Fort Langley, Abbotsford and a Paddleing Day on the Fraser River.!

I left late and arrived early. Despite heavy snowfall and despite the desperate actions of the numerous idiots on the highways I did arrive in Abbotsford unscathed. Do heart palpatations count.? Two seperate incidents will forever be paramount in my mind. The moron that was passing a transport between Whitecourt and Peers,on an icy highway,with fog prevalent in low areas,going uphill on a double yellow line...as I was cresting the hill.That called for a pit stop.

   

   The other incident happened when I was returning home, it was less tramatic but still annoying.The guy reading his email (assumed) crossing the yellow line in a curve near Cranbrook.What ever was in his hand was more important than the car he was driving. I arrived safe and sound and that is what counts. It was pretty chilly for BC as you can see from the photos of the members gathering in the parking lot.

 I have never spent any time in Abbotsford - Fort Langley before this trip, except to occasionally stop for gas and visit some of Marilyn`s old friends, but I highly recommend it for a time. What a couple of beautiful city`s.Fort Langley from what I saw reminds me of Old Town Canmore. As you can see from the photo`s the weather was quite chilly at about 2-3 C in the early morning as we all got ready to start the paddle at Matsqui Park in Abbotsford. Once we got the chill off of us by unloading the boats it was a very pleasant paddle on the Fraser River. We side tripped with a paddle up a small river near Maple Ridge, that feeds into Hayward Lake, to see the salmon run. If they were running I never got to see them.We only saw floating carcasses in the water in my boat. I heard someone else exclaim that they had seen a large salmon or two under their boat.I was more interested in watching the many bald eagles in the trees and on the gravel pads eating on salmon. I also learned that big brown headed eagles are younguns and not another golden eagles as I had mistakenly thought. When you only see one or two bald eagles a year in Alberta and they have white heads you just think they always have white heads.!

         The 2 white boats were supplied by the Fort Langley Club and they managed to get their hands on a Haida Type canoe. The Red Rogues from Kelowna BC were in the Red Canoe.They sat 13 people in the Haida Rendition Canoe and I heard it was an experience to paddle.I never got that lucky and was quite happy to paddle in the other canoes.The entire day was pretty good.  By the way. When it is 2-3 C you cannot keep your feet warm, even if you do not get them wet...Brr

   After a great supper and an even better DVD release party it was back to Alberta. 3750 kms later I arrived home.  I am officially finished this little adventure and I thank you for following my trip.

                             Matsqui Park near the Fraser River Bridge

                   First Stop near Maple Ridge on the bank of the River

                                                          It was this long...really !

                        Lunch on a gravel bar in the center of the river

                                                       Richard is always smiling

                                                  Rick goofing for the camera

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Merry Xmas to One and All

Getting Excited about Abbotsford

The Video release is on November 19 2011 in Abbotsford BC. Here is the trailer for the video.

Tracing the Columbia Video Premiere Oh, those Brigade Memories! Come to the Premiere of the film Tracing the Columbia-- Saturday, November 19, 2011, in Abbotsford, BC.  It’s going to be a fun weekend. Arrive on Friday so you can paddle with us on Saturday morning, and more.              Saturday is the BIG day Day trip (3 hours) on the Fraser River, from Mission to Fort Langley, starts early (9am) in the morning (Pre-registration is required; lunch makings will be available)             Tour Western Canoeing & Kayaking - where CLIPPER canoes are made. Guided tours will be available at 4:10 and 4:30. Their large retail store will remain open late for those who would like to do some shopping; 1717 Salton Rd., Abbotsford, B.C.             (No host) Supper at Finnigan’s Pub & Grill,  33780 King Road, Abbotsford Tracing the Columbia (the film premiere) is at 7 pm at the University of the Fraser Valley             33844 King Road.             With Reception afterwards If you pre-ordered your copy, it will be available for pick-up. Western Canoeing, Finnigan’s Pub and the University are all within easy walking distance of each other. If you fly into Abbotsford (WestJet) , there is a very affordable shuttle service into Abbotsford. Rental cars are available too. Accommodations We have reserved a block of rooms at Best Western Bakerview Inn, 1821 Sumas Way, Abbotsford, BC V2S 4L5. Call them directly to book, 1-877-336-6156, or email bwbakerviewinn@shawcable.com. Tell them you are with the David Thompson Columbia Brigade to get the price $84 plus taxes. All rooms have a fridge & microwave. There’s a restaurant connected to the hotel—and many other choices for food and drink within walking distance. See  http://www.roomstays.com/hotel/523555 for more details. You must book by November 1! Please reserve your tickets for the film by emailing Katie Stein Sather,  ksather@shaw.ca. Tickets are complimentary for Brigade members, $10 for others. They will also be available for purchase at the door. Space on the Fraser River day trip, in voyageur canoes and a Pacific Dancer (The Dancer is a First Nations canoe, built by Clipper and patterned after those used on the south coast of BC) is limited. Please reserve your spot, and know that we will probably have the boats full. Please email Katie,  ksather@shaw.ca. The cost will be $20 for non-members of the Fort Langley Canoe Club, $10 for members.  Please remember that November is BC’s rainy season; come prepared to be wet.

Missing The Brigade Life I Am !!

I thought I was the only one who seemed to be missing the Columbia  Brigade life. It seems that all the prior paddling partners that I have emailed, all are saying pretty much the same thing. It gets in your blood.
        The 4 AM wakeups,the early morning paddles on the pristine water,the sunshine,the bloody rain that wouldn`t quit, the headwind when you are so near to the finish,the absolute beautiful scenery, the jockularity..jockularity?..yes there was plenty of that. We had a lot of fun. Maybe it was just because we were all away from the steady grind of everyday life.  I know I miss it and that life must go on. In Slave lake Alberta it truly must go on as the rebuild of this community is just getting started. Thanks for listening and go have a peek at the flikr site where I have uploaded a months worth of my life on a 26 foot Northern Canoe.
     By the way I did eat pemmican and flat bread.   The pemmican I can do without, but I certainly understand how it was a life saver. BUT 3 lbs at a sitting...GROSS....

Dwaine`s Flikr Site

We are in Wenatchee Wa.

Unfortunately my trip is over. I must now leave the brigade and go home. Sadly, I am leaving many new friends behind. The Wenatchee World has done an article on the brigade and put me on the FRONT page of the Saturday morning paper. I took a lot of raspberries about being a "rock star" and a "photo hog" etc.I am hoping it was ALL in good fun.!  We had many good laughs all day about this. NALS team was just fantastic for this entire trip. Denny and Delores DeMeyer do not get enough acculades for this. They even took us out to lunch yesterday for a very good Mexican Lunch. This is a recurring theme. We need real good Mexican food in Slave Lake if anyone is listening. On another note , I spotted a Smittys Rest. in Wenatchee yesterday. I was unable to convince the 14 other people to go there for lunch.
      The City of Wenatchee showed up in throngs and were rewarded with fabulous sunshine on one of the hottest days we have experienced since we started. Again I am very impressed with the way people have grabbed hold of the Brigade and made it part of their heritage. The local government and the state legislature both made resolutions based on the Brigade and on David Thompson. How to go Wenatchee. The City claims to be the Apple Capital of the World. It is very pretty in town for sure and you can hear the scatter guns going off on the orchards as you paddle the Columbia.
    The City  fed us a very good BBQ meal and all in all it was fabulous. They had dancing,professional musicians,camp fires and songs and the whole scebang was really great. I had to go to my hotel around 8 Pm as I could not keep my eyes open. Starting at 4:30 AM does that to you. I even fell asleep on the phone with my wife I was so tired..
    I have always loved being on the water since I was a yound kid,if it is in my kayak or any boat but there is a different feeling when you are working as a team to generate the power to get a 280 lb boat accelerating through back waters and eddies. We had an unfortunate incident yesterday that bent our flagpole that showed how people could work together to accomplish things even under duress. I have added up all my mileage and I  only paddled about 478 km of the estimated 1600 to do. Half days (sharing the paddling so everyone gets some) and issues with Power Dams made for a couple of short paddle days. I have some great pictures and videos that I will edit clean up and upload to my flickr site in the next month.All my best to one and all and thanks for following my little adventure.Here is the photo that made the front page of the Wenatchee World.

The website isn`t setup the same as the paper was but it is a very good read indeed.  :-)




Wenatchee World June 26-2011/Kathryn Stevens



An extreme takeout

Hand over Hand and Up the Bank.

Bernie Couldn`t stay awake either !

Denny and Delores.

Oops sorry Buddy :-)

 

We are in Pateros Wa.

June 20

We had a 54 km paddle today to the mouth of the Spokane River at Twin Rivers where we had a decent campground but NO casino.
What kind of organization closes their Casino/Restaurant etc on a day of 87 º F ( 31ºC)  with 150-200 Paddlers coming into the main campground area.? Twin Rivers Casino does.!
The headwind was pretty strong most of the day and we were all feeling it at the end of the day.
Besides only having about half of the facilitys available we all made do. 3 of the showers were broken but the toilets worked and that sometimes makes all the difference.I went down to the Spokane River and washed in the river. A fellow paddler came down ,she walked into the river screamed " It is very Invigorating " at the top of her voice and went back up the hill.I never had a chance to tell her it was only COLD for a few minutes until you got used to it. :-)
June 21 - The Solstice
Split the teams into two as we only had enough paddlers to make it a split. The first team (6 paddlers )did 18 km and then we met them at a very nice campground Take Out. We (6 others) then had a fantastic paddle for 22 km to Kellers Ferry. The National Park is absolutely beautiful, as is the entire Columbia Basin on both sides. We have seen small amounts of deer and actually saw a couple of Rattlesnakes in this camp. I never did see one but did hear about two encounters. On the previous day we saw a garter snake swimming in the river.Tried using Collect on a landline and my credit card was not allowed as I didn`t have a 5 digit Zip code.

June 22
Very Hot at 89 º F. I paddled 22 Km to the Grand Coulee Dam and we had another fantastic National Park Campground.We were there very early and basically had a very easy day. Several people went to town for the Dam tour several of us went geocaching and tried to teach a newbie about it.I do not believe we created a convert.We had fun anyway. Grand Coulee is a very nice town indeed.Snake was spotted here as well.
June 23
The proposed days trip was supposed to be hard paddling with a strong headwind and 73 ºF.We had to move the boats about 20 kms upriver to put in so we were up at 4:30 AM (the sun was up already) and we had all the boats in the water by 7:30.Taking down the tent and packing everything every day into a truck you can actually get fairly good at it.The people who run the grand coulee dam had a large amount of water coming out of Lake Roosevelt when we went by it, so we had a good current for the first +_ 20 KMs.With a good current and a tailwind we were scooting along very well. We got to the crew change and the other team never showed up so I got a 39 km paddle. The problem is that we have 2 canoes and only 14 people in camp. We have to move 3 vehicles so we need extra people. As there are 9 teams there are a lot of paddlers and sometimes we cannot get that extra person to help us move a vehicle.Hence we only get one canoe into the water.You have to have 6 people minimum in a boat as anything less is just too hard.We are averaging 50 - 60 strokes a minute so when it gets hot we need to stop about every hour for a small break.

We are in Inchelium and off to Two Rivers Tomorrow

We had a beautiful day with overcast skys, not to hot and pretty darn Skookum paddling. We started at 7:30 Am which means we were up at 5 AM and tearing down our camp.I finally have everything in one Hockey bag and have sent much extras home with Monroe and Ellen Kinloch. The new people took to the boats with a zeal today which helped as we did a fair day at 44.5 km paddle. When we arrived at this Indian Reservation they had the boats do the figure 8s with the black powder charges and the grand entrance. The Band had the drums and did an official welcoming and prayer. I have left the grandstand so I can blog this. I ahve NO camera as the camera lent to me finally broke down so I am out of photos. To bad because the drum and native dancers are going full tilt with the bagpipes and dancers doing their thing as well. We were fed venison roast and ribs(very tender and not gamey in the least)brown beans ,coleslaw,salad,potato salads and chicken (very tender) breaded and baked. Sorry Marilyn I ate the coating scolding my self all along the way. TWO brownies for desert and a bottle of water finished off a very hard day. Tomorrow will be harder with 54 km as the paddle length. I have no new pictures but I will see if I can upload something nice from before.The Columbia basin is absolutely beautiful all down this corridor.

Happy Fathers Day to one and all.

We are in Kettle Falls Washington

Wow What a great community. Lots of interesting things to see and do. Colville just down the road is the main centre with a Wal Mart etc. There is an interesting restaurant that I really like the name of. We are moving tomorrow with a 50 km paddle to Inchilin. The last two days have been nice with the tent set up and NOT being moved. As usual we went down to the lake (no falls here anymore ) to do a Brigade Paddle and the skies opened up...sigh That is about 12 days in the last 13 with rain. You kinda get used to web feet and damp sleeping bags. I got bit in the neck last night either by a spider or an ant. The rigors of tenting I guess.
The town had a BBQ for us last night with a breakfast this morning for $4.00. The supper tonight is BBQ pig smoked in a huge BBQ right beside where I am sitting in the light rain writing this.I really like the feeling when all the paddles are working in sync and the boat actually lifts out of the water. Yesterday we had an experienced crew and we got up to over 20 km per hour with a current going into Ione.

Jack Nesbit was here at the Museum again last night. I never get tired of listening to him. Proof is I own 2 of his books. One signed The Mapmakers  Eye when we were in Idaho. Tonight we are watching The Shadows of David Thompson and the director of the film will be here in the museum. 

Guess why I like this restaurant?

Cusick - Kalispel Band Drumming


Here is Stan with his new tent sheet!

I am having major issues with the internet and my laptop so no more pics today.

We are in Oldtown Idaho

We arrived in Oldtown today. The bridge is 100 metres away and we will be in Washington.The towns have stood on their heads to greet and meet us. Fabulous receptions and great party atmosphere. Last night we were in Sandpoint Idaho. We arrived soaking wet and cold and nearly hypothermic. The rain never stopped all day. Just about everyone booked into hotels and few people camped. Jack Nesbit the author  was at the
landing at Dover Idaho and gave a talk to the group on David Thompson.He was here tonight in Oldtown as well.

Take off at Clark Fork



Lake Pend Oreille in the rain

My Green Condo



Camp at Oldtown





Found a WiFi

I only have twenty minutes to tell you to go visit Thompson Falls Mo. It is as beautiful and friendly as Libby.

The Brigade Arrives

We had a great turnout yesterday as most of the town showed up for the parade and today they had people in boats. It was somewhat busy. They had a wildmeat soup and totally awesome [ very good from many sources] buns and to die for cookies. Included with the real frontier meal and woodsman ie: mountain man it was  a real treat.This guy above is a local but not the man who made the stew from beans wildmeat etc.

Linda Haywood wife of Local Author

The real joy is in the paddling and the Clark Fork is riding high which means easy paddling downstream.

I have to leave now...