September 2020

 

OK, we have done 2/3 of the year.  The second third has involved staying isolated and avoiding contact.  When you live rurally, as we do, that has not been as difficult as it might seem.  We avoided the town of Osoyoos all summer because of the tourists, and only did restrictive trips to town to buy groceries and other fundamentals.  (Amazon has become our best friend in order to get interesting things in the mail.....)  Our neighbours have been careful, and we have actually had the pleasure of a few modest social gatherings with them.  The weather has been extremely cooperative, with temperatures in the high 20’s for the first week of September.  With little rain for three months now (less than 15 mm in total), everything is going brown.

 

Brian started a men’s cycling group that meets Thursday morning to cycle uphill to a marvellous Mexican restaurant, Su Casa.  Su Casa is in the middle of nowhere on Highway 3 (Crowsnest Pass).  Denis, a French Canadian, and his wife Flor, a Mexican, started their restaurant about the time we moved here.  Flor’s Mexican food is to die for, and can’t be more authentic.  Denis, a true character, bakes cinnamon buns.  This is the sole purpose of the Thursday morning cycling group:  go to Su Casa, have coffee and a cinnamon bun, and come home and have a nice afternoon nap.  It doesn’t get any better than this.  (Denis did tiling beforehand, and our tile floors were a result of his work.  Nothing like being versatile.)

 

Highlights for us this month have been a couple of good hikes.

Near the beginning of the month, we drove up a rugged road to Mt. Kobau, a major mountain west of Osoyoos. (The road was an adventure in itself…)  There was a decent trail around the summit, and a good opportunity to see over to the US.

 There were also obviously burned out areas, and you could see fireweed and other plants starting to fill in at the ground level.  Not commonly known, but standing burnt trees are extremely unstable and are prone to snapping off with little provocation afterwards.  Walking through a burnt out area should be done with caution.

 

On our way back, we moved a few broken trees off the road.

We could still see smoke from hot spots from the Palmer fire in Washington. 

 

The bird’s eye view from the top was marvelous.  One enterprising couple was there with wine glasses in hand and a vintage to celebrate.  On one side we could see the valley leading to Osoyoos, while on the other side we could see the Similkameen Valley leading to Keremeos.

 

We didn’t see much in the way of critters other than a couple of monster grasshoppers, each  about 2“ long.

 

Mid-September featured about 12 days in a row of heavy smoke from US fires, leaving us in a grey zone where we didn’t go outdoors and kept the windows closed.  It wasn’t fun, but thinking about what the people were experiencing in the states made our situation much more tolerable.  We have had a very benign year this year regarding wildfires in BC.  The smoke still made for some good pictures.

On September 20, we went for a walk around Conkle Lake.  This provincial park is near to us (kind of, in that we can reach the turnoff on Highway e in 30 minutes.  The road to the lake is a lumber road, graveled.  The 25 km takes about an hour to travel.

 Conkle Lake is named after a local settler, and is a fascinating view into some unique terrain.

We started at a parking lot and followed the sign called “Trail Start”.  We’re not dumb!  There was a beautiful sandy beach here which obviously was ideal for dabbling.

The forest we travelled though was dense and shady.  Trees were festooned with Horsehair Lichen and occasional bright patches of Sulfur Lichen.

A major fire came through the area in 1931, destroying many of the old-growth larches.  Nonetheless, some remain as really large trees.  Mature trees here (both larch and pine) will survive a fire, because of thick enough bark at that at point to withstand the heat and continue to grow. 

On the west side of the lake, we travelled through forest that included cedars and other wet-loving plants.  There were little fall colours, although fireweed and other lower plants showed some colour.

 

On the other side of the lake, things changed completely.  The dampness was gone, to be replaced by grasses.  We could see across to the other side, where rock falls from unstable cliffs had pulled trees down.  On the east side, colour was starting to show from the Aspen Poplar and the Larches.

We had been told this route was 11 km, and we were ¾ around at this point.  It surely was going to be easy to finish.  Additionally, we could see the sandy beach from the shoreline.

NOT.

We started climbing, which clearly wasn’t taking us back to the sandy beach.  And we climbed and we climbed.  About 2/3 of the way up, we saw a sign saying “Exit”.  What?  We climbed some more (for a total of 400 feet) and eventually crossed a wooden bridge.

Park information had suggested a trail to a waterfall about 2 km from where we started.

Lo!  We were at the waterfall.  Although it was attractive, it was at low ebb.  We were sure spring would be an exciting time to be there.  Some rock slabs along the creed were indeed impressive.

There are lots of fallen trees here, but the dynamics seem to be different.  We speculate on rock falls from unstable cliffs and snow loads on younger trees.  Or maybe Mother Nature is creating natural teepee frames.

Another 2 km of relatively steep descent took us back to the parking lot where we could see the sun setting. 

Good day.  There is no photographic proof, but we saw a bald eagle, a garter snake, and a small frog.  Frankly we were a bit too tired to take pictures at that point.  Recuperation must follow.

 

Thanks for visiting.  Remember, Relish today, Ketchup tomorrow…..