The Incredible story of Pan Phillips and Rich Hobson in the Chilcotin Continues as well as snowmobiling around Nimpo Lake.

This is about a remote area in west central British Columbia, Canada called the West Chilcotin. Surrounded by numerous glacial mountain ranges, alpine lakes teeming with wild Rainbow Trout, and full of wildlife. Living here goes from no running water or electricity to spacious log homes with all the conveniences and without the smog!
If you would like to see pictures of wildlife, mountains, lakes, exciting snowmobiling, events and more, and read stories like 'Lake Monsters' - just go into Archives on the lower left side of this page.
You can search this site for a subject of interest to you at the bottom of this page.

01/03/2006 11:24 AM

Happy First Day Of March

Unlike other areas, the first of March is still winter for us. I have to laugh when the newscasters mention spring bulbs flowering and they speak of the Home and Garden show in Vancouver. It's amazing what a difference there is in weather between our region and Vancouver, only 300 miles to the south of us, especially this time of year.
The night before last, our temperature dipped to -27C or -20F while last night we were a balmy -16C. The mill went to a later shift at the planer, starting at 10:00 in the morning rather than 6:30 after it had warmed up a bit. The machinery has a tendency to break at lower temperatures and hydraulics don't work properly at all. Never mind that it's a little hard on the people as well.
Years ago when I worked at the mill the shut down temperature was supposed to have been at -31C but I remember one night shift when we worked to -37C or about 35 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. There was a 25 mph wind blowing and frozen feet and hands were the order of the day. I don't know how low the temperature would have been if you took the wind chill into consideration, but I sustained severe frostbite on my legs while we all watched each other carefully for the white marbling on cheeks and noses, a sure sign of frostbite. Unfortunately, when you're stuck standing in one position for eight hours a day with no opportunity to move around, it's much harder to stay warm. To this day, my legs go numb as soon as the mercury dips below freezing.
We used to try to convince our bosses that the low production due to machinery and hydraulics not working properly could not possibly pay our wages, never mind the cost to the mill to repair machinery that broke down from stress in the cold. Our pleas fell on deaf ears. It's nice to see that mill management has smartened up a bit on that point.
Cooler temperatures have kept our snow on the ground so for anyone wanting to enjoy snowmobiling, cross country skiing or winter hiking, this is a great place to be for your winter vacation.
Just a reminder to everyone that if you would like to come see our beautiful area this summer, you might want to start booking your vacation now. You can go to the Resorts , B&B or Motels and Campgrounds pages to check out accommodation, while pages such as Summer Recreation , Fishing , and Tweedsmuir Park will give you a little taste of what we have to offer. Don't forget to visit the Photo gallery to see wildlife in the region or just see how beautiful our lakes, mountains and sunsets are in the Anahim Lake and Nimpo Lake areas.
Just to let you know, I won't be around for a few days and won't have access to a computer, so no blog until next Tuesday or so. In the meanwhile, Happy March!

28/02/2006 12:27 AM

B.C. Canada House in Turin, Italy

Newscasters have been touting the log building made of beetle kill pine for weeks now. Unfortunately, in footage of the building on the television, the blue stained logs just made it look grubby on the outside. Better lighting from TV cameras on the inside improved the look somewhat. Not to blow my own horn, but 17 years ago I was pointing out to co-workers at the mill how beautiful the blue stained pattern in some of the wood we were running was. The mill that I worked at between Anahim Lake and Nimpo Lake in the late '80's was one of the first to ever process beetle killed pine. In fact, to the best of my knowledge, the portable mills huge as they were, were designed specifically to process beetle kill logs in the Chilcotin where the infestation had gotten 'out of control' according to Forestry.
As I saw more and more of the wood come past my station - (I'm a lumber grader) - I started picking out pieces that were particularly spectacular in pattern and color. A fellow grader that was building a house on Nimpo Lake was just in the process of putting in his ceiling when I started pointing the blue stained and pink, heart stained, wood out to him. He decided to do an interlocking pattern on the ceiling using both colors of pine, and to this day it's one of the most striking ceilings I have ever seen.
I learned a few years later that some smart cookie in Prince George actually patented the name 'Denim Pine' that describes the beetle killed pine in British Columbia.
The reason that the B.C. Canada House in Turin looked so grubby in pictures is that the beetle killed pine has a wide variation in color from a very soft, delicate blue that looks like puffy clouds on sky, to sharp lines of dark steel blue in the wood. It is best appreciated close up. The color is often accompanied by tiny black pinholes that are actually made by the larvae as they feed on the tree through winter and exit in spring. The patterns are awesome and no two logs or boards are the same. Unfortunately, the forests they are in the process of decimating is not. You can learn more about what's happening to us locally at The Mountain Pine Beetle attacks Nimpo Lake.
I was glad to see that since the Olympic winter games are coming to our province of British Columbia in 2010, that at least the organizers were able to put a positive spin on the Pine Beetle devastation that we are experiencing. Perhaps, if nothing else, we can market the wood and wood buyers the world over will decide that our product is a must have.
As an end note, congratulations to all our Canadian Olympic Team that represented our country in such a competitive and dignified manner. Well, except the men's hockey team. That's when that truly Canadian term really applies.
Eh?
What the heck happened there?
Oh yeah. The millionaires. The prima donnas. Maybe we should go back to the amateur teams. I think they might put a little more guts and determination into the Games than that bunch we got stuck with in Turin.

27/02/2006 10:22 PM

Snowballs!

It took a long time, but we got snow! It took most of Saturday night and yesterday to accumulate about four inches of snow because it came down in tiny little flakes, but it's dense and it won't be disappearing soon. Barring a really unusual warm spell, that is. Three of the guys from Nimpo Lake went out snowmobiling yesterday and stayed low because of the snow. The light was flat and visibility poor in the open areas so there was no point in going up the mountain. Trails were nice through the trees though and it sounds like the guys had a good time touring around breaking old trails and making new ones. It also sounds like we need to get a work party together sometime before spring to widen some of the trails slightly. Sometimes just taking out one small tree here and there can make a tight trail so much nicer and reduce your chances of falling into a tree well or bending a ski or trailing arm on your snowmobile. We've also had beetle kill trees fall onto our trails and some of the old wagon roads that we use so those need to be chopped out. We all try to minimize the size of our trails. Tearing up the bush, which in this country is a very sensitive ecosystem, isn't on anyone's agenda. I think we're all pretty conscientious about our local environment and other than doing turns on local hay meadows, we stick pretty close to the trails most of the time when riding at lower elevations.
The weather people are warning of a real avalanche problem right now. Heavy snowfalls with a recent melt and winds have created the perfect conditions for that 'slippery slope'.
I was really surprised at the quality of snow we received the last day or so. It's very, very heavy, dense snow. It's 'squeaky' snow, the kind you normally would have after very cold temperatures and it lays on top of sugar snow with an icy crust that is very slippery. If we got much buildup at all in the local mountains, I wouldn't be trusting any bowl or slope. I think that the avalanche danger risk would be very high, even in our area. Time to wear those avalanche beacons! I'll certainly be wearing mine next time out.
It's kind of odd, but temperatures are dropping very quickly tonight. The weatherman didn't call for anything extreme for us but we're already at -20C or -5F and it's been dropping steadily for hours. I'm assuming that a cold, high pressure system north of us in the Yukon has dropped down much further than expected. The jet stream looks like it's doing some really strange stuff too. Greenland is going to have the same temperatures as Hawaii in the next day or two if it doesn't watch out!
I'm pretty excited because we've got part of my weather station, a Christmas present from my honey, set up now, and temperature conversions have just become a lot easier to do. Just have to figure out how to set the barometric pressure readings for our elevation. We can set the base station but not the monitor. Instructions on stuff just isn't what it used to be.

26/02/2006 12:41 PM

Betty's Grizzlies

This is about Betty's run-in with the grizzlies at the Home Ranch. Betty was driving home to the ranch with their two young children while Pan lay in the back of the wagon. They had been on the trail for ten days and were only four miles out from the ranch house when Pan suggested Betty hop a horse and ride on to the house to get the fires started. The team knew its way and would not sway from the trail home. This way the house would be on its way to warm by the time the wagon with the two children and Pan arrived.
They had been away for six weeks when Betty arrived at the ranch and her old saddle horse began shying away and snorting so she tied him up in the barn and threw some hay to him. She started the two hundred yard walk to the house when a feeling of uneasiness came over her and she could hear growling and crunching sounds from the ranch yard. Suddenly, a bear not forty feet in front of her stuck it's head out of a row of bushes, sniffed then turned around to return to the yard. Betty turned to dash back to the barn when another, smaller grizzly broke out of the bush and made its way toward the barn and the horse tied in there. Betty knew she needed to get to the ranch house and angled toward it as she heard yet another large body crash through the bush. She made it to the four foot high picket fence that surrounded her yard and stifled a scream as she saw the remains of a dead horse scattered over her front yard and two large grizzlies snoozing on her front porch in the sun, while four more bears tore and knawed at the remains of the horse.
Terror came knocking when Betty realized her crippled husband and children would be arriving at the ranch house with the rifle tucked away out of reach under the bedroll, and not have a clue what was before them. She realized she would have to walk past the grizzlies to warn her husband and children up the wagon road. As she tried to ease up the road the first hundred yards seemed like the longest in history and as she went, another grizzly came swinging down along the wagon trail. She beat a path off the road and he passed without paying attention to her, more concerned about the scent of shredded horse meat in his nostrils.
Betty finally met the oncoming wagon and shouted a warning to Pan. He had her climb up and hold the horses with a death grip while they pounded into the ranch yard, he ready with the old 30.06 rifle and his six gun. Shots wouldn't scare four of the bears away, determined to stay with their abundant supper, so Pan was forced to shoot them. As he said, he hated to do it but they were determined to stay, and he couldn't get into his own home until they were gone. All in all, there were twelve grizzlies that they saw for sure. Even though the grizzly is an opportunistic creature, that is a fantastic number of animals to see in one place in the Chilcotin and other than on salmon rivers such as the Bella Coola, I can't see that happening today.
I will not finish the book out. It's a fantastic ending to a fantastic story and you must read the series of books for yourself.
Although some of the locals claim there was some embellishment no matter where Pan Phillips walked, and a lot of color whenever Rich swept through, I do live here and I know the country. Athough you can exaggerate a lot of things, sometimes it's just too tough to bullshit about old Mother Nature, because she can usually throw more at you than your imagination could ever dream up!
I recognize the names of many of the people about whom Rich speaks and writes. I know some of the sons, daughters, grandsons and granddaugters of people from Anahim Lake that Rich Hobson writes about such as Lester Dorsey, Andy Holte, Andy Christensen, and the Thompsons. I had the pleasure this past summer of working with Lester Dorsey's granddaughter at the mill. You remember him? He did a lot of wrangling with Pan and Rich but he's most famous for riding that 10' high contraption built above the harrow described in the story at Wilderness Adventures Feb3 . I'm told Leslie takes after her granddmother, and I can tell you that old Lester sure couldn't have produced such a beauty on his own. This tall, high cheek-boned, black haired beauty with snapping black eyes outworked every two men they put next to her on the retrim chain, and then some. She only worked at the mill for a short time because she was going wrangling for her parents with their guide pack horse outfit for the summer, but she brought home the essence of the true pioneer of this country. Another granddaughter of Lester's that I've worked with in forestry can work ten guys into the ground and still be her smiling, apple cheeked, sharp eyed self at the end of the day before she goes to shoe up a bunch of horses.
I'm hoping that in years ahead, I can pass on the story of many of the people who didn't write a book - but not only did they pioneer this country, they have been strong advocates for preserving the region all of their lives. Those same people, as well as their sons and daughters, helped to create the RoundTable, a group of vested 'shareholders' in the resources of our area, including ranchers, guides, outfitters, trappers, resort owners and community members in general. The RoundTable process created by these people is now used as a model by many modern land practice groups throughout British Columbia and the rest of North America.

25/02/2006 2:11 PM

Disaster At The Home Ranch

Back to Rich Hobson's final book where Gloria's premonition about the Home Ranch comes true. During the vicious Arctic blizzards of the winter of 1948/1947 bodies at the Home Ranch consisted of Pan, his wife Betty, two small children and their fifteen year old hired hand, Shag. Pan had been feeding cattle about three miles from home near the stackyards and on one of his outings he found a partially eaten heifer killed by wolves. Over the days, as the blizzards raged on, Pan could no longer buck the growing drifts with a team and wagon to the feeding grounds. The only thing for it was for Pan to saddle up a good strong horse, buck his way around the worst of the drifts to get to the cattle, throw them hay over the fence, open up their water holes and set traps around the slain heifer for the wolves.
The only problem with the whole plan was that Pan chose his big stallion, Wang Leather for the job, and he'd only been ridden three times before in the breaking pen. But Pan decided he would be big enough, and strong enough, to break through the drifts.
On the third large plunge across the drifts the heavy wolf traps slung from the saddle horn slapped Wang Leather in the shoulder and the horse folded in the middle and started bucking hard. The first time the traps arced around they hit Pan in the midsection with an impact so hard blood spurted from his nose and ears. As the horse jumped a second time the heavy traps hit him in the stomach agian with as much force as the first time and before blacking out, he freed himself from the stirrups before the horse could drag Pan to his death.
The weather finally calmed, the thermometer began to plummet and Pan lay freezing to death in a pool of his own blood. Finally, Betty and Shag came with a horse pulling a travois, bucking through the hole in the drifts broken open by Wang on his return to the barn with a beaten up and empty saddle.
For ten days Pan lay at the ranch house in the gravest of danger, his stomach distended with blood, his hips and back a painful mess.
The weather finally cleared enough for Shag to ride the big stallion, Wang Leather around the Ulgatchez Mountains (then known as the Algaks) to where someone could call in a rescue plane on skiis to pick up Pan. Shag embarked on an incredibly heroic ride of seventy five miles to Anahim Lake over a little marked trail through deep snow, hard snow drifts, dark woods and across icy lakes in twenty four hours, more than half of that time in the dark of night.
When Pan finally arrived at hospital he was told that aside from internal injuries, his pelvis was split over an inch apart, the muscles had been torn from his hips, and if all went well, he might heal up well enough to walk in about nine months and someday he might actually ride a gentle horse. Of course Pan was having none of this.
He was rigged up in traction and it didn't take him long to decide he didn't need to be in traction at the hospital if he could rig up the same thing at home. He left the hospital in a few weeks and eventually mended enough to get around on crutches sometimes, and the rest of the time still used the traction at home following the doctor's blueprint to mend himself.
In the meanwhile, Betty did an incredible job of holding the ranch together, feeding and moving cattle into the grizzly infested summer range in the Itcha Mountains, getting in hay, firewood, and killing a moose for the larder. In September of 1948, nine months after Pan's accident she drove her children and crippled husband, who lay in the back of a wagon, the 200 miles to Quesnel for a check up with the doctor.
Surprisingly, Pan was healing well but the doctor told him he was still taking a chance of being crippled for life if he didn't go to Vancouver for some operations. Pan refused of course and was riding in the wagon when they returned to the Home Ranch. It was on this homeward trail that Betty ran into the grizzlies.
I'll continue with this tomorrow, although I really should have everyone go scrounge up the books that Rich Hobson wrote because every single one of them are well, well worth the read and I haven't even begun to cover all of the incredible stories in the books.
Last night hit about -30C or 20 below zero Fahrenheit and was very clear. Today started out really clear and cold but a light, high overcast moved in fairly quickly. We are supposed to see our temperatures warm up a bit and a little snow in some areas. We sure could use some of the white stuff here! Looks like the guys are going out sledding tomorrow, but I think I need to get some work done, but we'll see. It seems the trail smoothing job went well yesterday so at least a person won't get beat up too much on the bumps to Hooch Main.

24/02/2006 1:09 PM

Staying Low With Snowmobiles

Yesterday was a remarkable day for sledding. We were so tired when we came in last night that I just wasn't up to writing. So I'm sorry about missing yesterday's article but sometimes you just gotta have fun!
The day started out cool but clear. About the time we all met at Dot Island on Nimpo Lake, a fast moving storm cell was moving overhead. We got out of it at km14 on the Charlotte Main but you could see it was going to be a blustery day, so we chose to go on the Telegraph Creek Trail. It was deactivated years ago, which means that every hundred yards or so a deep ditch has been dug across the road. As per their agreement with the community and natives to protect the backcountry from wholesale hunting, etc., this was done by the mill after logging was finished in the area. You don't want to hit those ditches too fast or wrong but they can be fun if you know they're there and can get air. Snow conditions on Telegraph were beautiful and the trail wasn't beat up like those that saw 19 inexperienced riders go over them a couple of weeks ago.
We stopped for lunch on Whisper Lake that is said to have fine Rainbow Trout fishing in summer. It's a little lake hidden in a basin surrounded by hills and a steep little trail winds down to it. The wind was blowing pretty good but we found a protected spot at one end. The wind must have deposited all the snow there over the winter because there were several feet of sugar snow piled up on that end. If you stepped off of you machine you were not going very far without wallowing in snow.
From there we continued on up to meet with the trail that takes off to Goat Pass. There you could see the wind blowing snow sideways off of the mountains and we decided we definitely were not going up to Trumpeter. We continued down to km 24 on Charlotte Main and then down a trail to Charlotte Lake. These trails have all been trimmed up and marked by the our small group of regular snowmobilers over the years. Periodically we've formed a work party with saws, axes, stakes and ribbons to cut narrow trails that disturb the surrounding country as little as possible, but that still allow us access to the high country, or in the latter case, to go see our friends over on Charlotte Lake. There are about five full time residents on the lake that live without electricity except for those folks that have set up solar systems.
We had an enjoyable visit with Fran and Alice on Charlotte who told us the Charlotte Lake road had been plowed and so we wouldn't be able to return home by the route because there wouldn't be enough snow for the machines.
The hard, crusty snow due to the cold weather had been causing us a some grief yesterday because not enough snow was flying up from the tracks to keep the big powder machines cool. Even my machine can have overheating problems if I go too slow over hard trails, but I now have scratchers on my rails and that made all the difference in the world yesterday.
We backtracked to Charlotte Main and checked out a few meadows along the way. One meadow hayed in summer by the natives had old horse drawn equipment on it and I recognized the type of horsedrawn hay rake I used to have to ride as a kid during haying season. It was kind of neat seeing the newest of new machines (snowmobiles) parked next to a piece of equipment that had probably been built in the Depression era.
There was some nice snow on these little pocket meadows with no rocks and they offered a great opportunity to practice deep turns on the snowmobiles. The snow was deep enough to lay the machine on it's side but not so deep that you would get stuck if you laid it over too much or lost too much speed. It's been a few years since I've had the opportunity to practice and I had a lot of fun but my back and shoulders sure feel it today. The whole idea of this maneuver is that if you get into a tight spot and need to make a turn in a very small area, you stand on your machine, get speed up, lean out in the direction you want to go hanging on to your mountain bar and turn the skiis in the opposite direction of your turn. Amazingly, you can execute a turn pretty fast in a very small area. I was just practicing holding the machine on its side in a straight line but it takes a tremendous amount of energy to hold the machine up in this position. Andy and Logan were also practicing the turns and both are a lot better at executing full turns than I, although they also came off their machines few times. That's why you practice. It's a real balancing act to hold the machine at exactly the right position. It's sure beautiful to watch a good rider do it though. I've put some pictures up on the right showing Andy doing some excellent turns. Logan executed some beauties as well but I didn't get the camera on him quickly enough. Up until Andy told him yesterday about turning the skiis into the opposite direction of travel, Logan had been pulling his machine over with brute strength and not a little balance which takes a tremendous amount of energy. But he rode motorcycles for years and you can see that in his riding.
We're all looking forward to a couple of our riding buddies arriving in March that are summertime residents on Nimpo Lake. Henry, who is in his eighties used to race motorcross bikes and is still a hard act to follow. I'm also looking forward to some folks coming down from Quesnel in March to ride with us. I'm just hoping the snow will hold up at lower elevations so we don't have to trailer our snowmobiles.
All in all, it was a great day yesterday with a small group, good to excellent riding ability, and really nice snow on the trails. Other than those trails that got beat up so badly by the large group a few weeks ago. A few of the guys are going out today to try to groom them. Some years ago Lloyd collected some heavy conveyor chain from the mill and welded it up for a neat little trail groomer. It got down to -25C or about -10F last night and is still cool today so hopefully they can still smooth the trail out even if it is frozen.

The Flood

The years 1947/1948 were arctic blizzard and flood years. According to Rich Hobson in his third book "The Rancher Takes A Wife", he was told the weird weather had to do with the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima that created extra dust in the air and changed weather patterns. Who knows? Maybe it's true.
In July of '47 Gloria received a message that her aunt living in Vancouver was terribly sick and Gloria left Rimrock Ranch to rush to the woman's side.
Late in the afternoon after Gloria left, Rich noticed ominous clouds building up, turning day into night and and blinding flash after flash of lightning heralded an unbelievable downpour that lasted all evening and until daylight the next morning. The Rimrock crews had just begun haying a luscious crop to carry cattle and horses through the coming winter, so there were two cowhands on the place, one in the bunkhouse with his family, a 'confused' lady cook, and Rich.
They woke the morning after the storm to find the ranch house standing alone above a rushing torrent of water six feet deep.
As Rich watched, he could see his fence posts, uprooted trees and his hay rolling past in the water. He lost his entire crop, both haystacks and hay that had not yet been cut.
The only other things Rich could see in his line of sight besides roiling water were the stables with milk cows trapped inside and a few young calves perched precariously on top of some manure piles.
The cowboy with his family in the bunkhouse rowed over in a wooden dinghy to the main ranch house standing only eight inches above the muddy, still rising water, to inform Rich that his own family was ok and the bunkhouse was still over a foot above water, and then rowed the boat with cowboys in relay to rescue the stranded calves. The calves went into the kitchen of the ranch house while a stranded wrangle mare was put out in the glassed in front porch with some hay. The rest of the horses and cattle had stampeded to the woods and higher ground the night before after a few loud crashes of thunder, and other than a couple of bloated cows that floated past the ranch house the first day, it was some time before they saw the herd again.
The cowboys gathered up a couple of the milk cow's calves and hauled them in the boat to the far Rimrock side hill where one of them held the bawling calves. The milk cows were then let out of the barn sitting in rising water to swim for their calves.
A remarkable scene ensued the following morning when everyone watches as Rich's St. Bernard cross pup swims from the barn yard to the front porch where he deposited the small form he held in his mouth. It was a tiny kitten from a litter born not long before to Rich's pet cat that had taken up residence in a now completely submerged calf shed, and it was still alive. The dog swam back again from the barn yard with another small form, this one no longer alive. The dog continued swimming back and forth between barn and ranch house until he brought six tiny kittens over, three of which lived. A little later everyone turned to see the mother cat dripping wet and purring over her three remaining kittens. No one new if the dog had brought the full grown cat over or not.
The dog had just fathered pups of his own shortly before the flood and the ranch house was beginning to smell and look like a zoo, with three calves, a mare, three dogs, four pups, two cats, three kittens and the mix of humans stuffed into the house.
The water had risen to lay a half inch on the porch floor but had remained stable most of the day and now looked like it might begin receding. Rich Hobson looked out on his Rimrock Ranch and could only be glad that Gloria wasn't there to see their ranch devastated and the probable stock losses.
The remainder of the story about the flood is quite funny in places, especially when Rich's brother arrives with two other friends at the ranch in a car and proceeds to drive into the six foot deep lake now surrounding the ranch because he was busy talking after sharing a bottle of scotch with his friends and not paying attention to what was up ahead of him.
That devastating summer is followed by a killing winter with blizzard after blizzard and temperatures that often held at fifty below zero. Somehow, like many frontier pioneers, Rich and Gloria continued slogging through horrendous temperatures, weather, bad luck, and horrible conditions year after year. They faced their losses with wit and the sheer determination to succeed in their dreams. All the while both Rich and Gloria often recalled her premonition from the year before that something terrible was going to befall Betty and Pan Phillips at the Home Ranch.
For those of you that are new here, last week's articles can be found at Wilderness Adventures Feb3 most of which are about Rich Hobson's adventures in the Chilcotin. ""Nothing Too Good For A Cowboy" and "The Rancher Takes A Wife" are his second and third book on the subject. Hopefully, I can carry on with the disaster that occurs at the Home Ranch tomorrow.

The purpose of this web site is to draw attention to a remote area of west central British Columbia. It is a beautiful area that relies heavily on tourism. The search engines don't know much about the West Chilcotin, Anahim Lake, Nimpo Lake or any of the other small communities in the region and I hope to change that! Even as large as this site will eventually be, there just isn't enough room or time in the day to fully describe this incredible country but I am going to try scraping away at the tip of the iceberg, so join me!

Follow the links, and see what the West Chilcotin is really like!

Cowboys in cabin. photo courtesy of Paul Lowrie.

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