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!