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Published: August 15th 2012
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29th July ’12 Kamloops to Golden, B.C.
After a scrum in the motel’s breakfast room I managed to get a cup of tea and then we set off for Mount Revelstoke National Park. Once again lovely scenery – mountains and forests, like Alaska but with more trees. We drove into the park and then up 32 kilometres of hair pin bends to the car park near the Meadows in the Sky summit – there are lots of alpine flowers everywhere, hence the name. There were two car parks both of which were full so we ended up part way back down the road on a bit of verge. We got out of the car and were instantly attacked by mossies and biting flies, nasty!
Once back up at the top car park we caught the shuttle up to the top and there we climbed up to the ‘Historic Firetower’ which used to be used for fire spotting and where you can get 360 degree views of the surrounding mountain ranges. That done we did the First Footsteps Trail where there was a great metal sculpture of an Indian Brave greeting the dawn (well I think that’s what he was
Mt. Revelstoke NP
Meadows in the sky doing). Then we hiked back down to the car on a trail through the woods. I kept spotting bits of black hair which I suspect came from a bear, which did nothing to calm my fears, especially as I had read you should carry Bear Spray with you at all times and of course we didn’t have any!
Anyway we made it back in one piece and then drove back into Revelstoke town for some lunch, it was 2pm and McDonalds was heaving!! We then continued along Highway 1 following the valley through even higher mountains and had two more stops for yet more walks. When Howard pulled off to do the Skunk Cabbage Boardwalk I thought he was joking, but no, it seems he must have developed an interest in botany…… so we did the walk through a swampy area, being attacked by mosquitoes and looked at the large green cabbage looking bushes (no comment), maybe the flowers when they come out smell like skunks? Who knows…..
The next walk was through the mossies and the ‘giant cedars’, which were nowhere near as big as the ones in New Zealand or the States.
Then back on
the road and our final stop of the day at the Roger Pass Visitors Centre with lots of Columbia ground squirrels scampering about looking cute. They also had 2 avalanche canons near the road which was interesting and inside was a film of them being used. There was a good display board about women mountaineering and the scandal in the 1920s when they started wearing ‘pants’ instead of long skirts. I do mean trousers of course!
Here’s a quote from the Banff Crag and Canyon newspaper of September 11, 1920 –
‘The young women who strut about the street and dine in hotels dressed in riding togs should be soundly spanked and sent to bed……..Pants are made for men and not women. Women are made for men and not pants…’
Thank goodness times have changed!!! In the visitors centre looking at a stuffed wolf we reckon that our Alaskan Lynx may have been a wolf after all, or maybe a coyote – we are soooo good at identifying animals ha ha.
And so finally after 270 miles we reached Golden and the Pinewood Motel – not much to look at from the outside but lovely inside
and with great mountain views.
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