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' about the
Lakesounds
just
go into Archives on the lower left side of this page.
Rolling over an image will give you its description.
Check out the Picture
of the Day.
22/09/20087:29 PM
Chilly Willy!!!
Fall
came with a vengeance this morning. The temperature
started dropping really fast last night and we finally
had to start a fire to warm up the house. It was just
below freezing when I went to bed and was below -4C or
24F when I got up. The lawn had a pretty good rime of
frost on it and some of my flowers took a hit. The
rest just sat there feeling sorry for themselves and looking
very pathetic.
It was clear and sunny all day today, but it never did
get above 7C or about 42F and there was a ruddy cold wind
from out of the north and west all day. I really
regretted having no earmuffs on my walk today!
I'm going to have to get used to bundling up a bit more.
The first half of September was so nice that we got a
little too used to it and keep thinking we can get away
with lighter clothing yet.
I spent part of the day trying to get everything watered
in well before winter hits. Then got hoses picked up and
drained and Andy drained the water pump that we use for
irrigation. We already lost one to frost a year ago so
we're a little more cautious about 'surprise' temperatures
now. While not everything is picked up in
case of an early snowfall, we're nearly there.
There have been quite a few boats out on the lake slowly
trolling around for fish for the past few weeks, with
fishermen relaxing in the sun and relishing the flat calm
water. Not so today. I don't think I saw
anyone out there on the lake and if there was, they were
far braver souls than I.
The planes aren't flying nearly as much now either. Most
of the resorts are finishing up and Tweedsmuir Air is
probably pretty much done for the season. I did
see one Super Cub come in hard today, though.
I was rolling up watering hose when I heard the uneven
sound of an airplane engine having problems. I saw a guy
coming in over the lake into the wind which was coming
out of the north, just as he should, but it looked like
he was having problems either taking off or landing. It
sounded like his power was cutting out on him and he was
heading straight for our little peninsula before he finally
decided to put her down. Well, he did but not for long.
His floats hit the water and he took a big bounce
and then hit the water a second time and finally settled.
He hit pretty hard but it looked like he had good tight
control of the plane even after it bounced, but for a
while there I was afraid there was going to be an accident
the way his wings tipped in the wind.
It took all of last night and until this morning for the
modem to start working again after it was blasted with
that power outage. I don't know how many more it will
take before it fries completely so if we go off line for
a long period of time and you don't see any articles posted,
that may be why. I wasn't able to get last night's article
posted until today, so if the timing seems confusing,
that's why.
21/09/20087:11
PM
Tomorrow Is Fall
Or
it's supposed to be. I think we might have jumped the
gun by a day though. It was pretty chilly out today
never getting above 12C or a little over 50F with a north
wind. We haven't seen much for wind in the past
while so even when temperatures have been down it hasn't
seemed all that cold. But today I was about ready to break
out the ear muffs before going on my walk. All in all
though, it really wasn't a bad day with mixed sun and
cloud. It did take a long time for the fog to burn off
this morning, though. I think this sudden cooler
weather will turn the leaves on the trees really fast
now. I noticed that our aspen have suddenly gone
from mostly green to yellow and brown in what almost seems
overnight.
Andy, our new neighbour, and Logan went out scouting on
the fourwheelers today. I asked them to see if they could
find my 'Split Rock' meadow and check around for some
sign. They tried pretty hard and covered quite a bit of
country but couldn't find the meadow and never did
see much sign but they had a really great day.
So I think if it's a nice day tomorrow we'll skip the
hunting again and work on the greenhouse instead. I think hunting season is going to be a washout
for us this year. Everyone that has a moose tag
for the regions on both the west and east side of the
highway is saying the same thing. Too warm, no fresh sign,
and we're all thinking the animals are still up high.
I think that the next time we try for a limited entry
hunt, we'll go for October when it's sure to be cooler.
Of course if my luck follows its usual course, we'll get
a tag and there'll be four feet of snow on the ground! We had another power outage today. It wasn't
a long one but it sure played hell around here. Probably
the worst damage it did was knock out our satellite modem.
We were able to reset it after the last power outage knocked
it off line but it's beginning to look like it's fried
this time. The worst part about it is the people that
installed the satellite told us not to plug it into a
surge protector but to plug it directly into the wall.
I'm not looking forward to the expense of replacing
that little puppy. I'm starting to get a little
angry at the power outages around here. The last few have
had nothing to do with downed trees or wind but has had
more to do with the diesel generators in Anahim Lake.
There was a time that the most an outage might screw
up was a freezer but now we all have so many electronics
around our homes, it becomes an expensive proposition
to replace components destroyed by an outage. And of course
you can bet BC Hydro is happy to take your money every
month but you won't get anything out of them because of
an outage. In any case, I have no idea if I'll be able
to load this post up on the 'Net today or any time this
week until we get online again.
As promised last article, I've uploaded a bunch of pictures
from our trip down to the Bella Coola Valley this week.
As usual, you can get a description of each picture by
rolling over it with your mouse.
I've started a new week so you'll find last week's articles,
including those stories written by Chalmer Morse about
Rimarko Ranch at September
Week Three.
Brand
new search engine. Check it out!!
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!
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