They've just never improved on wool...

...well, except maybe for Merino. I'm a big fan of wool: blankets, shirt & jackets, socks, mitts, pants... It's the best I've found for all these things when it comes to spending time in the outdoors in cool and/or wet environments. Synthetics have a very limited place in my outdoors wardrobe; usually only for garments that are used for fast and light peak bagging, or when you you know you won't be spending any significant amount of time outside.

Wool is warm, resists body odours for a looooooong time, layers well, isn't restrictive or bulky, maintains insulative capacity even when quite damp, and can be worn near a fire without fear of melting or getting wholes in it. A distinct advantage when in the outdoors. When your clothes get wet you get hypothermia, real fast. Anywhere in Canada this is a danger, 12 months of the year. Being able to dry clothes by the fire is essential!

I recall one time when fishing on the Skagit river in the cascades, when my waders developed a slow leak in the left boot. I was wearing socks made from polar fleece, which of course ended up quite wet by day's end. No problem I thought, I'll dry them out by the fire tonight. Well, I set them up by the fire to dry all right, and momentarily forgot to tend to them. The result: Melted plastic goo! Ugh... good thing I brought extra socks!

A few weeks ago I was snow shoeing in the cascades and my socks got wet again. This time however I was wearing wool! Once we got the fire going in the stove, I laid the wool socks (2 pairs) out flat directly on the hot cast iron stove to dry. I left them there for probably 20 minutes with no ill effects. When I put them back on they were toasty warm and dry. Try doing that with synthetics! Moreover, the whole time they were wet, my feet stayed warm so long as I was moving. Even more interesting, I tried out Mors Kochanski's tip of removing my shoes and walking directly in the snow with my wool socks! While it wasn't an extensive test, my feet never the less didn't freeze, and the snow seemed to be sucking the moisture out of the sock.

There are some down sides to wool that should be acknowledged of course. The coarser stuff can be itchy (Merino solves that), it's heavier than synthetics, doesn't dry out as fast in the sun, and moths could eat it. But overall in my opinion the benefits outweigh the drawbacks by a wide margin for outdoors trips, especially extended ones. The resistance to body odours is of inestimable value. I once wore a wool base layer for 1 week straight, day and night, before it finally began to smell a little bit! Synthetics seem to pick up body smells immediately by comparison.

So if you haven't already tried some good old fashioned wool clothing, and other apparel, I highly recommend doing so. There's a whole industry dedicated to getting people to spend their hard earned dollars the latest "High Tech", "Tactical" outdoors "Gear"; and it's all so much baloney! The good old fashioned stuff wins out almost every time. Why bother spending money on the "latest, greatest" stuff that you "absolutely MUST have"(<-- according to the manufacturer / marketer of course!) if you plan spending time in the woods? Spend a bit of money on some quality wool apparel, and enjoy for years!

From spring at the beach to winter in the mountains....

Last weekend was pretty amazing! It was a genuine study in contrasts, going from this:


To this:


Within a space of 24 hours!

We had planned to spend Sunday snowshoeing in the Cascades east of Vancouver, but hadn't planned at all on spending Saturday exploring the beach. But when we woke up Saturday morning the Sun was shinning (I mean REALLY shinning!) marking the end of a solid 2 weeks of non-stop rain. So we got our butts in gear ASAP and headed down to Wey-Ah-Wichen park to see what the Sea had to offer.

Bracket fungus isn't too hard to find. Not too sure what this species was though!


Last summer's blackberry bushes could still be found.


This moss looks an awful lot like sphagnum, but I'm not yet that much of an expert to be sure.



This guy seemed to be having a bad day:


He was going all to pieces!


All in all it felt pretty damn good to soak up some warm January sunshine for a change... as these guys would probably agree:


The next day we were up early and out the door in search of snow! The Fraser valley is green and wet, and it feels like spring. High up in the mountains though winter has a firm grip on the land. Soon after the town of Hope we left the valley far below as we gained elevation, and took in some fantastic mountain vistas. And while it had started raining again down in the valley, the high peaks of the Cascades held back the moist air off the pacific and left us with another sunny day. And so, soon enough we were tramping along, all smiles, through this stuff:


The difference in the forest between the lower mainland and the mountains is quite striking! In the valley Douglas fir and Cedar dominate. But up here at over 1300 meters in elevation its mostly spruce, with only a few firs and cedars.



Along the way we stopped to pick up conifer resin at every good opportunity. It would come in handy later on for fire lighting. At the halfway point we arrive at a little bridge over the outlet of a small lake. We sat down to have a delicious meal of Saucisson, cheese, pickles and pear cake.


I honestly can't understand why people spend money on high processed "performance" foods which make all kinds of foolish claims regarding their "scientific formulation". Frankly, it's all a bunch of food marketing non-sense! And besides, it all tastes like CRAP! Why eat that shitte when you can eat real food? Anyway, soon after sitting down we were (VERY!) quickly joined by some not so shy Whiskeyjacks who seemed to share the same opinion!



Typically you're not supposed to feed the wildlife, but some of them are so damn persuasive that you just can't help yourself!


Caught in the act!!! Here's a fitting description of the whiskeyjack from Wikipedia "Gray Jays readily capitalize on novel food sources, including food sources introduced by humans living on or passing through their territories. To the frustration of trappers using baits to catch fur-bearing animals or early travelers trying to protect their winter food supplies, and to the delight of modern campers, many individual Gray Jays quickly learn that we can be an excellent source of food, even coming to the hand for bread, raisins, or cheese. Such familiarity has inspired a long list of colloquial names for the Gray Jay. In addition to the once official ‘Canada Jay,’ there are, meat-bird, camp robber, venison-hawk, moose-bird, gorby and, most notable of all, ‘whiskeyjack’. This a corruption of an aboriginal name, variously written as wiskedjak, whiskachon, wisakadjak, and many other variants, of a mischievous prankster prominent in Algonquian mythology."

What was even cooler, was seeing one of these!


This is a picture of a long tailed, white weasel... and it's not my shot! These little guys move really fast, and I couldn't ready my camera before he had run far enough off into the woods to make a shot not even worth it. He had apparently been under the bridge and once he realized that we were going to stay a while he apparently decided to bug out. He seemed a little miffed as he went!

Soon we were back on our way, and as the sun began to go down the water vapour that it had created over the frozen lakes began to crystallize in the air. It was quite a sight!


After packing up the snowshoes, we headed over to the group camping area where BC parks (yes, we were in a park...*sigh*) is generous enough to allow you to light a fire, in a stove no less! While this wasn't ideal, I try not to pass up any opportunity to practice our fire lighting skills. Being able to light a fire in any and all conditions is pretty important when you spend time in the outdoors, and we're definitely not there yet. While the theory is simple enough, real life experience is what is truly required.


We had brought some wood from town (would be able to gather any in the park!) and soon set to work on splitting it up. Once that task was done we hunted for dry twigs in the woods. We gathered up a BIG bundle, and set down to get the fire going. While the twigs did light, it wasn't easy getting them to turn into a real blaze. They were sort of wet, which really sapped strength from the fire. You had to hold the bundle together, and try to make it as vertical as possible in order to get some heat to build up. This was not easy with everything sitting in a stove! What really did the trick was using the conifer resin along with some fuzz sticks! Conifer resin just keeps on burn once it's lit, and it allowed us to get enough of the twigs going to finally get the fire established.


Once the twigs are really burning, you have to have LOTS of small, dry, split wood to really get some heat going. And be sure to preheat your fuel!! This really makes maintaining the fire much easier!

Once the fire was going we collect some snow outside and got a brew going with some pine needles picked earlier in the day. Sitting there wool sock drying on the stove, pine needle tea on the brew, feet up and relaxing was a pretty great way to end the weekend. Soon enough it was time to pack up and head back to the valley far below, and start planning the next outing!

Winter in Gatineau

I'm back in the Lower Mainland after having spent a week in the Ottawa area for the holiday season. Most of the time was spent with family, but I did get outside at least a few times... thankfully!

One day was spent on the snowshoe trails in Gatineau park. For those who don't know, Gatineau park is a rather large (363 km2) park to the north of Ottawa. It is operated by the federal government, and is one of the hidden gems of the Canadian parks system... but it's not officially a National Park! I highly recommend spending some time there, preferably in the less well traveled areas, if ever you're in the National Capital Region. With an observant demeanor and a willingness to explore you're bound to come across many natural wonders.

As for our day out, it was a good day and made a much appreciated change from sitting around at my parents home all the time. There was snow a plenty and the occasional sunny break! This old barn made some nice pictures.



The forest here is full of paper birch, white pine, red pine, some cedar, and Balsam Fir!


If you're interested in plant identification, including trees, try smelling them whenever you can! Your sense of smell triggers memories and recognition far more powerfully that visual stimulus ever could. For me, nothing smells like Christmas like the smell of a Balsam Fir!

There were also lots of mushrooms around like Horse's hoof fungus, or this yellow ball thing, found on a birch, which I have yet to identify:



Or these things:


Which again, I have yet to identify! If anyone has the answers (or even suggestions!) please let me know!

On our way home we stopped to try fire lighting in cold weather. It was about -12 C. The whole affair was rather rushed as it was getting on and we were expected for dinner that night. Still, using a small twig bundle, some dead pine branches, cattail fluff, birch bark and, most importantly pine resin, we managed to start a small camp fire.


The pine resin really was critical in getting the fire going; that stuff just keeps on burning! It came from a red pine that we'd come across earlier in our walk.


With more time devoted to preparation of the tinder, kindling, fuel, location, etc, and better still a small axe, we could have had a really nice little blaze going. It's really nice to practice these skills and develop proficiency with them in all conditions!

Snowshoeing in Coast Mountains

Wow! Been a long time since I've written anything! I'll forego the quintessential excuses and simply note that adapting to a new job, moving into a new appartment, buying a new car (small and ultra efficient to be sure) and rebuilding my old Jeep to get it through the safety inspection has kept me thoroughly occupied for the past 3 months!!

With all of this work though, I've been feeling ever more desparate to spend time in the outdoors, and 2 weeks ago I had finally had enough! I had to get out into nature!

To cure my nature sickness we went up Mt Seymour to do some snowshoeing on one of the established trails. Ok, so it wasn't a big time wilderness adventure, but it sure made me feel good, and made for some nice pictures! Besides, any time spent in the outdoors can amaze you when you know how to look and listen...

After leaving the madness of the parking lot behind we were pretty quickly into the woods. Amazingly for the west coast, it was a gorgeous sunny day!

Frozen creeks were seen with regularity.

The occasional break in the forest made for some fantastic winter scenes!

Along the way we saw LOT of cedars, as well as Fir trees laden with oleoresin.

Soon enough we came to the summit of Dog Mountain. Here's were you see some really breath taking vistas!




To the south, in the distance, Mt Baker could be seen rising rising up nearly 11,000 feet above sea level. There are some interesting first nations legends about this peak...

And to the North could be seen Grouse Mountain, the so called "Peak of Vancouver".

On the way back, the late afternoon sun shone through the forest at a much lower angle. It provided welcome sunlight on our faces.


All too soon were back at the trailhead, and civilization...

It was a very quick outing, on a very popular trail, so it was very difficult to feel in touch with the natural world. We really didn't have a chance to leave behind city life and settle into the rhythms nature. Still, it was MUCH better than spending a day at home, and I was happy for it!

For now, I'm almost done with my work on the Jeep and the appartment, so I'm excited and looking forward to getting out and exploring much more in the New Year. In fact I've already started planning all of my vacations, outings and weekends. Meanwhile I'm heading to Ottawa for Christmas, and I hope to do some ice fishing and winter time fire lighting while there! Can't wait to get out there!

Kayaking Desolation Sound!!!

Finally another update, and finally an actual excursion to report! It's been a pretty rough year, what with finishing school during a recession, but I was determined to get out (once at the very least!!!)and camp in the outdoors before ski season gets here! So last weekend the girlfriend and I headed up to Desolation Sound provincial park and spent a couple of nights camped out in the great outdoors.

OK, so it was only a couple of nights, which hardly constitutes a major excursion... but you have play the cards you're dealt, and we didn't have much more time. As it was, we were able to make a 2 1/2 day weekend out of it, and felt pretty lucky!

So last Friday I pointed my old Jeep west on highway 1. We left (thankfully!) Vancouver behind and headed towards the Sunshine coast for our first Kayaking excursion on the west coast. 150 or so km's on the odometer, and 9 hours later we arrived at Okeover arm provincial park. Yes...it took 9 hours! All credit goes to BC ferries. Normally I've found their service to be good, but that day it was a total disaster! Still, the views were pretty spectacular, even when we were just sitting on a patio outside waiting for the ferry to show up.



We finally arrived well after dark and quickly pitched a tent and decided to go straight to bed in order to get a fresh start in the morning. It was a rather cheerless camp the first night, with no fire and no dinner. The night was clear though so we did without the fly, and left the tent windows open for a view of the stars. It was quite beautiful.

The next morning we picked up our rental Kayaks at Powell River Kayak. I highly recommend Powell river due to the location of their shop about an hour's paddle from Desolation Sound PP. No other shop is closer.


If you're looking for knowledgeable staff however, look elsewhere. I'm from the east coast, and where I come from marine weather changes FAST. You NEED to know the latest marine forecast, and keep a constant look out for changes in weather in order to be safe on the water. The staff at Powell River looked at me like I was "out to lunch" when I asked them for an up to date forecast, and didn't seem to take it at all seriously. Note to self: Pick up a hand held marine VHF radio... relying on other people can frustrating and potentially dangerous.

Soon however we where on our way, paddling out into a glorious day. It was bright and calm and the water was perfect.


As we headed north we saw seals, starfish and LOTS of oyster farms. In fact, much of the area is held in private Oyster leases, so there is no bivalve collection allowed. Too bad! We would have like to try some mussels! On the other hand, there was no cell service, so we couldn't call the "red tide" hotline to find out if they were even edible. We were probably better off not taking the chance.

After and hour and a half or so we arrived at a series of 3 islands known as the Isbister islands. We saw MANY starfish and even a sun star. I'd never seen so many in one spot.


The islands were covered in sphagnum moss and bog cranberry. I forgot to take pictures; too bad! We thought about camping here for the night, but decided to move on to see what else was available.

After kayaking around some more, we decided to head up to Grace Habour to check it out as a potential camp site. It was a beautiful trip, and it was on the way to Grace Harbour that I realized how much the forest was different way up here on the sunshine coast, as opposed to the lower mainland. There's a lot of pines, instead of firs, and it's much more arid looking. Apparently we were in the rain shadow of the Vancouver Island ranges, so the area gets a lot less rain and a lot more sun.

As we pulled into Grace Harbour we were VERY disappointed to find that it is used by boaters to pump out their raw sewage! A large sign warned us of the danger, and indicated that no swimming was allowed. We wouldn't have wanted to anyway; the water was very dark, murky, absolutely FILLED with jelly fish, and it made your skin itch when you got out of your kayak! UGH! It was gross, but the camp sites were nice, and the day was getting on, so we decided to stay here for the night.

Soon we had our camp site all set up. The weather was so nice that I decided a simple tarp would suffice for shelter.


After we set up the tarp I set off into the bush to gather up some wood and get a fire going for dinner. BC Parks DOES NOT LIKE FIRES! In fact BC Parks is VERY UNFRIENDLY towards any kind of bushcraft activity with involves interacting with the natural environment. When you're in a BC Park, you're supposed to act as though you're in a museum... look, but DON'T TOUCH. This explains why I would prefer to avoid BC parks and camp on crown land instead. The policies make sense in high traffic, front country areas close to Vancouver; but less traveled and backcountry areas shouldn't be subject to the same rules in my opinion. Making fire and use of local plants is central to bush living, and quite frankly spending time in the outdoors is much less enjoyable without doing so. So risking a steep fine I never-the-less cut some pieces of dead alder (or perhaps silver birch!) and proceeded to get a fire going to cook dinner. It didn't take too long, and soon we had a tripod set up and some water set to boil.


We had pasta for dinner, and it was great! After a long day of paddling pasta is simple, goes down easy, and tastes great. We also made some simple Bannock on a stick.


It was a touch bland, since all we had for ingredients were whole wheat flour, baking powder and water. Still, it cooked up nicely and did a good job sopping up the left over pasta sauce.

After dinner we fetched some clean water (from a nearby stream... not the harbour), boiled it up over the dying fire, and set about washing the dishes. With all the chores taken care of I stored the food bag and cooking equipment well outside of camp in an out of the way spot. There probably wasn't any bears around, but I like to follow Cliff Jacobson's advice and run a scrupulously clean camp. Storing all food in double zip lock bags and placing in under a rock or log or similarly 'out-of-the-way" location, well away from camp pretty much guarantees you won't be molested by hungry animals in the night... or so I thought!!!

Not long after we lay down to go to sleep we realized we weren't alone! For about an hour we had a curious mouse scampering over us, checking out our camp, and pulling on the girlfriend's hair until she finally put on a touque!!! I found the whole thing to be quite comical, if a little exasperating; every time you'd be on the verge of falling asleep the mouse would do something (like run across your shoulder!) to wake you up. Soon enough though he realized there was nothing to be gained from us and went about his business elsewhere. The rest of the night passed nicely. We had some rain in the wee hours, but tucked in all snug under the tarp, we barely noticed.

The next morning broke calm and clear.


I wish we'd had more time to enjoy it, but I was feeling the pressure to get moving in order to be sure we made our ferry connections home. Since we'd burned all the wood the night before, and in the interest of expediency, we used the camp stove to get some coffee going and knock together some breakfast.


We had a delicious meal of eggs, bacon, tomatoe, bagels and cheese to start the day. Soon after, with all the mess kit washed up camp was broken and the kayaks packed up a ready to head out.


We didn't linger too long since the water was filthy and stinky. We decided to head out and find a place to wash off our feet, legs and Kayaks. 25 minutes of paddling brought us back to the Isbister islands where we clean our selves in the fresh clear water of the sound. Man... it felt GOOD! We found some limpets clinging to the rocks. Too bad! As far as I know it would have been perfectly safe and legal to collect some and eat them, but we were on our way home, and I didn't want to dally.

Most of the rest of the Kayak trip back was pleasant. Again we saw lots of wildlife, and the girlfriend even ran over a seal! Bet he was pissed! Soon enough we were back at Powell River Kayaks, and unpacked the boats, and packed up the old Jeep. Our trip was over, but I was REALLY happy! It had been a great, albeit short outing and I can hardly wait to do more.

6.5 hours later we arrived at Horseshoe bay and soon found ourselves back in Vancouver...