

History, sex and anarchy – welcome to grammar school. Alan Bennett’s witty British comedy History Boys follows a class of too-smart-for-their-britches schoolboys as they prepare for university entrance exams. Taught by professors who hold opposing views on the purpose of education, the students learn to challenge the very nature of their schooling. Bennett’s provocative play comes to life at Victoria’s Langham Court Theatre, January 7 through 23. Tickets: $18. 250-384-2142.

KELOWNA January 9, 2010 – “Elvis Generations”

Slap on your sideburns and squeeze into your jumpsuit: the King of Rock ‘n Roll is reborn at Kelowna’s Creekside Theatre. “Elvis Generations” – a stage spectacle celebrating the legendary crooner’s 75th birthday – features three nationally competitive Elvis tribute artists. The award-winning doubles will perform favourites from throughout the singer’s career; a tribute deemed so authentic that fans will wonder if Elvis has really left the building after all. Tickets: $22. 250-766-5669.

108 MILE HOUSE January 8-10, 2010 – Cariboo Challenge Sled Dog Race

courtesy Cariboo Challenge Sled Dog Society

Dog sledding enthusiasts unite!  This year’s Cariboo Challenge Sled Dog Race has been rerouted to incorporate 108 and Sepa lakes into the racing circuit, allowing additional room for spectators and creating more challenging trails. Also featured at the family friendly event: face painting, auctions, a 100-metre mini-dash for the kids and a celebratory bonfire. The nearby Hills Health Ranch, one of the province’s top backcountry spa-vacation resorts, provides accommodation for participants and also hosts a Racers’ Ball. Details: 250-791-5225, ext 225.

KAMLOOPS January 16-24, 2010 – Sun Peaks Resort Winter Wine Festival

What’s better than swilling the best of Okanagan’s vineyard bounty? Easy: imbibing said vintages at B.C.’s Sun Peaks Resort, named by Conde Nast Traveller as Canada’s second-best ski resort. And starting January 16, Kamloops’s alpine village hosts the 12th annual Winter Wine Festival, where both amateur and seasoned vino enthusiasts converge for a week of pairings, tastings and colloquiums. Bonus: after gorging on regional cuisine, attending savoury seminars (check out Cadbury Chocolate & Heavenly Wine’s sweet treats) and taking part in the winter wine brunch, visitors can work it all off with an afternoon of the region’s top snowboarding and skiing. Ticket info: 1-877-212-7107

VANCOUVER January 22 – February 28, 2010 – LunarFest

Vancouver’s 2010 Olympic Games are also an opportunity for Canada to share its cultural diversity with the world – and what better way to kick off the festivities than with a city-wide Lunar New Year’s celebration. Part of the Cultural Olympiad programming, the free public event includes the re-creation of Granville Street as a schoolchildren-created Lantern Forest; artists from Korea and other Asian countries performing acrobatics and dance; a First Nations tableau of lanterns showcasing indigenous designs and an event wrap-up lantern procession led by Public Dreams. See website for information.

Canada’s first theatre made entirely of snow and ice hosts the Only Animal's premiere of NiX. Photo courtesy Trudy Lee/The Only Animal

VICTORIA January 22, 2010 – NiX

Created for the Olympic Games’ Cultural Olympiad, this frozen winter wonderland – Canada’s first theatre made entirely of snow and ice  – will host theatre troupe The Only Animal’s premiere of NiX, a unique love story that promises to thaw audience hearts. Staged on the shores of Whistler’s Logan Lake, the show follows the adventures of two survivors and an arsonist as they face an ice age that threatens the end of the world, with fireworks, dying snowmen and explosive fire. Ticket info: 1-800-838-3006

INTERNATIONAL: SHETLAND ISLANDS January 26, 2010 – Up Helly Aa Festival

On the last Tuesday in January, the townsfolk of Lerwick, Shetland Islands (off the coast of Scotland), dress in their Viking best and converge in the town square to celebrate their Norse heritage. Holding flaming torches and surrounded by as many as five thousand spectators, male villagers march toward the town’s replica Viking Longship, which builders spend more than four months creating just for the occasion. The boat is set aflame, mimicking the ancient Viking tradition of offering a burning ship to the Sun God. And after the audience watches it sink into the sea, the revelry can begin: a melee of dance, drink and feasts that lasts well into the wee hours. Consider it a Viking-style Mardi Gras. Contact: Shetland Tourism, +44 (0) 1595 693434.

by Dave Quinn

Background

The Flathead River rises in the often overlooked southeast corner of British Columbia like some mythical creature born in the shadows of imagination. From here it ripples south across the U.S. border, mingles momentarily with Montana’s historic Clark Fork River, then joins the great Columbia in the race to the Pacific. Protected by a ring of jagged Rocky Mountain peaks and logging roads with triple-digit kilometre markers, the far reaches of the Canadian Flathead are a bone-jarring, tire-puncturing two-hour drive from the nearest town, the East Kootenay community of Fernie. Understandably, the headwaters of the transborder Flathead have only recently begun to share their secrets.

The 158,000-hectare watershed is considered by many to be the lynchpin for wildlife diversity in the southern Rocky Mountains. The Flathead shelters more grizzly bears than any other non-coastal region in North America, the highest number of vascular plant species in Canada and some of the purest water on the planet. Perhaps most important, the largest unpopulated valley in southern Canada provides critical breeding habitat, particularly for wide-ranging carnivores such as grizzlies, wolverine and lynx whose home ranges can encompass thousands of square kilometres. The high mortality rates of carnivores due to hunting or human encroachment on habitat makes breeding grounds crucial pieces in the conservation puzzle. The Flathead is possibly the most important such wildlife refuge in the southern Rockies.

“No other region along the Canada-U.S. border sustains such a diversity of wildlife and ecosystems.”

–Mark Angelo, Rivers Chair/Outdoor Recreation Council (ORC) of B.C., and Order of Canada and Order of B.C. recipient

Unfortunately, remoteness does not equal protection. Sprawling clear-cuts now claw their way to meet the alpine, the scars of increasing off-road vehicle traffic are seen even in the valley’s farthest reaches and so-called “mountaintop removal” open-pit coal mines are being proposed for this unique drainage. “No other region along the Canada-U.S. border sustains such a diversity of wildlife and ecosystems,” notes Mark Angelo, Rivers Chair for the 120,000-member Outdoor Recreation Council (ORC) of B.C., and an Order of Canada and Order of B.C. recipient. Yet despite ever-increasing human incursions over the last 10 years, the Flathead appears to have been abandoned by government decision-makers.

It has taken Cline Mining Corporation’s proposal of a two-million-tonne-per-year open-pit coalmine in the upper Flathead to bring tensions to a head, reigniting a century-old debate over the fate of this wild valley. In March 2007, ORC placed the Flathead atop its annual list of endangered B.C. rivers, ahead of more famous coastal cousins such as the Fraser, Skeena and Stikine. Contaminated runoff from large-scale open-pit mining would poison the Flathead, which flows directly into Montana’s Glacier National Park and Flathead Lake. “While mining is a major industry in our province, many British Columbians have expressed the view that there are some places just not appropriate to mine. The Flathead River is one of them,” says Angelo.

“While mining is a major industry in our province, many British Columbians have expressed the view that there are some places just not appropriate to mine. The Flathead River is one of them.” 

The Flathead River rubs shoulders with wilderness royalty: bounded to the east by Canada’s Waterton Lakes National Park and to the south by Glacier National Park, crown of the U.S. national park system. In 1932, these transborder parks were united to form the world’s first International Peace Park and have since received a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site designation. But conservationists insist a critical chunk is missing in the Waterton-Glacier complex. A glance at a map reveals what looks like a bite taken out of the preserve’s protected core – in the B.C. portion of the region.

Discussions about a park in the Flathead are not new. As early as 1911, conservationists such as Kutenai Brown, Waterton’s first park superintendent, acknowledged the superlative wildlife values of the Flathead Valley. In his March 1911 Report of the Superintendent, Brown wrote, “It seems advisable to greatly enlarge this park . . . to have a preserve and breeding ground in conjunction with the United States’ Glacier Park.” But it has taken the advent of modern wildlife biology survey methods, including radio collaring and DNA hair snagging, for scientists to truly understand the Flathead’s contribution to the southern Rockies ecosystem.

The Environmentalists’ View

Biologist Bruce McLellan has spent much of the past 25 years raising his family in a cabin in the Flathead Valley while working on one of the world’s longest-running grizzly bear studies. “On the coast, salmon are a major food source, so that determines where you find significant grizzly populations. Here in the Interior, it is huckleberries,” says McLellan, “and the Flathead has a lot of huckleberries. Yet huckleberries are just one reason why the Flathead supports such an uncommonly high density of grizzlies. The valley is also the breeding ground for grizzlies in all the surrounding areas,” notes McLellan.

Yet despite nearly a century of advocacy, the southeast corner of B.C. is noticeably free of what conservationists call “green blobs” – nature sanctuaries that serve as breeding grounds for neighbouring wildlife populations. 

Grizzlies aren’t the only members of the “claw and fang” clan to call the Flathead home, however. Sixteen species of carnivores, ranging from tiny weasels and badgers to wolverine and cougar, thrive here, in one of the most diverse carnivore populations on the continent. Without the Flathead, many surrounding valleys would no longer have a source of carnivores and other wildlife to replace those lost to trapping, hunting and natural mortality. Yet despite nearly a century of advocacy, the southeast corner of B.C. is noticeably free of what conservationists call “green blobs” – nature sanctuaries that serve as breeding grounds for neighbouring wildlife populations. To rectify the situation, a coalition of grassroots, national and international conservation interests is working overtime to focus B.C.’s political eye on this neglected corner of the province.

“Core protected areas are a key concept in conservation,” notes Harvey Locke, the visionary behind the Yellowstone-to-Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) and advisor for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS), a national conservation group that has helped protect more than 400,000 square kilometres of Canadian wilderness. “To secure a future for wide-ranging species such as grizzlies and lynx, which are both protected by the U.S. Endangered Species Act, large, core sanctuaries with no hunting or trapping are critical – and biologists have identified the Flathead as perhaps the single most important basin for carnivores in the Rocky Mountains.”

"Provincial parks are not truly protected. And even if they were, they don’t have the staff to police them. Hunting, snowmobiling and even heli-skiing are allowed in some, and B.C. Parks has only one staff member for every eight parks. How can you call that 'protected.' "

Not surprisingly, uncertainty over the Flathead’s future has sparked ongoing debate among the East Kootenays’ 56,000 residents. National Park proponents cite underfunding and poor management in provincial parks as the rationale for a national park. “Provincial parks are not truly protected,” explains John Bergenske, executive director of the grassroots East Kootenay conservation group Wildsight. “And even if they were, they don’t have the staff to police them. Hunting, snowmobiling and even heli-skiing are allowed in some provincial parks, and B.C. Parks has only one staff member for every eight parks. How can you call that ‘protected’?”

Parks Canada, for its part, is interested in stepping in. In 2002, it identified the Flathead as “an area of interest” for expansion of Waterton National Park – a proposal that initially garnered huge local interest. The city council of Fernie, the local Regional District of East Kootenay and the Ktunaxa First Nation (in whose traditional territory the Flathead is found) subsequently called for a park feasibility study. But for local hunting groups and ORV users, the word “park” can be a four-letter word.

National Park Designation: Those Opposed 

Sparwood, B.C.’s Kent Petovello, president of the East Kootenay Wildlife Association, draws on 30 years of outdoor experience in the Flathead when he says, “A national park is something most hunters would never consider. Why?  Most locals call Banff and Jasper ‘tourist pits.’ It goes beyond common sense to promote ski hills, golf and condominiums in a place like the Flathead. Some hunters might accept a Class A Provincial Park or wilderness area with legislated designations, but nobody wants a national park.”

Fernie’s Mike Sosnowski, owner-operator of a local snowmobile tour company, is similarly opposed. “Local input into the management of the Flathead is the answer to maintaining a healthy valley,” he insists. “A park would exclude a majority of the current users of that land base. It’s already managed by provincial and federal laws and standards that have worked very well so far. Leave it be.”

Economic Benefits of National Park Designation

“But the problem with ‘leaving it be,’” says Wildsight’s John Bergenske, “is that the current land use regime leaves the valley open for mining. We have an open-pit coal mine proposed for the headwaters of the Flathead right now, with more to come. This special place needs a special plan that includes a sanctuary like a national park in part of the valley and a ban on mining in the rest of it.”

“Such a plan would also be good for the B.C. economy,” says Harvey Locke. “We live in a world where the most rapidly disappearing commodity is wilderness. Protected areas are now economic drivers and diversifiers. And this is especially true for regions like the Flathead, which has one of the least diverse economies in B.C. – one susceptible to the booms and busts of highly unpredictable resource extraction markets.” He notes that towns such as Invermere, Canmore and Kalispel have booming economies simply because they are close to Kootenay, Banff and Glacier national parks. “People like living, and raising their families, near permanently protected nature. Such towns benefit not only from increased tourism, but from increased numbers and a diversity of residents.”

When the number of jobs that would be potentially lost was balanced against potential new Parks Canada jobs and the predicted influx of new families, the net annual benefit for the region was estimated at an impressive $1.44 million, with 23 additional full-time jobs generated.

To test this theory, Bergenske and Locke hired an independent economist in 2005 to evaluate the economic impact of a national park designation for the Flathead. When the number of jobs that would be potentially lost was balanced against potential new Parks Canada jobs and the predicted influx of new families, the net annual benefit for the region was estimated at an impressive $1.44 million, with 23 additional full-time jobs generated.

Currently, the East Kootenays boast five immense open-pit coal mines that collectively produce 25 per cent of the world’s “shipped” steelmaking coal. Hunters, conservation interests and even many local miners agree that another mine is not what the region needs. They may disagree on the proposed park expansion, but they see eye to eye on Cline Mining Corporation’s proposal to haul two million tonnes of coal annually from the Flathead’s headwaters down 40 km of forestry road to a rail siding on the Elk River. When Cline officials held public open houses this January in Elko, Fernie and Sparwood, the sentiment at the packed venues was clear: No, thanks. Local opinion was equally adamant in the more than 60,000 emails and faxes that subsequently crashed the email server of the governor of Montana and flooded B.C.’s Office of the Premier.

Overwhelming negative response such as this does not bode well for Cline Mining or for any future proposed mines in the Flathead. And if the public remains galvanized around keeping the Flathead wild, the future may well turn out bright for B.C.’s most endangered watershed. For conservationists such as John Bergenske and Harvey Locke, this would mean an expanded Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park. For Kent Petovello and other hunters it would mean a Flathead free of open-pit mines but with status-quo management of hunting and off-road-vehicle access. For its part, Parks Canada needs only the approval of the provincial government to proceed with a feasibility study for a national park (the province has so far declined to respond to calls to protect the Flathead).

Meanwhile, after more than a quarter century spent working and living in the Flathead Valley, Bruce McLellan is watching change edge slowly but surely into the valley where he has raised his family. “I’m not sure what the future holds for the Flathead. I’m only sure there have been changes, in human presence, off-road vehicle use, hunting pressures – all of which is not great for grizzlies,” he observes. “But I want to see the Flathead stay the same as it was 10 years ago, just like everybody else. And the only way to keep what still exists there today is to provide some measure of protection for tomorrow.”

Dave Quinn is a Kimberley, B.C.-based wildlife biologist, wilderness guide and author whose work takes him from the Kootenays to remote regions of the Arctic and Patagonia.

>>For more information on the transboarder Flathead Valley and the struggle to keep it wild: flatheadwild.ca; peaceparkplus.net

>>Related reading: B.C.’s Latest RAVE Focuses on the Flathead; Northern B.C.: The Last Wild River

Here in lush, green B.C., the transportation sector accounts for more than a third of the province’s provincial greenhouse gas emissions. Passenger and heavy duty vehicles take the lion’s share of those emissions, with 39 and 26 per cent, respectively. And domestic aviation claims just 7 per cent of the transportation sector’s emissions, though there are, of course,opportunities to cut those emissions to help the province achieve its overall goal of 33 per cent reductions by 2020.

(left to right) Pacific Carbon Trust CEO Scott MacDonald, Minister of State for Climate Action John Yap, West Coast Air CEO Rick Baxter/courtesy Resilient Consulting Group

West Coast Air is the latest B.C. business to reach its zero emission target: “carbon neutral” status, with West Coast Air CEO Rick Baxter, Pacific Carbon Trust CEO Scott MacDonald and Minister of State for Climate Action John Yap on hand to make the announcement at the airline’s downtown Vancouver terminal on January 11, 2010.

The 35-year-old, locally owned and operated float plane airline started its journey toward zero emissions in 2007 – studying its carbon impact with the assistance of Climate Smart, then measuring its carbon footprint and coming up with strategies to reduce that footprint. After achieving organic emission cuts of 12 per cent the first year and 10 per cent in each of the two years following, the airline has now partnered with Pacific Carbon Trust to source carbon offsets for the remainder of its emissions.

“[West Coast Air] is helping the province reduce emissions by 33 per cent by 2020,” said Yap, referring to BC Climate Action Plan targets, adding that by sourcing carbon offsets through the Pacific Carbon Trust, the airline is “supporting the growth of a vibrant low-carbon economy in B.C.” As well, Yap noted that the airline’s investment in “made-in-B.C.” carbon offsets makes the airline’s emission reduction accomplishment particularly significant. 

Now that two of B.C.’s regional carriers are carbon neutral (Harbour Air being the other), the province’s domestic aviation emissions will hopefully close in on zero as well. But what should the province be doing about reducing passenger and heavy-duty vehicle emissions?

Over the past few years, B.C.’s Flathead valley has slowly but surely risen to the top of the controversial list of “Canada’s Most Threatened Valleys” (Kimberley photographer Patrice Halley and I covered the Flathead for the summer 2007 issue of Westworld). The Flathead is home to the highest diversity of carnivores in North America, some of the purest water on the planet, the highest density of grizzlies in inland North America and the most diverse mixture of plant communities in the Rocky Mountains.

The Flathead is home to the highest diversity of carnivores in North America, some of the purest water on the planet, the highest density of grizzlies in inland North America and the most diverse mixture of plant communities in the Rocky Mountains.

All this seems at odds with open-pit coal mining, coal bed methane development and gold-mine proposals in B.C.’s portion of the Flathead – some places are just too special for the heavy hand of heavy industry. Which is why for 10 days this July, photographers and filmmakers with the International League of Conservation Photographers (ILCP) conducted a Rapid Assessment Visual Expedition (RAVE) into the Flathead Valley to document its landscape and wildlife, and to help distill a vision of hope for a solution to protect it. This proposal includes National Park status for a third of the valley and a wildlife management plan for the entire region.

With 60 “fellows,” including the likes of Wade Davis, Art Wolfe, Frans Lanting and Flip Nicklin, the ILCP represents some of the most accomplished, well-recognized names in photography. And when these pros turn their lenses to an issue, that issue is certain to garner a lot of attention – both for the insightful and poignant images ILCP photographers capture but also for the compelling stories their photos reveal.

The gala opening of the ILCP Flathead RAVE photography exhibit was held New Year’s Eve at the Fernie Arts Station, with the exhibit moving on to Cranbrook on February 4^th at the Key City Theatre, then to Kimberley on February 25^th at Centre 64. The marquee evening in Cranbrook will feature presentations by local photographer and mountaineer Pat Morrow, ILCP photographer Garth Lenz, and Spirit Bear phenom Simon Jackson. These local showings will be followed by RAVE exhibitions at galleries both in the region and abroad, showcasing one of B.C.’s critically threatened landscapes to as large an audience as possible.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Since 1911,when Waterton Park’s first superintendent John ‘Kootenai’ Brown called for it’s protection, conservationists have working to gain protection for southeastern British Columbia’s Flathead Valley. Following Parks Canada’s identification of the Flathead as an area of interest for a new park, Flathead National Park has been inching its way closer to reality. Do you think that National Park status is a good solution to this century-old debate, or perhaps you’d prefer to see a Provincial Park, a simple Wildlife Management Area, or no protection at all?  Tweet me at @KootenayDave to let me know what you think!

Related reading: Northern B.C.: The Last Wild River; Flathead on the Mind

Also, visit your local MEC store to check out the in-store display highlighting the Flathead Valley and the need to protect it.

Photos: Garth Lenz

Artists strive to capture the essence of a subject – to essentially freeze it in time to allow the rest of our less intuitive brains time to render the fat from the meat, to see it’s true spirit.

Some of us work with words.  We try to arrange this jumble of symbols you see before you in such a way as to kindle some inner fire if inspiration and understanding.

Award-winning Nelson photographer Kari Medig seeks unique perspectives that tell his subject's stories in compelling ways. Kari's work will be featured at KMC's Backyard Booty on December 11th.

Others break our fast-paced world into frozen, individual images. Photographers offer us our world one frame at a time, allowing us to explore the full range of human emotion, the power of landscape, the meaning of shape, tone and colour.

Painters and sculptors are limited only by the human imagination – their own and that of their audience. Their offerings are as much a glimpse into their own souls as a lens through which to view our surroundings.

For the last five years Nelson’s Mitchell Scott and Peter Moynes have bound a range of place-based art into the pages of a single publication, Kootenay Mountain Culture magazine (KMC). And for the past five years, KMC’s high-quality presentation, resonant content, and creative depth have had locals clamouring for the next edition of this biannual months before publication.

In addition to celebrating the local flavours in print,This years event launches on December 11 at Nelson’s Capitol Theatre. Showtime 7 p.m.

Courtesy Jeremy Down

Whether you’re an ingredient in the unique spice that is Kootenay Mountain Culture, or just a voyeur wanting a better peek at what’s on the other side of the powder curtain, Backyard Booty in Nelson is the place to be this month.

Links:

karimedigphoto.com
www.jeremydown.com
Mitchell Scott: adventurestorytelling.ca

Lead photo courtesy Jeremy Down

by Dave Quinn

In 1879, legendary American naturalist and wilderness advocate John Muir paddled B.C.’s lower Stikine River, which from its headwaters on the Spatsizi Plateau carves a 250-km path through the Coast Mountains between Telegraph Creek, B.C., and Wrangell, Alaska — a remote waterway described by Muir as a “Yosemite 100 miles long.”

Some 130 years later, the Stikine’s lower half has survived the salmon wars, plans to dam its “Grand Canyon” and a proposed open-pit gold mine in a major tributary. But the threat of coal-bed methane (CBM) development in its headwaters — which requires a particularly destructive fossil-fuel extraction technique — still looms. The good news: local First Nations and conservationists such as David Suzuki and Wade Davis have united to “save the sacred headwaters” of the Stikine, Nass and Skeena, three of the province’s most important salmon-producing rivers. The collapse of B.C.’s southern salmon stocks in the summer of 2009, resulting in closures to commercial and First Nations fishing on the Fraser and dramatic decreases in grizzly populations on the south coast, only reinforces the urgency of their struggle.

>>Related reading: 2010 update on the Stikine + excerpt from Gary Fiegehen’s photography book Stikine: The Great River; Northern B.C.: Swim the Skeena;

B.C.’s Latest RAVE Focuses on the Flathead ; Flathead on the Mind

>>Tame the Wild Facts? Reader Comments:

On the whole, Westworld magazine has been a very interesting and informative read over the years. Occasionally though, an article appears that really “gets my goat” – usually when a story’s focus leads readers to believe something that is more sensational than factual, such as winter 2009’s Landmarks column (“The Last Wild River” by Dave Quinn).

It’s a beautiful river and deserves protection. However, while I am uncertain what is meant by “wild,” I’m sure the Stikine is not the last wild river – in B.C., Canada, the U.S. or the world. Also, the last sentence has two errors. First, there was a much lower return in the sockeye runs than anticipated, but the other species have returned in good and, in some cases, record numbers on the south coast. In fact, the biggest single effect on these returns is ocean survival, something we have little control over. Second, the coast’s grizzly populations are dependent on returning salmon, but why does their range seem to be expanding on the south coast? Grizzlies are swimming from the mainland to Vancouver Island because there’s not enough territory for them.

–Laurence Brown, via email

The collapse to which Dave Quinn is referring involves sockeye salmon, specifically the Chilko River run. There are five species of salmon – six if you count steelhead, which are now included in the same genus – and the numerous runs of these species in literally thousands of streams in the province did not all “collapse” this summer. (All the “southern” runs did not collapse, either.)

–Geoff Chislett, via email

Writer’s Note: For years, news reports have noted declining and less predictable salmon returns along the southern west coast. According to the CBC, for example: “On the U.S. west coast many salmon runs have completely collapsed; in B.C. the situation is only slightly better. But in the north Pacific . . . many salmon runs are at or near all-time highs.” In fact, the 2009 sockeye collapse on the Fraser (and the Chilko, according to Mr. Chislett) led to a judicial inquiry. Some returns of other species were larger than expected, as Mr. Brown correctly asserts, but the situation is frighteningly similar to the prelude to the collapse of the east coast cod fishery.

Re: B.C.’s grizzlies – these bears swim from the mainland in a natural process called “dispersal.” They rarely, if ever, survive the first humans they encounter after “island hopping” to Vancouver Island.

>>Do you have an update on the fight to save the Stikine, Nass and Skeena? Let us know!

Photo courtesy Dave Quinn.

The Economic Benefits: Facts versus hype

by Kerry Banks

In the euphoria that followed the announcement that Vancouver had won the bid to host the 2010 Winter Olympics, there was a lot of talk about how the Games would be a gold mine for the local economy: creating jobs, boosting tourism and providing a bonanza for local suppliers. But while it is undoubtedly true that same local businesses will make a killing – porta-potty companies, for example, and parking lot owners, limousine rental firms and flower shops – a number of studies by top economists reveal little evidence that hosting the Games produces significant economic benefits for any host city or region. In fact, according to a 2008 study by three economists who specialize in the economics of sport, in the short-term, taking on the Games can actually be damaging. In their analysis “Slippery Slope? Assessing the Economic Impact of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah,” for example, the authors found that “general merchandise stores suffered a net loss of $167.4 million during  the Games time,  as did ski resorts and other recreation firms.” As Victor Matheson, one of the paper’s authors, noted, “It’s a fun time to be in the spotlight, but most cities lose money.”

Although the accounting methods of Olympic organizing committees are often murky, the evidence further suggests that all of the last six Winter Olympics ended up losing money. The organizers of the Turin Games in 2006 admitted to a $32 million deficit. And while organizers of the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics boasted an operating profit of $110 million, the U.S. General Accounting Office determined that the federal government contributed $1.3 billion toward the event. Plagued by cost overruns, the 1998 Nagano Olympics also lost huge piles of dough, though no one knows exactly how much because the organizers burned the accounting books, leaving the financial impact a mystery.

Likewise, the 1994 Lillehammer and 1992 Albertville Olympics ran multimillion-dollar deficits. Even Calgary, where the 1988 Winter Games were claimed to have turned a $90-million profit, lost money. In 1999, Tom Walkom, a Toronto Star reporter, discovered that Calgary’s organizing committee had omitted the cost of building sports facilities from its figures, and the federal, provincial and municipal governments contributed $461 million toward the games – nullifying any profits.

In light of the past record of host cities, then, Vancouver’s chances of avoiding a similar financial disaster are slim. As a recent editorial in Forbes magazine ominously states: “Over the past five years the operational costs of the 2010 Winter Games has mushroomed from $1.3 billion to almost $2 billion. In other words, Vancouver is going to take it on the chin as declining sponsorship and tourism revenue combined with higher security costs push the Vancouver Olympic Committee deep into the red.”

Local gal to carry the Olympic torch December 19

by Bernice Paul

The Olympic Torch Relay, which began locally on October 30 in Victoria and  is wending its way some 45,000 km across Canada,will be borne by a total of 12,000 torchbearers – athletes and civilians alike. Twelve thousand, each of whom will carry the torch for 300 metres before the final bearer enters the Games’ opening ceremonies and lights the Olympic flame. Not even I, a mild sports fan at best, can help but sprout goose bumps just reading about it.

One of the selected torchbearers is Jessica Langelaan, who has been associated with 2010 for some time now. In fact, last year she was given the enormous and never-been-done-before task of measuring the carbon footprint of the entire 2010 experience, including the torch relay. And apparently the relay accounts for about 3,000 tonnes of greenhouse gases – approximately one per cent of the total footprint of the Games. Because the relay is on foot, its emissions all come from the travel associated with the support teams, security and medical assistance. Oh, and the flame? “It’s butane or propane… and a very, very tiny part of the footprint,” according to Langelaan, who now works as a consultant for Offsetters, the official carbon-offset supplier for the Games.

As for her bid to carry the torch, it goes something like this:

“I auditioned to be in the opening ceremonies,” explains Langelaan,  “and made the mistake of telling my grandmother”  – who became convinced – and very excited – about dear Jessica being on television. Unfortunately, the opening ceremonies didn’t call back and Langelaan couldn’t break the news to Grandma. “So I had to be a torchbearer – for my grandmother.”

Needless to say it’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And it strikes me that Lanelaan is more proud of being a torchbearer than of having calculated its carbon footprint. And of course, most of her family will be descending upon Oakville, Ontario, to watch her carry the torch, including her best friend from Thunder Bay. (Her aunt has purchased red scarves for the whole family to wear so that they’ll stand out amongst the red-mittened crowd.)

“I don’t want to build it up too much – it’s only 300 metres!” says Langelaan. “No one’s ever come to watch me do anything and suddenly the world will show up to watch these 300 metres!” True, and a tedious leg it will be, too. It has already snowed in Ontario, so graceful trotting could prove challenging.

Langelaan takes the torch on December 19 at 3 pm EST – her very own red carpet moment. Here’s hoping it’s the longest and happiest 300 metres in her life.

You can follow Jessica or the entire Torch Relay on Twitter.

Part Two to follow

Lead photo courtesy Jessica Langelaan

Although it is clearly not too difficult to design an Olympic clothing line that will make scads of money, impressing the critics is a different matter entirely, as Hudson’s Bay is finding out

by Kerry Banks

Back in 2005, HBC defeated Roots and Lululemon to win the bidding war for the athletic wear sponsorship for the next four Olympic games (2006 Torino Winter Games, 2008 Beijing Olympics, 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, and 2012 London Olympics). For this privilege, HBC forked over a hefty $100 million.

Macleans magazine dubbed the HBC's winter Olympic line as "banal, but wearable."

However, the Canadian Olympic clothing that HBC produced for Beijing in 2008 met with scathing reviews:  “garish,” “loud,” “psychedelia run amok,” were just some of the reactions. In its company blog, Lululemon dubbed HBC’s sartorial stylings the “vomit pajama line.”

Chastened by that reception, HBC opted for a more conservative approach with its 2010 Winter Olympic consumer line, which is based on four distinctly Canadian items: the parka, toque, knitted sweater and buffalo plaid. Even so, the company still managed to spark controversy. After surveying surveyed the line of red, white, black and grey clothing, Vancouver Liberal MP Hedy Fry thought she spotted a partisan conspiracy, comparing the HBC’s official Olympic log, (a black ‘C’ with a red maple leaf in the centre) to the logo for the Conservative Party (a slanted blue ‘C’ with a red maple leaf in the middle). Others felt it was a direct rip-off of the Royal Canadian Air Force’s logo—a red maple leaf inside a black ‘C.’

It turns out, the HBC was sensitive enough to the similarity between its new logo and the military logo that it called in its lawyers for a meeting to determine that they were, in fact, different enough. As Hudson Bay’s fashion director Suzanne Timmins told Canadian Press, “When you’re dealing with the maple leaf, red, white, black, you’re going to come across a lot of different logos that are very close to other people’s logos.”

"Cowichan First Nation officials accused HBC of stealing their iconic sweater design after rejecting their proposal to produce Cowichan sweaters for HBC's line of 2010 Olympic clothing."

But there was more flak to come. Cowichan First Nation officials accused the retail giant of stealing their iconic sweater design after rejecting their proposal to produce Cowichan sweaters for HBC’s line of 2010 Olympic clothing. (HBC’s $350 Olympic sweater – featuring a maple leaf and elk — has become one of the clothing line’s most popular items since it was unveiled in October.) Hudson’s Bay initially dismissed the comparison, insisting its hand-knit sweater was not a Cowichan, and that the Vancouver Island band couldn’t meet the company’s production requirements to be an official supplier in any event. But after being threatened with legal action and public protests, HBC changed its tune. The company is now close to finalizing a deal with the band that will likely see Cowichan sweaters sold in Hudson’s Bay Company’s Olympic superstore in downtown Vancouver and in an aboriginal pavilion during the Games.

Meanwhile, the media’s reaction to the HBC’s Winter Olympic line appears to be lukewarm. Macleans magazine dubbed it “banal, but wearable.” The Globe and Mail declared: “These are items that have been designed to sell. Even if some Canadians are left cold by the nostalgic knitwear, foreigners will likely regard the pieces as quaint and worth buying as stylish souvenirs. Where the apparel comes up short is originality.” Chris Rudge, boss of the Canadian Olympic Committee, was more enthusiastic. He said the clothing “screams Canada” and is “bold, inspiring, modern, contemporary and cool.” Even so, “bold and “contemporary” do not seem to be the appropriate adjectives for designs that HBC fashion director Suzanne Timmins admits were inspired by the 1970s Crazy Canucks alpine ski team and the classic Canadian comedy show SCTV, featuring Bob and Doug McKenzie. She also noted that designers decided not to go with seal-skin trim, as requested by Canadian MPs to support Canada’s seal hunting industry.

The total value of licensed Olympic merchandise sales worldwide is expected to top the $500-million mark by the time the Games end, resulting in about $54 million in revenues for VANOC.

Of course, despite what the fashion mavens think, the total value of licensed Olympic merchandise sales worldwide is expected to top the $500-million mark by the time the Games end, resulting in about $54 million in revenues for VANOC. And no one need shed any tears for American-owned HBC, with its 21,000 square-foot Olympic superstore on the main floor of its downtown location jam-packed with more than 1,000 pieces of officially licensed Games merchandise. The store also features a Coke cafe decked out in Coca-Cola colours, a pin wall that can hold 21,000 pins; a display of special-edition watches from the 2010 Winter Games and past Games presented by Swatch; a concierge service offered by Purolator to ship purchases to a customer’s hotel or anywhere in the world; and replica Olympic Torches presented by Bombardier. With the Winter Games still several months away, Hudson’s Bay has already struck gold.

To view all of HBC’s Winter Olympic designs: http://store.hbc.com

So, how do you feel about the HBC’s new line of Olympic clothing? Are these items that you would buy?

Photos: Kerry Banks

The raven ranks among the world’s most intelligent creatures, displaying high learning ability and use of logic for solving problems, in some tests even surpassing chimpanzees. (courtesy Kerry Banks)

Ravens may be common in the Rockies, but they remain a novelty to me. I find them to be impressive birds: large, intelligent, playful and talented mimics. I remember sitting beside a beach in Tofino one afternoon listening to a raven imitate a dripping faucet. The same bird then made me jump when he did an uncanny and eerie impression of a human voice, calling “Tommy. Tommy.” Actually, it sounded just like the vocal in The Who’s song, so maybe the raven had been listening to the tune on someone’s stereo.

I stroll down the main drag, Banff Avenue, which may be the only street in town not named after an animal. The critter roll call includes Squirrel Street, Caribou Street, Lynx Street, Wolverine Street, Whiskey Jack Crescent and Porcupine Place. The town itself is named after Banffshire, Scotland, the birthplace of  Lord Strathcona and George Stephen, two major financiers of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

Able to accomodate 1,700 guests in 700 rooms, the baronial Banff Springs Hotel has been described as having “corridors for the invalid, turrets for the astronomer and balconies for lovers.”

My destination is the Banff Springs Hotel, a gothic castle at the south end of town. And the man behind the creation of this five-star luxury hotel: William Van Horne, General Manager of Canadian Pacific Railways, who viewed the hot springs near the railway station of Banff as a potential tourist attraction. His vision was fuelled by the philosophy “If we can’t export the scenery, we will import the tourists.” Hence, in 1886, Van Horne commissioned Bruce Price of New York, one of the foremost architects of the day, to draw up plans for a hotel to be built above the confluence of the Bow and Spray Rivers overlooking the Bow Valley. Construction began in the spring of 1887, and the palatial resort opened on June 1, 1888. At the time it was reportedly the largest hotel in the world.

Like any grand old hotel, the Banff Springs is said to have its share of ghosts. For example, there are frequent sightings of Sam Macauley, a bellman who died here in 1976. It is believed that he still haunts the upper floors of the hotel. Several people have identified him as a real person and have spoken to him. But then, suddenly, he disappears right in front of their eyes.

And too there is the story of infamous Room 873, which no longer exists, though the hotel does have rooms 872 and 874. According to the legend, a family was murdered in Room 873, and strange things kept taking place after the room was cleaned up and re-opened, including a mirror hung in the room that displayed the fingerprints of the little girl who died there. No matter how many times the staff cleaned the mirror, the fingerprints constantly reappeared. Coupled with the reports of guests who claimed to see the family on occasion, the management decided to close off and wall up the room. Today, staff and guests still reported seeing the spirits of the family near where the room has been closed off.

I spend a couple of hours looking around the hotel and taking photos from various vantage points. I don’t encounter any ghosts, but in the hotel’s flower garden I do find a ghostly coloured moth that looks like it fluttered right out of the pages of a children’s book of fables.

Not all moths are nocturnal, as is clear from this photo. But the identity of this silvery species found in the flower garden outside the Banff Springs Hotel is a mystery to me. Does anyone know the answer?

By the time I meet up with Masters in a coffee shop back on Banff Avenue, I have a headache, the result of tramping around like a maniac in the high altitude air. (At 1,463 metres, Banff is the town with the highest elevation in Canada.) Mysterious as always, Masters refuses to tell me what he did all afternoon. We drive over to the Pox, er the Fox Hotel, where, thankfully we find that the desk clerk’s face is not melting. She has an Australian accent, like about 70 per cent of the people we have met so far who work in the Rockies’ service industry.

Dinner is at the upscale Maple Leaf Grille and Lounge. The Maple Leaf was recently awarded “Best Resort Restaurant, North America” at the United Kingdom’s 2009 Hardy’s Skiing and Snowboarding Awards. I’m not exactly sure what this means, but it is proudly noted on the restaurant’s website. I order the barbecued rib-eye; Masters opts for the Wild B.C. Salmon. “We are in Alberta—the land of beef. Why are you ordering B.C. seafood?” I ask.

“I felt like salmon,” he replies.

The front balcony of the Banff Springs Hotel looks out over the Bow River and the gap between Mt. Rundle and Tunnel Mountain.

“OK, salmon boy. Let’s head back to the Pox. According to our official itinerary we have to be in Lake Louise by  8 a.m. for our hike.”

(To be continued …)

Part I, II, III

Photos: Kerry Banks

by Kerry Banks

In 1965, TV viewers were introduced to My Mother the Car, a situation comedy about attorney David Crabtree, who purchases a dilapidated 1928 “Porter” touring car after hearing the car call his name in a woman’s voice, which turns out to be that of his deceased mother. Much to Crabtree’s frustration, however, his mother refuses to reveal her presence to anyone but him, saying, “Son, the world just isn’t ready for a talking car.” Four decades later, things have changed.

SYNC: What is it?

Ford and Mircosoft have developed a factory-installed, in-car communications and entertainment system called SYNC that enables drivers to make and receive phone calls hands-free and control a range of digital audio via voice commands and buttons mounted on the steering wheel. The system is currently offered on 12 different Ford, Lincoln and Mercury vehicles in North America.
To place a call, simply press a button on the steering wheel, then say the name of the person you wish to call. SYNC will automatically connect with the names in the mobile phone’s contact list.

SYNC can even receive text messages and read them aloud using a robotized female voice known as “Samantha.” To reply, the driver selects from one of 15 pre-selected text messages, such as “Where are you?” “I need more directions” and “Be there in 10 minutes.” SYNC can also interpret a hundred or so shorthand messages, such as LOL – for “laughing out loud,” and will read swear words; it won’t however, decipher obscene acronyms.

The most advanced technological feature of the SYNC system is the ability to play songs from a connected media player via voice command. When a new player is plugged in for the first time, SYNC takes a few minutes to index all the audio files, after which drivers can use voice commands to select music by genre, album, artist or even track title. Commands such as, “Play artist The Clash,” or, “Play track ‘London Calling,’” will give drivers direct control over their music library. According to Microsoft, the same voice-selection interface also works for digital audio tracks stored on USB thumb drives.

See the System in Action

Lead image courtesy iStock

courtesy Whitewater Ski Resort

Nelson’s Whitewater Ski Resort (WH2O) is one of the last of a dying breed. Purely and simply, WH2O is a ski hill. Period. No on-hill accommodation facelifts. No lifestyle-oriented real estate tummy tucks. No Rundle-rock and timber frame implants. Just one valley, two lifts and enough snow to choke a mountain caribou – 140 cm at the time of writing. Not bad for November 23.

At the other of the rugged Selkirk Mountains and the ski resort spectrum lies an altogether different beast, the much-touted Revelstoke Mountain Resort (RMR). Rescued from receivership last year, the new development  boasts 1,700-plus metres’ elevation – the highest lift-serviced vertical in North America – and, at full capacity, zips skiers all over the mountain on 20 different lifts while allotting skiers their choice of 5,000 beds to sleep off all that vertical. If that’s not enough, with its cat skiing and heli-ski partners, RMR also offers 200,000-plus hectares of terrain to choose from. Different slopes for different wallets.

The only things these two vastly different resorts share are the sick skiing of the Selkirk Mountains and an opening date: Saturday, November 28. These are the first Kootenay hills to fire up the lifts this season.

So take your pick: bigger-better-higher-faster at the ‘Stoke, or the very chill, very real aura of Nelson’s Whitewater (don’t forget its Fresh Tracks Café – for some of the best lodge food on the planet). Winter is here. See you on the boards this weekend – bring your snorkel!

Lead image courtesy Whitewater Ski Resort

by Rob Howatson

1. TALK ABOUT GOOD INTENTIONS GONE BAD. In 1850, the HMS Investigator departed England in search of the Franklin expedition, which had disappeared in the Arctic five years earlier. Yet not only did the rescue ship fail to find Franklin survivors, the Investigator became stuck in the ice and its crew faced starvation, madness and death on the uncharted Polar Sea. Vancouver author Brian Payton captures all of the gripping, freeze-thaw action in The Ice Passage: A True Story of Ambition, Disaster and Endurance in the Arctic Wilderness. (Doubleday Canada; $35)

2. MOST PLACES-TO-SEE-BEFORE-YOU-DIE books are a dime a dozen, but this one comes with the moral authority of the United Nations. World Heritage Sites: A Complete Guide to 878 UNESCO World Heritage Sites features gorgeous photos and pithy descriptions of Earth’s most culturally, historically and geologically significant locations. (Firefly Books, $30)

3. BEST BUY FOR DISTINCT TAKES on the world’s most awe-inspiring landscapes and the unique animals and peoples that inhabit them – as captured through the lens of master shutterbug Art Wolfe. Travels to the Edge: A Photo Odyssey contains 100 of the Seattle artist’s fave images, including an inter-tribal stick fight in the mountains of Ethiopia and a startled herd of guanacos on the Andean pampas. (Mountaineers Books; U.S.$25)

WRAP IT UP FOR CHRISTMAS All books available at better book-stores throughout the province.

See also:

• Luggage Tags
• Custom Maps
• Top 7 B.C. Reads

Skeleton is one of the fastest sports on ice, with sleds reaching speeds of 140 km/h, and Jeff Pain its most decorated Canadian athlete. Pain helped pioneer the sport in the years leading up to its debut as a permanent Olympic event at Salt Lake City in 2002. And the tall, lanky Calgarian landscape architect has nearly 20 World Cup podium finishes, two World Championship wins and a silver medal from the Torino Olympic Games in 2006. The only souvenir missing from Pain’s trophy case is gold, which he intends to correct this February when he dons his raging-beaver helmet in Whistler. Given his mature-for-skeleton age of 39, it will be his last bid for Olympic glory.

WW: Describe the skeleton

JP: It’s bombing headfirst down a twisting, icy flume on a sled that looks like a cafeteria tray attached to two tubular steel runners.

WW: What is the view like from behind your visor during a race?

JP: I imagine it is the same as one would get if duct-taped to the underside of a car that is careening down the highway at ridiculous speeds.

WW: What made you want to do this?

JP: In 1992, I decided I wanted to be in the Olympics, so I went in search of a sport that would get me there. I tried track and field and the bobsled, but I wasn’t good enough. And I was too old to join the luge program, but those guys suggested I approach the skeleton people, because, in the words of the luge folks, “they’ll take anybody.”

WW: Your sled has no brakes. How do you steer?

JP: By humming the old tune “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.” I can tilt my head and use the wind to drift me in a certain direction. Or I can lower a shoulder. Or I can push a knee into my sled that will affect the runner beneath it. Or, for really quick response, I can drag a toe.

WW: Describe takeoff.

JP: We run for 30 metres and fall down. By that I mean we wear spiked shoes, shove our sled along the relatively flat push-area and then dive aboard.

WW: How far off the ice is your chin during the 50-second ride down?

JP: Zero to two inches.

WW: Zero?

JP: There are some steeply banked turns that produce so much G-force that it’s better to have your chin guard on the ice as you enter the curve — rather than have gravity slam your face onto the track.

WW: What was your worst wipeout?

JP: At Whistler in March. I was test-driving a new sled that proved to be wrong for the conditions. I had a small crash in curve six, which led to a big crash in curve seven and, for the first time in my career, I was thrown from my sled in such a way that I couldn’t hang onto it. I slid on my butt down the track at 120 km/h, pursued by my 33-kg sled. Luckily, the board flipped upside down, which slowed it enough that I could grab it and ride aboard to a stop in curve 10. There, I stood up, bent the saddle back out with some help from the concrete wall and continued on to finish in a blistering three minutes and 24 seconds.

WWRAP IT UP FOR CHRISTMAS To tour Whistler’s Olympic venues after the Games, including transportation from Vancouver, lunch at Monk’s Grill, close-up looks at the ski jump and sliding track and a chance to fire a biathalon gun: $139/Enjoy Tour and Travel. 604-719-7161

A popular haunt for X-country skiers, hikers and mountain bikers, the Smith-Dorrien Trail is a gravel road that winds through the heart of one of the wildest and most scenic landscapes in Alberta's Kananaskis Country.

Back in the car, plotting our course to Mt. Engadine Lodge, I say: “Everyone on a roadtrip has to have a role. Why don’t you be the  take-charge guy.”

“Who are you going to be?” asks Masters.

“I’ll be the distracted, laid-back guy. I’ll be Good Time Charlie.”

Luckily, Masters consulted the road map while I was shooting photos of the lake, and confidently predicts we’ll be at our destination soon. He’s right. From out of nowhere, the road to Mt. Engadine Lodge suddenly appears on our right.

The lodge is a major surprise. I was expecting antlers, cowboy paraphernalia and massive wooden beams and split-pine finishes everywhere. And there is a lot of wood, but nothing else is predictable. For starters, the place is not a working-ranch-cum-guest house but a sophisticated boutique backcountry operation operated by Chris and Shari-Lynn Williams, a pair of professional innkeepers. (Chris, a former air-traffic controller, and Shari-Lynn, an accountant, left their day jobs to run resorts a decade ago.)

The lodge's dining room windows afford a spectacular view of the Rockies rising sharply across Moose Meadows – a natural habitat for coyotes, moose, elk, deer and beavers.

Before coming to Mt. Engadine(www.mountengadine.com) in 2007, the couple worked for five years at the Wickaninnish Inn in Tofino, B.C, where Chris was the chief concierge and Shari-Lynn the front-office manager. The well-travelled couple have also worked as innkeepers in Vermont, New Mexico, Cape Cod, on Prince Edward Island and on St. Lucia in the Caribbean. Here at Mt. Engadine they also supervised a major renovation, with the lodge’s nine rooms transformed from dorm-style bunk beds to luxurious suites complete with king-size beds, living areas and private baths. And the rooms are now named (and decorated) after indigenous animals, which are easier to remember than numbers. I’ve been assigned the Moose room, which is appropriate since the lodge is reputedly the best place in the Kananaskis to spot moose. The ungainly beasts like to congregate in a mud wallow adjacent to the property, supposedly attracted by the minerals in the soil.

I have a half-hour before dinner so I wander off down the road to a nearby bridge to take photos. The lodge has an incredible setting, on a hill overlooking a broad meadow and surrounded on all sides by soaring mountains. I’m enjoying the peace and solitude when two tour buses suddenly pull up and disgorge a pack of noisy German tourists. Their timing could not be better: minutes after they unload, a mother moose and her calf begin approaching across the meadow. The sight silences the crowd.

Spray Valley Provincial Park (along with neighbouring Peter Lougheed Provincial Park): more than 100 km of hiking and mountain biking trails, plus canoeing and kayaking on easily accessible lakes and rivers.

It’s occasions like this that make me wonder what European tourists think of Canada. This is the first moose I’ve ever seen in the wild and I’ve lived here all my life. This bunch of Bavarians may well be under the mistaken impression that you can order up exotic wildlife here at will.

_______________________________________________

“A visit to this mud wallow, where the moose

come every day about now, is like a once-a-day vitamin,”

says Engadine manager Chris Williams.

________________________________________________

I make it back just in time for dinner. The roast chicken is delicious, the wine terrific. Masters and I share a communal table with a group of Americans touring Alberta with an outfit called Country Walkers. The company (www.countrywalkers.com) offers 75 worldwide walking itineraries, and on this one, local guide Dave Holder spearheads daily, rigorous hikes into the wilds. Judging by the speed with which the day’s survivors are wolfing down their food, all that walking must work up a serious appetite.

After dinner, we talk with Chris about Mt. Engadine’s niche in the backcountry market, and how the level of personal service and attention to detail is what he thinks sets it apart. For example, he hand picks the wines, seeking out moderately priced, tasty stuff that most guests will not be familiar with. Likewise, the beer is from small, local Alberta breweries. And during the summer months, he brings in musicians – overlooked Canadian talents such as Suzie Vinnick, recipient of the 2008 Canadian Maple Blues Award as Female Vocalist of the Year. “The musicians stay here over the weekend and interact with the guests,” he says. “It’s all very casual.”

Local moose gather daily at the mud wallow alongside Alberta's Mt. Engadine Lodge. The site is rich in selenium, a nutrient the animals need for bone development.

The overall goal is to provide visitors with a unique experience. Of course, the wildlife also contributes. Later that night, as I’m savouring a glass of wine on the outdoor deck, a large owl makes a screeching descent into a nearby pine tree. This intrusion instantly attracts the attention of the country walkers, who are diligently keeping track of Canadian fauna spotted on their trip. They’re still debating whether the bird is a great horned owl or not when I finally stumble off to my Moose room and climb into my Moose bed.

Part I, III

Photographs: Kerry Banks

by Kerry Banks

From 1921 to 1945, Jericho Beach was home to the Pacific Coast Station of the RCAF, and a concrete wharf was built as part of its seaplane base. The structure’s perimeter was later enhanced during the 1976 Habitat Forum, using the original 1938 railings from the Lions Gate Bridge.

___________________________________

“But many complained that the wharf

had become an eyesore, and in July 2008,

 the Parks Board voted to demolish all

but the most eastern section of the structure

____________________________________

But many complained that the wharf had become an eyesore, and in July 2008, after a public consultation process, the Parks Board voted to demolish all but the most eastern section of the 0.6-hectare structure, which would be repaired to create a viewpoint overlooking the harbour. Interpretive signs would outline the wartime history of the dock and its postwar evolution, while the remaining area would be restored to a natural beach. However, since 2008, a new Parks Board has been elected, and a group of citizens – who want the wharf repaired and made available for public events – have mounted a fresh campaign to save the relic. As a result, a second consultation is being held this fall to decide the Jericho landmark’s fate.

What’s your view? Should this B.C. landmark be saved?

savejerichobeach.ca; kendalkendrick.com

Painting by Kendal Kendrick

by Sonu Purhar

WHISTLER November 12-15: Cornucopia

For anyone who loves food and wine (and really, who doesn’t?), Whistler is the place to be November 12 to 15 – when the village hosts its annual Cornucopia celebration. The event brings together a Mulligan’s Stew of chefs, restaurateurs, sommeliers and vintners, all eager to share their tips and tricks with the public. Event highlights: a Casino Royale party worthy of Bond; an Artisan Market at the Westin Resort & Spa ( a sampling bonanza); and, of course, sumptuous spreads of nibbles, multi-course meals and after-dinner treats. Don’t miss: the Crush Gala Grand Tasting, Cornucopia’s two-night finale, where foodies and grape lovers can sip and swallow the bounty of more than 75 local wineries. Ticket prices vary; see the website for details.

• FRASER VALLEY November 21-22: Bald Eagle Festival

courtesy Fraser Valley Bald Eagle Festival

The folks in Sasquatch Country turn their attention to the skies this month in anticipation of Canada’s third-largest gathering of bald eagles. More than 1,200-plus raptors are drawn to the valley every fall by its millions of spawning salmon, though the birds aren’t the region’s only visitors. November’s cool, damp weather coaxes the bulk of Fraser Valley’s wildlife population into the open, including bears, seals, coyotes and great white sturgeon, with venues from Mission to Chilliwack providing eagle-watching opportunities, jet-boat eco-tours and guided walks through ancient aboriginal sites and around the Chehalis River. Fraservalleybaldeaglefestival.ca; 604-826-7361

Also see: Mighty Hawg Daytripper

• REGIONAL HIGHLIGHT November 5-15, Montreal: Cinemania

The days are shorter, the skies darker, the weather gloomier – what better atmosphere for Montreal’s annual Cinemania film festival? This year’s lineup features the year’s best in French cinema – and with some selections playing exclusively at the festival, it could be film buffs only chance to view. There’s a film for every taste, from the steamy biopic Chanel Coco & Igor Stravinsky to the political thriller Secret Defense/Secrets of State. Non-francophones can also rest easy: the films are all subtitled. 514-878-0082

• INTERNATIONAL HIGHLIGHT September 23-December 2, Rome: Romaeuropa Festival

Every year, countries around the world create stunning cultural productions, most of them unseen anywhere else on the globe – but the Fondazione Romaeuropa wants to change that. For more than two decades, the Rome-based institution has presented a multifaceted event showcasing an inspiring fusion of original international performance. And last year its 60 festival picks drew an audience of 60,000-plus spectators, all eager to witness the latest worldwide masterpieces in contemporary art, from hip-hop to ballet to Indian dance – and this year’s bash is already on its way to topping those numbers. The festival is in full swing throughout November; download program and ticket information from the website. +39 06 422961

Lead image courtesy Whistler Cornucopia

by Rob Howatson

  It is our first night at Kona Village Resort on Hawaii’s Big Island, where Leila and I have been assigned a window seat in the property’s quiet but elegant restaurant. As my wife scans the menu, I watch gentle waves roll across Kahuwai Bay, the surf faintly lit by a single floodlight strapped to a coconut tree.

Kona Village prides itself on being unplugged. Its 125 thatched-roof bungalows, arranged around a lagoon and black- and white-sand beaches, are tricked out like five-star hotel rooms – minus the distractions of air conditioning, televisions, radios and telephones. Walkways are lit by low-slung garden lights and the occasional tiki torch. Guests are issued flashlights to find their way after the evening festivities . . . or, as one young vacationer is now doing, to explore the tidal zone after sunset.

______________________________________

“Did you see that?”

My wife glances up from the menu. “What?”

“In the water, just beyond the kid.”

__________________________________

The eight-year-old is dressed in a crisply ironed shirt and pleated walking shorts, his blond mop perfectly combed. Earlier, he had been seated at the table next to us. Now, the beam of his flashlight bobbing erratically, he turns his back to the sea and stoops to examine a shell. As he does so, a blubbery, white, two-metre-long appendage rises from the water and flops about for a jarring moment before disappearing. The boy does not see the apparition. Neither does his family, happily chatting away in the restaurant.

“Did you see that?”

My wife glances up from the menu. “What?”

“In the water, just beyond the kid.”

I try to describe it, but the best I can do is confirm what I didn’t see. It wasn’t a whale. It wasn’t a shark’s fin. It wasn’t a squid’s tentacle.

“Hmm,” says Leila, returning her attention to the menu. “Calamari sounds good.”

Having logged a lot of vacation miles together, my wife is familiar with my nervous travel quirks. When we stayed in Hilo, for example, on the jungle side of the island, and the power went out as we prepared for bed, I sprang to my feet and began cranking our Wind ’N Go flashlight.

“Prepare the rental car for evacuation to higher ground,” I whispered into the darkness.

Leila rolled over and went to sleep. Apparently, she either didn’t know or didn’t care that Hilo had been flattened twice by tsunamis in the previous century, or that the city lies at the base of an active volcano, or that a week before our arrival, the Big Island had been rocked by a 6.7 earthquake. In fact, Leila slept particularly well that night. I popped a Zantac, stared at the ceiling and listened to the coqui frogs.

______________________________________

The appendage, the two-metre limb,

the white blubbery thing, lifts again from

the water, within striking distance.

______________________________________

After that episode, I vowed to relax. But it’s hard when a little boy is tinkering about in the dark beside the Pacific, oblivious to a lurking sea beast. The appendage, the two-metre limb, the white blubbery thing, lifts again from the water, within striking distance. The boy sees the creature and steps toward the bay to investigate. I scan the restaurant for our server, unsure of what to say even if he should materialize. “Kraken” is the only word that comes to mind – the monster in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. As in “Waiter, there’s a Kraken in my view.” As in, “Doesn’t the Kona coast possess one of the steepest offshore slopes in the Hawaiian Islands – a logical place for a leviathan to ascend?!” Leila senses I am about to do something spectacularly decisive and hides behind her menu.

________________________________________

My flailing, untanned limbs propel me

out of the darkness and onto the barely illuminated

rocky landing with such force that the startled boy

nearly stumbles backward into the sea. 

________________________________________

I bolt from the restaurant and race across the lawn, singeing my hair on a tiki lamp as I round a corner. My flailing, untanned limbs propel me out of the darkness and onto the barely illuminated rocky landing with such force that the startled boy nearly stumbles backward into the sea. Whatever has been crashing about in the shallows is gone. But I notice, for the first time, a wooden sign: Please Do Not Swim with, Touch or Throw Rocks at the Manta Rays. I realize the coconut tree floodlight is meant to attract the gentle winged giants, which move slowly through the shallows and sometimes expose the white underside of a wing tip, as if waving hello. The boy shoots me a wary look and resumes beachcombing. I slink back to the restaurant, avoiding eye contact with his family, now crowded at the window. Leila peeks over her menu. I flash the “shaka” signal (back of the hand, pinky and thumb extended) – a Hawaiian greeting . . . and, of course, surfers’ code for “hang loose.”

Lead image courtesy Margaret Butschler/Vancouver Aquarium

by Sonu Purhar

The morning of the jump, I’m peering through the windshield at scudding storm clouds, wondering if I’ll be devastated – or relieved – if we have to cancel, though there’s plenty of time to mull over both possibilities as we navigate the seemingly endless hectares of the Fraser Valley’s rural heart. Two weeks ago, I resolved to start my own “bucket list” – now-or-never goals to accomplish before kicking the bucket, so to speak – à la Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman’s 2007 film of the same name. Swan-diving from a plane seemed a good place to start. But after persuading a friend to accompany me and booking with Skydive Vancouver, all I can see clearly now are clusters of moody cows.

We’re greeted at Skydive’s Abbotsford office by instructor Gerald Harper, a leather-skinned Aussie with an impressive 14,000-plus jump record and several New Zealand and Canadian skydiving championships. With 32 years in the jump business, he assures us, Skydive’s safety record is equally impressive.

___________________________

What Harper doesn’t reveal, however,

is that two to three skydivers die each

year in Canada.

___________________________

The preliminaries taken care of, he then ushers us into a barn-like hangar hung with world flags and daunting equipment, where, as if signing on for a suicide mission, I shakily scrawl my name across a death waiver.

Just weeks ago, the now-vacant skies droned with the military and civilian aircraft of Abbotsford’s annual July air show, performing aerobatics alongside the 100-plus skydivers who jump daily in summer. The sport isn’t exactly booming, but in 2007 more than 40,000 first-timers took the plunge in B.C., some as old as 85 – no doubt crossing items off their own bucket lists. Today there’s only one other newbie, and once she’s down we’re up.

My friend Carla and I trek to the middle of the field on which we’ll soon be landing and eagerly scan the skies. A plane shoots out of the clouds; minutes later, something drops and falls like a brick before an enormous pink parachute unfurls and the snapping wind weaves our predecessor through the clouds like an erratic Mary Poppins. We’re enthralled, rooted to the spot. But Harper hauls us back to the hangar for “training”: a two-minute demo of awkward poses practised belly-down on a battered wooden vaulting horse, followed by “suiting up” in bubblegum-pink overalls – tighter than a disco jumpsuit – with matching cap and goggles. Within the hour, Harper and fellow staffer – and son – Jess, a gold-medal-winning New Zealand skydiver, are herding us across the sodden grass to a rickety-looking Cessna. I squeeze into the cramped hull; the others crowd round like stacks of cargo as the plane taxis for takeoff.

First jumps are always completed in tandem with an instructor, but I’m still caught off-guard when, after just 14 minutes of flying, Harper clips the front straps of his jumpsuit to those on my back. There’s no time to dwell on this abrupt intimacy, however. My new free-fall mate manoeuvres me to the ratty curtain that serves as a makeshift door and pushes it aside. I freeze: cold wind whips my face as I gape at endless kilometres of slate-grey sky. Far in the distance, the earth stretches like a strip of carpet.

Arms crossed tightly over my chest, I crouch on my knees, ankles crossed, as if in rapturous prayer (which maybe I should be). Sprawled 12,000 feet below, Abbotsford’s agricultural expanse appears hazily through accumulating clouds, the airfield just another postage-stamp speck in a checkerboard of green. A screaming wind fills the tiny Cessna, echoing my jumbled thoughts, one more frantic than the rest: Am I really going to jump? For one infinite moment, I hang suspended over the door jamb, staring into a vast gulf of cloud; then we plunge down.

Earth and sky fuse. I’m jerked in 10 different directions, free-falling at 200 kilometres an hour. Air floods my lungs, the wind a giant boot crushing my face. Just before I can panic about death by suffocation: a body-wrenching jolt as the parachute abruptly snaps taut – and suddenly we’re drifting peacefully, the dazzling metropolis of Vancouver sprawled wondrously before us. Harper spins us in a slow circle, pointing out the sights: the white dome of B.C. Place, Vancouver Island’s bumpy ridges and, far in the distance, the hulking mass of Washington’s Mount Baker.

Giddy with exhilaration, I mentally scratch “skydiving” off the list. Next up: bungee jumping!

TAKE ACTION

• Skydive Vancouver: Tandem and advanced skydiving; also offers solo courses for those ready to go it alone. $272. Abbotsford, B.C.; 1-888-738-5867
• Pacific Skydivers: Perfect for newbies (half-hour of ground preparation). $239. Pitt Meadows, B.C.; 604-465-7311
• Whistler Skydiving: Soar over snow-covered peaks. $270. Pemberton/Whistler, B.C.; 604-698-7120
• Victoria Skydiving Adventures Inc.: Bonus: ask about the Exhibition Jumps, which raise money for local charities. $375. Victoria, B.C.; 250-655-4434

Lead image courtesy Sonu Purhar

by Jennifer Patterson

The boreal forest stretches out beneath us, broken only by the occasional sinkhole lake, as we leave Fort Simpson and the Mackenzie River behind. The Twin Otter floatplane lifts west, into the sun – still high in the northern sky – and over the Nahanni National Park Reserve, a 4,766-square-kilometre slice of N.W.T. wilderness near the Yukon-B.C. border and the headwaters of the South Nahanni River. Save for the roar of the engine and wind, our group travels in silence. We have waited all day for this flight; some of us have waited our entire lives to raft the South Nahanni – a Canadian Heritage River that moved Pierre Elliot Trudeau to make it a national park reserve in 1976. Two years later, the area became  the first natural region in the world to be designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

We fly over the canyons and karstlands of the Ram Plateau in the Mackenzie Mountains, where every ripple of rock is lit golden in the evening sun. Shafts of sunlight burst through the clouds and we catch our first glimpse of the Nahanni, its Fourth Canyon and – with a collective gasp – Virginia Falls. In The Dangerous River, my grandfather’s 1954 account of his N.W.T. explorations, he  writes about feeling the vibration of the “Falls of the Nahanni” from 20 miles away. One week later, on August 25, 1927, Grandpop snapped the earliest photographs of the then-unnamed falls, accompanied by Minnesota prospector Albert Faille. Now a lifetime, two days and four flights later, my father, brother, sister and I touch down in the heart of the Nahanni wilderness, as our plane scuds to a stop on the wide and silty river near the campsite above Virginia Falls. My heart skips a beat. This is where my family’s love affair with Canada began.

R.M. Patterson, courtesy Albert Faille

It was my brother, Jeremy, who planted the seed of this family expedition – to mark the 80th anniversary of Grandpop’s 1927-to-1929 paddle up the South Nahanni. Soon I was calling my sister, Sam, in Victoria, and urging her to join us. Her only reservation: our easy raft float downriver wouldn’t compare to Grandpop’s adventures navigating rapids in a loaded canoe, surviving sub-zero temperatures and living off the occasional kill of wild game – epic stories he recounted in five books, numerous magazine articles and over Sunday dinners at the Victoria home he shared with our grandmother. Raymond Murray Patterson was one of Canada’s foremost adventure writers. A legendary figure in our family, he also inspired a generation of Canadian adventurers, many of whom to this day attempt to replicate his journeys into the wild. His first book received rave reviews: The New York Herald Tribune described The Dangerous River as “an emotion of the north . . . recorded, it is not too much to say, in a mixture of Thoreau and Jack London.” The New Yorker called it “truly enchanting,” while The New York Times said its modest writing “betrays no indication that Mr. Patterson realizes what a remarkable man he is.”

Day Two: Virginia Falls to Strawberry Island

Nothing beats the Canadian North for bringing diverse groups of people together – my grandfather and Faille 80 years ago and now the Patterson clan: me, the writer, my father, a retired B.C. Supreme Court master, businessman brother Jeremy and architect sister Sam. Then there’s the rest of our 15-member group: Wall Street fund managers Jen and Laura; Corin, an amateur photographer; real estate mogul James and his 14-year-old nephew Jacob; journalist Michael and wife Vivien; guides Rob, Kaj, Jamie and Bhreagh.

Awoken early the next day by the camp bustle, we are anxious to pack up the tents and follow the wooden boardwalk through Jack pines and black spruce to Virginia Falls. The black-and-white photographs I’ve seen in Grandpop’s heavy, leather-bound albums soon come alive in full sound and colour: the Sluice Box Rapids, now a roar of whitewater, and just ahead, Virginia Falls, plunging 92 metres into the river’s Fourth Canyon. And at its base, dwarfed by limestone cliffs: the three sky-blue inflatable rafts that will transport us 200 km downriver over five days. From here, they are the size of jellybeans. My 71-year-old father and I stand for a moment, spellbound. Over the din of the rushing water, I ask how long he has waited for this moment. His eyes are fixed on the river ahead. “Forever,” he responds.

We could spend hours here, but the river waits. We strap bags to backs for the 1.2-km portage to lower ground through rosemary-like Labrador tea, northern starflowers and kinnikinnick. A dirt trail descends in a steep series of switchbacks, where the waters’ gentle mist falls on us like fresh dew. Southerners James and Jacob are already lounging on a log below, dressed in camouflage gear. They will spend the better part of this trip waiting for the rest of us.

courtesy R.M. Patterson

The Nahanni is the stuff of legends – tales of gold and adventure, trappers and prospectors, of the indigenous Nahanni and those European adventurers, my English grandfather included, drawn here in the quest for freedom and fortune. After the Klondike Gold Rush, placer gold was rumoured to have been found up the Flat River, a tributary of the South Nahanni. But men stayed away, fearful of the unforgiving terrain and the numbers of dead or missing that led to tales of “head-hunting Nahanni.” In reality, the string of murders and deaths by starvation, accident or misfortune along the river were more likely the result of gold, greed or poor planning – in the wake of the frenzied and lawless gold rush. Even when Grandpop and Faille set off from Fort Simpson in 1925, their dream of paddling north up the Nahanni was considered pure suicide.

From a rocky launching point on the beach, we don wet-weather gear: sou’westers, Patagonia rain pants, rubber boots and life jackets. Packs loaded and secured in the 18-foot Moravia rafts, we then settle in, five to a craft, a guide at the helm. The dramatic rust-coloured Fourth Canyon is the first of four to come. At their greatest height, these sheer rock faces – which escaped the last ice age – rise steeply to 1,200 metres, then curve into natural amphitheatres of dolomite, limestone and layers of sedimentary rock that rival the Grand Canyon.

In one of the other rafts, Jeremy and Sam swap old jokes, leaving me, the baby of the family, alone with Dad. I feel privileged, keen to experience the river through his eyes as he trades anecdotes about Grandpop and the river with the guides. His face lights up as he sees for the first time the landscape he has until now only heard about. “The cliffs and this marvellous, calm water flowing through here – it’s just extraordinary.” He points to the shore: “That’s the sort of spot where Grandpop would have camped, on that grassy bank, with a place to beach a canoe.” Further downstream is Marengo Creek, which Grandpop named after Napolean’s favourite horse.

But it isn’t long before the clouds roll in. And just a few hours later, at a rocky camp on Strawberry Island, I lie in my tent and listen to the rolling thunder echoing off the canyons and mountains like bursts of gunfire.

Day Three: Strawberry Island to The Gate

A light mist rises off the river as we launch the inflatables and head downstream toward the Figure 8 Rapids, a stretch of whirlpools, boils and eddies that Grandpop and Faille, remarkably, navigated without portaging. High water has since changed these rapids – now categorized as class III-plus in difficulty. But by canoe, says Rob, the Nahanni has always been an incredibly challenging river to run, so “you can imagine what it was like for your grandfather and Faille to canoe upstream. That’s why The Dangerous River is so talked about now, because it would have been tough to paddle up. It’s too deep to pole, and in these canyons there are no beaches for tracking a canoe.”

courtesy R.M. Patterson

Travelling downriver at about 10 klicks, we soon pass the Flat River and the site of Faille’s cabin, where in 1927 Grandpop stopped on his way to the falls. Faille spent decades on the river, prospecting for gold and trapping furs. But large quantities of gold were never found.

We fall into a rhythm: awaken early, breakfast and break camp. The guides buzz about, prepping the rafts for another day on the river and, in a place where time is meaningless and cannot be gauged by the sun’s position in the sky,  preparing meals that provide the day’s structure. Pancakes and sausages one morning, eggs Benedict the next. Lunches are eaten  en route – pita stuffed with tabbouleh or caribou smokies roasted over the fire. Dinners feature smoked arctic char and asparagus soup starters, main courses of pork tenderloin, chicken curry or lamb kebabs on a bed of couscous. Later, we perch on camp stools, sip tea and talk well into the evening as Michael shares stories of life in Africa and the guides tease Jen and Laura about Sex and the City. But always, the focus comes back to the river and Grandpop’s books. Vivien encourages my father to read from The Dangerous River while Michael takes notes. Jamie, the son of bush pilots, who now studies at Oxford, observes, “What’s most compelling about these stories is the legend that was R.M. Patterson himself. He’s a great writer, but he was also out there living life in a really big, amazing way.”

Day Four: The Gate to Headless Creek

Rob and Kaj, courtesy Jennifer Patterson

The rafting life is making some of us restless. Keen to climb mountains in search of Dall’s sheep, eight of us scramble to the top of The Gate, a narrow limestone passage with 460-metre-high walls, for a view of Pulpit Rock and downriver toward Big Bend, a 90-degree hairpin turn in the river. At the summit, Corin snaps photos and a shirtless Jamie salutes the sun in a yoga pose. I study the almost-bonsai twists of stunted trees and tundra plants, brittle reindeer lichen and low-lying shrubs laden with crimson berries, thinking of Grandpop and the “dreamy afternoons” he spent hiking here, where “the river was a distant murmur through the warm scent of pines.”

We soon pass through the foreboding Funeral Range to the Headless Range and Headless Creek, so named for two brothers whose decapitated skeletons were discovered tied to trees here in 1908, or so the legend goes. In 1927, strangers again warned Grandpop against setting out on another expedition: “Men vanish in that country,” one cautioned. “Down the river, they say it’s a damned good country to keep clear of . . . a country lorded over by Wild Mountain Men . . . the river fast and bad.” The MacLeod brothers’ murder was but one of hundreds of dark stories about the Nahanni. From 1908 to 1945, many more men disappeared, starved to death or died here mysteriously.

Fittingly, that evening on a river-rock beach under blue and pink brush strokes of cloud, Dad reads a passage about Willie and Frank MacLeod from The Dangerous River – ghost stories in a haunted valley.

Day Five: Headless Creek to Lafferty Creek

We paddle past Headless Creek and through Deadmen Valley, stopping at Sheaf Creek. We’re looking for the site of the cabin where Grandpop and the English trapper  Gordon Matthews, his companion on his second Nahanni trek, overwintered in 1928-1929. We pull the rafts onto the beach, and while Vivien and Jamie investigate wolf, bear and raptor tracks in the sand, Sam stumbles upon a rusted stovepipe and a conspicuous clearing in the trees. Further upstream is the likely site of the men’s food cache, where foodstuffs and fur pelts were stored on high wooden platforms to deter animals. We examine sunken cabin beams and the remnants of a makeshift stove, fashioned from an old oil drum, with the enthusiasm of amateur archaeologists. Kaj is certain we have found the site, exactly as Grandpop described it, in a clearing in the trees. Dad’s chest puffs with pride as photos are snapped for posterity. Even Rob and the guides make a note of the find for future trips downriver.

We lunch at Dry Canyon Creek, ride the high-standing waves of the Cache Rapids where Matthews almost drowned after falling overboard in 1928 and enter the dramatic First Canyon, its towering limestone walls the highest yet. Later, at our Lafferty Creek camp, Dad reads from Grandpop’s journals, written in the form of a letter home to his mother in England and published posthumously as the Nahanni Journals.

Day Six: Lafferty Creek to The Splits, a.k.a. “Bug Hell Island”

It is the last full day on the river and we slip into swimsuits in preparation for the hot springs ahead. From here on, we’re at the mercy of the infamous mosquitoes of the North; Rob warns us to keep bug shirts at the ready. Soon enough we reach Kraus Hot Springs, greeted by the sulphur stench of rotten eggs. The rocks in the pool overlooking the river are covered in a brown sludge, the water warm and brackish. Kaj slathers his face with mud, a Nahanni tradition, as a light river breeze keeps the bugs at bay.

We camp on what Bhreagh dubs “Bug Hell Island” in The Splits, where the Nahanni widens as it braids and weaves in myriad directions. Bug shirts are the preferred dinner attire, as dragonflies dive-bomb our heads, hunting for insects. We bat the bugs away from one another. But when the hordes reach class-IV-plus we escape to the sanctuary of the tents, diving in and quickly zipping up the fly. But I still count – and kill – more than 60 mosquitoes that have somehow followed us inside.

Day Seven: To Nahanni Butte and Fort Simpson

It is with mixed feelings that we leave the river behind. Jeremy, in particular, is heartbroken that the trip is almost over. And all of us feel humbled by the epic journey made so many years ago by Grandpop, without the security of experienced guides or their gourmet meals. Soon we are returning by plane from Nahanni Butte to Fort Simpson, where roads replace rivers and hot showers, flush toilets and bed linens await. The group scatters, to B&Bs and frontier hotels, with promises to meet up for a last supper at the only restaurant in town. But like Grandpop, after months of sleeping in the open air, I cannot bring myself to stay indoors. Instead I lie in a hammock in the B&B’s garden, reading and rereading passages from his books in an attempt to prolong the euphoria of being on the river. Later, unable to sleep, I lie staring at the ceiling fan, plotting my return – this time for two weeks,
in a canoe.

Getting There Yourself

• THE OPERATOR Nahanni River Adventures/Canadian River Expeditions (1-800-297-6927). Cost: $5,022.20 per person for seven-day expedition.
• GEAR Quick-dry clothes, hiking boots, rain gear, insect repellent. Checklist at nahanni.com.
• TO LEARN MORE The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) works to protect the 40,000-square-kilometre Nahanni watershed from mining and to expand the park’s boundaries.
• CRITICAL READING The Dangerous River: Adventure on the Nahanni by R.M. Patterson (TouchWood Editions, 2009; $19.95); Nahanni Journals: R.M. Patterson’s 1927-1929 Journals/ed. Richard C. Davis (University of Alberta Press, 2008; $29.95).
• ON SCREEN Nahanni (1962), a short National Film Board classic, following Albert Faille upriver to Virginia Falls. nfb.ca/film/Nahanni l

Lead image courtesy Jennifer Patterson

It is late afternoon when we arrive in Fernie, and the town’s brick buildings are bathed in a soft, golden glow. It is the perfect evening to see the Ghostrider. Many of B.C.’s frontier towns have legends attached to them, but none are more colourful than the “Fernie Curse.”

The tale begins with mining magnate William Fernie, the town’s founder. During one of his prospecting trips in the area, Fernie met a tribe of First Nations people, and  noticed that one of the chief’s daughters was wearing a necklace of shiny black stones. Knowing these stones were coal, Fernie asked about their source. The chief agreed to show Fernie where the stones had been found, with the condition that the prospector marry the princess. But, after learning the location of the coal deposits, Fernie reneged on the deal. The angry chief responded by putting a curse on the valley, saying it would suffer from fire, flood and famine. In April 1904, fire reduced Fernie’s wooden commercial district to smouldering rubble. Four years later, a second fire gutted the entire city. In 1916, more damage was done when the Elk River overflowed and flooded large sections of town. The near-famine conditions of the Great Depression made residents believe the curse would never end.

courtesy library; flickr.com

That’s the way the situation remained until August 15, 1964, when members of the Kootenay tribe, led by Chief Ambrose Gravelle (Red Eagle), assembled in Fernie for the ceremonial lifting of the curse. Mayor James White made amends for the wrong done by William Fernie by smoking the “pipe of peace” with Chief Red Eagle.

Though the curse has now been banished, the memory lingers. On sunny summer evenings a spectacular shadow appears on a rock-face high above the city that shows the form of the jilted princess sitting on a horse with her father, the chief, who is walking beside her. They call it the Ghostrider.

Fernie: Coolest Town in North America – According to Rolling Stone magazine

Today, of course, Fernie is more popularly known as a mecca for skiers, snowboarders, hikers and mountain bikers, and tourism is on the rise – thanks in part to some glowing media coverage. Rolling Stone magazine have dubbed Fernie the “Coolest Town in North America” and Outside magazine ranked it among its “Top 20 Dream Towns,” two points noted by British Columbia magazine when it did a 2006 cover story on the town, entitled “Coolest Fernie.” However, my first impression is that this is one of the sleepiest places I have ever been to. The downtown sidewalks are deserted and it’s so quiet you can hear yourself think. All that’s missing is a dog asleep in the middle of the main street. I dunno, maybe you have to see it in winter.

Joe finds a store that is actually open – a head shop – and begins interviewing the owner, an attractive woman who came here from somewhere else, which seems to be the secret to Joe’s heart. I wander off and end up in a saloon where I drink a beer and watch dust motes drifting in the air.

courtesy patrick 444; wikimedia.org

National Geographic Traveler 2009 Pick: Island Lake Lodge

A 10-kilometre drive up into the mountains gets us to Island Lake Lodge. Situated at the 1,400-metre level, the remote setting packs a visual punch: green-roofed wooden chalets dwarfed by the towering, grey mountains of the Lizard Range, and everywhere you look ramrod straight evergreens rising up out of a blanket of emerald green. There is a beautiful lake in front of the lodge, bald eagles circling overhead and jackrabbits in the parking lot. The air feels like it is composed of pure oxygen.

The lodge www.islandlakeresorts.com/ is famed for its powder snow and cat-skiing operations, but its summer pleasures – fine dining, fishing, hiking and a full spa – are also attracting a following. Recently, the travel magazine National Geographic Traveler published its “Stay List 2009 Guide,” an elite list of 129 hotels around the globe with a transcendent vision that goes beyond traditional hotel-keeping. Island Lake Lodge was one of only 13 Canadian hotels included on the list.

We have dinner on the lodge balcony. Head chef Kelly Attwells recommends the steak. He can personally vouch for the beef, because he bought it at auction. He means he bought the entire cow. “Her name is Midnight,” says Atwells. Hearing that, Janice decides to pass on the steak. She doesn’t want to eat anything that she knows the name of.

courtesy Tom Ryan

During dinner we learn that the area boasts one of the largest concentrations of grizzlies in the province. There is plenty of other wildlife as well. At the head of the trail that leads down to the lake a blackboard lists the latest animal sightings. Today the board reads, “Moose, bear, cougar spotted this week. Make noise on the trails! Keep dogs on leash.” The moose, a 1,000-pound female, is a local celebrity. Every year or two, she swims out to the little island on the lake and gives birth. She stays there until the calf is ready to get around on its own. Apparently, the cow has already has already had her baby this year.

Midnight is delicious and the wine is first-rate. It should be, considering that the lodge has 3,000 bottles in its wine library, ranging from $40 to $600 a bottle. Even so, I’m not sure how Joe can enjoy his. Beside the vino, he also has a glass of coca-cola, a beer and a scotch in front of him. And his foul-smelling cigars are back.

I stare out across the valley at the Lizard Range and its three most prominent peaks, popularly known as “the Three Bears.” A thought comes to mind. “Hey Joe,” I say, “standing out there are the three bears: Papa, Mama and Baby Bear. Which one are you?”

“Bears?” he says. “I don’t see any bears.”

(To be continued …)

Part 5

Part 4

Part 3

Part 2

Part 1

Lead image by Island Lake Resorts

So after a two-year hiatus,  I felt like it was about time for a visit, so I peeled myself off the couch and my eyes from the computer screen, and headed back to the buzz. It was Saturday and Robson was in full swing: jam packed with slow-moving tourists, giggly teenage girls taking Facebook pictures of themselves and muscled meat heads honking at skimpily dressed 20-somethings from their gas-guzzling SUVs.

The first place that caught my eye was The Candy Aisle. This brightly coloured sugar palace is childishly fun. I explored the shelves and shelves of gummy animal-shaped treats and those red ones shaped like lips and big feet. Yum. It really takes you back to your childhood, then reminds you of that trip to the dentist when they took that little screaming drill to your back molars… Ick. It was worth it? Right? Maybe not, but at least now you are a grown up now and can set alarms on your iPhone to remind you to brush your teeth.

Bang-On

Next, I trekked over to the massive disaster that is Granville Street. What a mess! It’s a minefield of rubble, wires, cement and construction debris. Next time I’ll wear boots and not flip flops. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Bang-On, an eclectic, retro, custom T-shirt shop packed to the rafters with funky tees, accessories and the friendliest store employees around. You can spend hours perusing Bang-On’s collection of rockin’ retro prints and picking the perfect tee to complement the print. There are also fabulous sunglasses, belts, caps and a very nerdy collection of vintage electronics. I may have swooned when I spotted a Commodore 64 in the middle of the store.

El Kartel

A few blocks down from Bang-On I found another cool clothing store, El Kartel. This hot spot isw definitely funky, perhaps a bit too funky for me and my wallet, but their 50 per cent-off sale rack had a few pieces I could manage, though maybe not the small, gold, sequined halter top I tried to squeeze myself into. Luckily, there was a DJ spinning hip hop beats, so no one heard my profanities when the zipper jammed and  I got stuck in said small, gold, sequined halter top.

Cupcakes

After wrestling with possessed halter tops, I was feeling bit peckish. My hunger radar lead me directly to the new Cupcakes shop on Robson and Thurlow. If you haven’t tried these delicious $3 bites of heaven yet, you haven’t lived! Diet Smiet, these are worth a few extra bulges in your bikini bottoms. Just suck it in, no one will know

I was almost done savouring my last bite of  the pink and sprinkled “Sweet 16″ cupcake, when I ran into a mob of Japanese exchange students taking pictures of their new monkey balloon hats. In front of me was a very happy Balloon Man (Robson and Bute), blowing up a dozen heart-shaped balloons and counting the stack of $20s in his hands. I’m not sure if he’s there every day, but if you see a large, slightly smug, balloon Elmo, poking his head above the crowd, you’ll you’ve struck gold.

Balloon Man

Candy, cupcakes, funky tees, DJs and balloon animals? Maybe Robson isn’t so bad… I’ll definitely come back for a gander and some sugary snacks this summer!

Journey down the rabbit hole into Lewis Carroll’s zany, hallucinogenic fantasy world – Sunday July 15, when the Community Arts Workshop Society hosts its 14th annual Alice in Wonderland Festival at East Vancouver’s Trout Lake. Attendees are encouraged to dress up in their best Wonderland garb, joining forty-plus Community Arts players representing the book’s cast of characters. Challenge the Queen of Hearts to a croquet shootout, join the Mad Hatter for a cup of tea and dance the Lobster Quadrille – then pose for a photo with Lewis Carroll himself. 1-5 pm.www.communityartsworkshop.com/teaparty

Courtesy of {link:http://www.flickr.com/photos/dm-set/3464173554/} dm-set on flickr{/link}

Got a competitive edge? On July 14, Alice aficionados around Vancouver will converge at English Bay to help set the world record for largest assembly of Alices in one location. 1:30pm. To register: www.aliceinwonderlandfestival.com/alices-everywhere-sign-up

• VICTORIA July 16 – 19: 1st Annual Festival of Food & Wine

This new foodie bash promises to be the event of the summer, with a culinary walking tour of the city’s cafe and teahouse gems, a chocaholics anonymous seminar (profiling the history of chocolate-making and ending with a spread of sinful treats) and the provocatively titled Pig and Pinot on the Patio, i.e., the perfect porker-pinot pairings. The festival kicks off with a gala dedicated to B.C. wines and cuisine, featuring top chefs dishing out insider tips (and nibbles) to the rhythms of live jazz. Events priced individually, with tickets from $10 and $169. www.victoriataste.com

• THROUGHOUT B.C.: July 31 – August 9

The perfect precursor to Whistler’s 2010 Olympics: the World Police and Fire Games, an international sporting bonanza that sees firefighters, police and customs officials from around the world flexing their athletic prowess. Held every two years (Adelaide, Australia showcased the 2007 WPFG event ), this year’s challenge will be hosted by B.C. with events throughout the province: including boxing, the Grouse Grind Mountain Race and the better-than-any-reality-show must-see, the Toughest Competitor Alive challenge. www.2009wpfg.ca/

• INTERNATIONAL SPOTLIGHT:  July 22

This date marks a historic world event: the 21st-century’s longest solar eclipse. Just over six minutes in duration, this kind of mega eclipse won’t be seen again until the year 2132. Best location for witnessing this astronomical rarity: northern India, eastern Nepal and northern Bangladesh. What better excuse to jet off to Southeast Asia http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEmono/TSE2009/TSE2009.html

Related Post: Fresh Tracks (summer 09)

Lead image courtesy a_seph

by Helena Zukowski

1. Royal Soil

It was in Paris in the Roaring Twenties that exiled Georgian prince Nicholas Abkhazi met and fell in love with Shanghai-born Peggy Pemberton-Carter, launching a romance that would span seven decades, three continents and one world war. Separated when Peggy spent two-and-a-half years in a Japanese internment camp and Nicholas was incarcerated as a POW, the couple reunited after World War II and married, beginning a new life in Victoria on an overgrown, weed-infested lot that, over the next 40 years, would become one of B.C.’s most important gardens. (In 1999, it was purchased by the non-profit Land Conservancy, which protects the province’s historical and culturally significant landmarks.) Today, the Abkhazi Garden is renowned for its harmonious use of site, including the glaciated rock outcroppings and Garry oak trees unique to the southern tip of Vancouver Island.

Major Plot Points:

The tearoom’s Royal Abkhazi blend, created in 2008 by Victoria’s Silk Road tea company, with homemade scones and local organic jam. • A Curious Life: The Biography of Princess Peggy (on-site gift shop). • May 17 Plantaholics Sale — independent growers’ unusual plant specimens. 250-598-8096; abkhazi.com

2. Rhodo-mania

Bryan Zimmerman was a Christmas tree farmer when, 30 years ago, as he was clearing 9.7 newly purchased hectares in Courtenay, he had a vision of “creating something lasting” — a unique woodland garden. So to avoid disturbing root systems, Zimmerman worked the land by hand, then took generous advantage of the island’s reputation as one of the best places in North America for rhodos. The result: the internationally acclaimed Kitty Coleman Woodland Gardens, where, serenaded by songbirds, visitors lounge in rustic gazebos or wander woodland paths skirting water features and 3,000- plus rhododendrons. (“Kitty” is the First Nations woman who paddled ashore here in the late 1800s and for whom a nearby creek is named.)

Major Plot Points:

On-site artisan festival, Labour Day weekend. 250- 338-6901; woodlandgardens.ca

Milner Gardens

3. A Touch Of Class

When Horatio “Ray” Milner purchased this 28-hectare Qualicum estate in 1937, he intended it to be a bucolic escape from his hectic professional life. The World War I veteran, lawyer, King’s counsel, philanthropist and Order of Canada recipient, along with wife Rina, found some time to start a garden. But it was the second         Mrs. Milner, Veronica, who was the true visionary behind today’s Milner Gardens and Woodland. A British aristocrat — related to Winston Churchill — and an accomplished artist, Veronica would spend 40-plus years nurturing a serene, unique escape that has drawn such famous visitors as Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip, Princess Diana and Prince Charles. Along with many rare trees, the garden is renowned for its 500-plus rhododendrons and azaleas — anchoring an immense perennial garden.

Major Plot Points:

Art & Photography in the Garden, an artists-at-work event, July 18 to 19, including silent auction, live music and lectures. • Margaret Cadwaladr’s In Veronica’s Garden (on-site gift shop). 250-752- 8573; mala.ca/milnergardens

Ronning Gardens

4. Bernt Earth

In 1910, Norwegian homesteader Bernt Ronning settled a tract of North Island wilderness on a government promise that a road would be put through to Cape Scott. The thoroughfare never materialized, but hikers did — stopping in whenever the trapper, fisherman and camp cook was home to boogie on his hand-hewn “dance floor” and thump out songs on the pump organ. Ronning’s true love, though, was his two-hectare garden — laboriously fashioned out of the rainforest and planted with seeds and tree cuttings from around the world. After his death in 1963, the forest reclaimed the garden, but local horticultural angels intervened. And today the original rhodos in Ronning Gardens bloom alongside trees planted by its founder decades ago.

Major Plot Points:

Twin monkey puzzle trees, once among the oldest and rarest in B.C. (though one of the original pair has died, several others have grown in its place). • North America’s tallest monkey puzzle — 24-plus metres — is also here. 250-288-3724.

Shephard Gardens

5. Beds, Path & Beyond

The garden created by Bill and Marilyn Shephard is a veritable babe compared to Prime Picks one through four, but it has been nurtured with equal lashings of love. The 1.5-hectare property near Port McNeill was a horse farm before the Shephards purchased the land in 1991 and transformed it into the intimate extravaganza it is today — known particularly for its early summer bulbs and perennials (rhodos, azaleas, peonies, tree peonies, wisteria and globe flowers).

Major Plot Points:

Personal tours led by Marilyn or son Joe, with a hand- ful of fresh strawberries or raspberries from the garden. 250-956-4709; shephardsgarden.com

Lead image: Kitty Coleman Woodland Gardens

by Kerry McPhedran

The moon is almost full. Each stroke of our paddles lifts and spi lls lime-green stars.We are stardust. No one speaks.

White talcum-powder beach, turquoise waters – this could be Fiji. Only we’re sun-kipping on tiny island 32, one of the more than 100 islands and islets that make up British Columbia’s world-famous Broken Group off the west coast of Vancouver Island. If there is a sea kayaker’s mecca, this is it. And island 32 is just our lunch stop.

My double-kayak partner, Jennifer, hangs sloth-like, suspended by her pink gumboots and arms off a cantilevered log tossed high by a storm. Guides Natalie and Liz, having packed the leftover guacamole, quesadillas and fruit salad, sprawl in their own sandstone “paradise recliners.” Fellow paddlers Nora, Condrea and Stan are beached in the unexpectedly hot September sun in various stages of digestive dozing, hands folded over bellies. Someone burps contentedly.

On the last day of our trip, I’m rerunning a slide show of trip highlights on the back of my eyelids.

Five days ago, we were seven strangers sizing one another up on board the coastal freighter MV Frances Barclay on her three-and-a-half-hour run down the Alberni Inlet to unload kayakers and their gear at historic Sechart. A whaling station in days gone by, Sechart is now the gateway for the Broken Group and week-long guided camping/ kayaking trips with Batstar Adventure Tours.

Batstar appealed to our phalanx of urbanites because of one key phrase on its website’s “Why Choose Batstar” page: “Unplug from the grid.” Owners Blake and Rhonda Johnson, who packed up professional careers and two kids in Calgary back in 2001 to follow their passion for kayaking, hiking and biking the west coast, understand that time is everyone’s most valuable asset. Seeing us off on the Frances Barclay that morning, Blake cryptically advised: “Forget the city – go to the Happy Place.” We weren’t sure what he meant, but we were willing to look.

Natalie and Liz, hard-core West Coast transplants from Montreal and New Brunswick, expertly loaded a week’s worth of food, drinking water and gear into the single and double Seaward kayaks at Sechart, and our flotilla headed across Sechart Channel to explore the now-protected wild places that make up one third of Canada’s Pacific Rim Park (along with the West Coast Trail and Long Beach). A leisurely hour-and-a-half paddle out of Sechart landed us on the tree-fringed sandy beach of Keith Island – Batstar’s ace in the hole when it comes to competing with the 11 other operators trolling the Broken Group (out of some 60 kayak operators in B.C.). Thanks to the historic 2005 agreement signed by the Johnsons with the Tseshaht Band to train and license Tseshaht youth as sea kayak guides, Batstar guests – never more than eight in a group – have exclusive use of the island as a “no trace” base camp. “There are more than 100 islands in the Broken Group,” explained Natalie, “but only eight have designated campsites and competition can be fierce – especially in summer when paddlers arrive from all over the world.” Not only private, but protected and central, Keith Island is the ideal paddling-off spot for daytrips to the Broken Group’s Inner and Outer Islands. We feel privileged to share this ancestral village site.

An hour after landing, we’d unloaded the week’s gear, hauled the kayaks above high tide and pitched our tents – the only work Natalie and Liz allowed us all week. Not a potato to be scrubbed, not a dish to be washed. I felt like a free-range kid all over again, with grown-ups who let us wander around if we don’t go too far from home, take us somewhere fun every day, teach us new skills and call us when meals are ready.

When Natalie and Liz aren’t planning the next day’s route, cleaning gear or checking weather on the VHF, they’re rappin’ and cookin’ under the white-and-yellow-striped tarp suspended between trees over a two-burner Coleman on a plank. Using local organic ingredients and “a lot of lovin,’ ” they set a folding table with such tasty dishes as curried chicken, basmati rice, wild greens, grilled salmon, even sushi rolls, chocolate cake and fresh-fruit flan. A jar of wildflowers or a sea urchin’s discarded shell decorates our table.

Camp couldn’t be cozier or more comfortable with roomy three-person tents for two, camp chairs around a nightly beach fire and a spotless and discreet cedar outhouse. Montreal-born “Nat” and Liz scamper about like deer shod in bright blue and yellow Holeys, but are amazingly strong, with an easy energy and cheerful friendship that sets the tone: happy campers all.

Each morning we woke to the wild, weird, rattling call of a kingfisher and his blue-winged flash; the smell of freshly brewed organic coffee; French toast and bacon, frittatas and bagels, or pancakes custom-shaped like starfish. At night we sipped wee drams in companionable silence around the campfire and watched sparks fly to the stars. Days ended with Liz handing out hot-out-of-the-pot cloths reminiscent of Japanese restaurants, to wash our hands and face – all part of the Batstar promise of “five-star service, billion-star view.”

But our guides’ true competency played out on the water that first day of paddling, when we opted to explore the outer rim of Effingham Island with its 100-metre-high cliffs and paddle through sea arches, only to find we’d slipped from sunshine into an unnerving wall of thick fog. Next landfall, Japan, and the Pacific swell was building. While the Broken Group’s great appeal is its protected waters for first-time paddlers and open ocean for veteran kayakers, the weather can change from calm to storm in less than an hour. I was grateful we were with guides. Natalie herded us into a tight pod and we made for more protected Dicebox, that day’s lunch spot – peering like Mr. Magoo, barely able to see our kayak’s bow let alone an island.

Once home to nine longhouses, Dicebox today draws kayakers to explore on foot the wave-swept cave whose ocean garden floors are thick with starfish, sea urchins and lipstick-pink lichens. The Tseshaht people called this beach A:ts’:a:tsophshil, meaning “when you’re there it’s so beautiful that you don’t want to leave.”

I wondered what the Tseshaht called Wower Channel, our afternoon paddle alongside a Steller and California sea lion haulout, where hundreds of giant pinnipeds – what Blake calls “eight-year-old bully boys” – weighing up to 900 kilos, groaned, roared, burped and barked fishy-breathed testosterone. “Don’t make eye contact,” I urged Jennifer, paddling in the bow seat.

“Wow! It doesn’t get much better than that,” Jennifer called back over her shoulder as we left the bully boys behind and paddled on into Coaster Channel and back toward camp. “Whale at 2 o’clock!” called Stan. A white flash of belly. Nothing. And then the telltale, heart-shaped spout of a 30-tonne great grey, spraying his valentine from two blowholes 12 metres into the sky. Some 25,000 grey whales migrate north to their summer home in Alaska, and the Broken islands lie smack in the middle of their route. Resident whales, like this one, are visible year-round.

Only Day One, and we were definitely off the grid.

For five glorious September days now, we’ve had the Broken Group almost to ourselves: lazy picnic lunches in sheltered coves, paddling into sea caves, beachcombing for breast-shaped moon-snail casings and hiking past shell middens into an ancient Sitka spruce forest. We’ve gunkholed along rocky shorelines in our kayaks, drifting above the intertidal world of burgundy and orange batstars, pink sunstars, apple green anemones and hermit crabs. Arctic loons, great blue herons, orange-footed oystercatchers and cormorants are just some of the 230 species here. Natalie’s silent raising of her paddle overhead is our cue to stop paddling, be silent and look.

It’s hard to believe the Broken Group was once home to more than 10,000 First Nations people. But the evidence is all around us, in shell middens, in tranquil lagoons where rock-walled fish traps line the shore, in burial caves – and in Ty Marshall, a handsome apprentice Tseshaht guide who joins us halfway through the trip and shares stories his people have passed down from father to son. Traditionally his people have gathered cod, salmon and sea mammals off Keith Island. The island’s timber was used for planks and canoes. Hermit crab shells still rattle from the clothing of Tseshaht dancers.

Natalie interrupts my mental slide show. It’s time to leave island 32 to paddle back to Keith Island for our last night. Magic time: the moon is almost full. Natalie promises bioluminescence – the startling flash of millions of tiny sea creatures always present but rarely visible. We slip into our kayaks and, in the shadow of a neighbouring island, each stroke of our paddles lifts and spills lime-green stars, our hulls cutting the wine-dark sea like laser beams. We are stardust. No one speaks. As we slowly paddle back to our campsite, Natalie breaks the silence. “This is what animals do: eat, travel and sleep.”

Early the next morning, ours is the last boat to slip off the beach. Only our skid marks show we have landed. There is not a ripple on the water. By a trick of light, there is no horizon. The white clouds and blue sky are now the sea. Paddling, I glance sideways at the other kayaks. All are suspended in the Happy Place.

piggy-back paddlers

Not a camper? Check out Mothership kayaking from historic Columbia III.

“The Columbia is coming!” was the welcome cry along B.C.’s coast early in the last century, when a series of stout ships operating under the Anglican church’s Columbia Coast Mission served isolated logging camps, lighthouses, floating homes and First Nations villages, bringing medical help, religious services, Christmas parties and cartoons (an enticement to visit the dentist). Today the cry still goes up, but from kayakers as they paddle around a remote rocky bluff to see the waiting Columbia III, a handsomely restored 21-metre vessel now operated by the Campbell family as Mothership Adventures.

Why this company: To explore the pristine wilderness destinations of Desolation Sound, Broughton Archipelego, Johnstone Strait and the Great Bear Rainforest from the comfort of a mothership, knowing that after a day’s kayaking there are hot showers, freshly brewed organic coffee, Fern’s gourmet dinners with wine in a cozy salon — and a dry bed in one’s own cabin.

Comfort and security for novice kayakers aside, a mothership also equals unique experiences for hard-core sea kayakers. The ship repositions daily for a greater variety of wilderness than camping kayakers can hope to cover. Columbia can also easily access remote stretches of rugged coastline and steep-sided, glacial-carved fiords expedition kayakers avoid (knowing there is nowhere to camp or haul out in an emergency). “We never backtrack,” says Ross Campbell, former coastal logging helicopter pilot and current owner/captain, who knows just where to position guests for their best chance to see pods of 30 orcas in the Broughton Archipelago or beachcombing bears in the seldom-visited Great Bear Rainforest. And while most guests want to paddle rain or shine, they can always opt to stay on board with a book from the ship’s well-stocked library, or to chat with Ross in the wheelhouse as he navigates the many islands and inlets, always remaining out of sight and hearing of the paddlers.

Details pay off: Personal kayaking gear is neatly stowed under cover on the aft deck; a mini-crane system quickly retrieves the double Necky kayaks from the roof; professional sea kayak guides Miray and her partner Luke, born and bred on the West Coast and passionate about their work, help guests embark off the broad stern swim grid — managing the tricky balance between professional service and relaxed informality just right. As one visitor put it: “First class people running a first class operation.”

Day trips can include paddles up river estuaries past lush grassy meadows, lake swims, walks to abandoned native villages, picnic lunches and fresh crab feasts. Wildlife is everywhere. Brightly coloured intertidal life clings to the surf-swept rocks; sea otters and seals play in the kelp beds; osprey and eagles laze overhead and, with luck, wolves or a grizzly lope along a beach. At night, a Celtic tune or two from Luke and Miray and much laughter at anchor in a remote cove, lulled by the cradle that is Columbia III.

Who should go: Beginners and up.

Tips: Book Vancouver to Bella Bella flight early — for cheaper fare (and to guarantee a seat). Take waterproof, not waterrepellant, rain gear; technical inner clothes wick sweat.

Basics: June to October, depending on destination (e.g., Great Bear Rainforest — August and September only). Departures from Campbell River, Port McNeill and Bella Bella. All-inclusive rates (gear, accommodation, guides, meals, wine) run from $1,900 for four nights to $2,850 for six. Themed tours (historical, photographic, natural history) run two, four or six nights ($690 to $2,850). 1-888-833-8887; www.mothershipadventures.com

island fix-you uppers

Why this company: Batstar sets the standard for B.C.’s kayak touring industry; co-owner Blake Johnson is past president of the Sea Kayaking Guides’ Alliance of B.C. Batstar uses the best gear, pays top wages and benefits and rotates staff to avoid burnout.

Details pay off: B&B overnights both before and after each trip allow guests to re-pack gear into supplied dry sacks. Chartering a water taxi back to Port Alberni at trip’s end cuts travel time in half. Only Batstar guests have exclusive use of Keith Island, ancestral site of the Tseshaht Band (a big plus in peak season with only eight campsites in Broken Group).

Who should go: Beginners and up

Tips: Pack everything on Batstar’s excellent gear list; all kayaking, camping and kitchen equipment is provided. September expeditions mean less fog and rain than in summer, fewer kayakers.

Basics: Weekly, May to October. $1,689/person; eight guests, two guides. 1-877-449-1230; www.batstar.com