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Wilderness Adventures - May, Week 3/2006
|
This
is about a remote area in west central British Columbia, Canada
called the West Chilcotin. Surrounded by numerous glacial mountain
ranges, alpine lakes teeming with wild Rainbow Trout, and full
of wildlife. Living here goes from no running water or electricity
to spacious log homes with all the conveniences and without
the smog!
If
you would like to see pictures of wildlife, mountains, lakes,
exciting snowmobiling, events and more, and read stories like
'Lake Monsters' - just go into Archives on the lower left side
of this page.
You can search this site for a subject of interest to you
at the bottom of this page. Check out the
Picture
of the Day.
31/05/2006
7:41 PM
|
Short
|
Well
folks, this is going to be short because I don't
even know if I can get online. So there doesn't
seem to be a lot of point in writing a long article if
I can't get it loaded up today. As usual, this seems
to be a high peak time for Telus, and doing anything on
line is getting next to impossible. Certainly
running a business would seem to be out of the question.
So, I'll see how it looks tomorrow. In the meanwhile,
my apologies. I look forward to getting a satellite
system this fall when we get back, and hopefully be shut
of Telus and all of the problems associated with this
particlular communications system. Obviously getting a
pic loaded up for the picture of the day is also out of
the question. Sorry folks!
|
30/05/2006
11:16 AM
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Glorious, Sunny, Wonderful Day
|
It's
just one of those phenomenal days. Hmmm. Okay. Tell me
again. Why I'm going to Alaska? Really, we don't have
Denali or muskox, but we sure have everything else! And
we're a lot closer than Alaska is for most travellers.
I've always wanted to see Alaska and I know I'm going
to enjoy the trip, but on days like this in the
West Chilcotin, I just don't want to leave.
The wildflowers are blooming and the aspen have finally
popped with bright, fresh, mint green leaves. Nimpo
Lake is blue, blue, blue and full of trout doing slow
rolls to the surface. The Coast Range is still
covered with lots of snow and stands out against the sky.
The perennials in the garden have survived yet another
winter, (most of them anyway. We lost a rose but it was
ugly anyway) and I'm going to miss all those great blooms.
It's nice to hear the roar of the floatplanes again
and see the awe on the faces of those in fishing boats
sitting in their wake that have never been on the same
water as a floatplane taking off.
Our air is clear, we have wildlife and birdlife galore,
fantastic views and endless country to fish, hike and
canoe.
Tell me again why I'm going to Alaska....sigh.
Like most Canadians, I love spring and summer. Most
of Canada has to crawl out from under the weight of a
long winter every year, and when you see people
being interviewed on television in Toronto about the heat
wave there right now, all you see on their faces is pure
joy. "Heat wave? Bring it on dude! The memory
of it will help keep us warm next winter!"
The votes are in on whether to try to continue a conversation
about this area on this blog, or talk about our trip to
Alaska. The former was going to be very difficult to say
the least, considering that I'm not going to be here.
So far, everyone seems to be very much in favor of hearing
about Alaska. So, unless I suddenly receive a lot of email
votes to the contrary, Alaska it is.
I'm actually quite eager to write about our trip on the
way up to that great state. Northern British Columbia
is pretty darn nice, and although I've never been
to the Yukon, I've heard nothing but good things about
it. It can't hurt our tourist industry trade to describe
the north country and you definitely have to go through
both the province and the territory to get to Alaska if
you're driving.
Our hope is to be gone somewhere between two and four
months, since it doesn't seem possible to truly experience
either that part of Canada or the state of Alaska in a
shorter time. I realize that lots of people go for just
a couple of weeks, and I'm sure they see lots, but I'm
looking forward to having absolutely no schedule, no place
we have to be, and getting off of the beaten path. The
last is most important to me. Although Denali and
the surrounding park are exciting I'm sure, crowding
onto a tour bus really isn't my cup of tea. I know from
everything we've read that there is a lot of emphasis
on the wildlife you can see in the park, but it sounds
very much like the wildlife we have here. I really want
to see the mountain, (Mt. McKinley or Denali) but again,
from everything we've heard and read, it's often covered
in cloud and you're more likely to see it from outside
the park.
It does't look like there are a whole lot of roads
in Alaska, so we're looking forward to driving
most of them. And if we find a spot or a town we like,
I'd like to be able to stop and stay for awhile and get
to know the people.
As much as I would like to take some of the ferry trips,
we may be a little limited on that score. We're taking
both our big dogs with us so unless we can find an obliging
babysitter or an RV park that will look after them for
us, we'll be limited to day trips.
Anyway, you folks that haven't voted yet still have one
week to send an email to the following address at articles@resortsbc.com
if your opinion differs from the majority. And even if
it doesn't, write anyway. I enjoy hearing from everyone
a great deal.
The one thing that I do regret about not being here this
summer is not being able to meet those people that I have
traded emails with that are coming to the West Chilcotin
this summer. I'm sorry to miss you but have a great trip
and enjoy the area!
|
29/05/2006
7:28 PM
|
Car Show
|
I
got an interesting email from a fellow that owns the Country
Inn Motel in Nimpo Lake. Ted was driving one of his cars
into Williams Lake for the Laker's car show this past
weekend and towing another. This is an excerpt from his
email. "30 kms out of Nimpo I ran into a Cattle
Drive and both cars got to drive through Cattle droppings
and 4 Thunder showers. Since I'd already washed the Stealth
twice and the Daytona once, I wasn't impressed."
It's just a fact that some things in this country make
it stand out from a few other places. Yes, we're modern.
We have car shows. But we also have cattle ranches. Cattle
drives are a commonplace event in the West Chilcotin both
in spring to move cattle up into summer pasture and in
fall roundup and moving them back down into the low country.
Naturally, it's a lot simpler to move cattle on the roads
because you don't have to cut fence to move them through
each pasture or onto other landowners' property, and the
road provides a chute of sorts, helping to keep the cattle
in line. Riders still use horses here, unlike
a lot of other provinces that just use fourwheelers. Mind
you, at the cost of fuel, that might change soon.
In almost every case, as soon as it's possible, the riders
will move their cattle over so that traffic can get by
and so that no one is held up too long. That's especially
true of Highway 20 from Riske Creek to here. As soon as
it's possible, the riders moving cattle try to arrange
to let you by.
I don't know of anyone that actually minds being
caught up in a cattle drive. Maybe if you're in
a real hurry to get somewhere it might be frustrating.
But I think that there's just something about a cattle
drive that automatically slows you down and forces you
to take it easy. Reflect back on a time when the automobile
was a rare thing and moving cattle by horseback a much
more common occurrence all over North America. And of
course, it was a slow affair.
Face it, we all move too fast now days.
Fast automobiles, phones, cell phones, computers, airplanes,
high speed transit systems, and even fast cat ferries.
Everything designed to get us the information we want
at high speed and get us to our destination faster. I
guess the nice thing about a cattle drive blocking the
middle of the road is that no matter how fast your automobile
is, no matter how fast you want to get some place, how
fast you want to access information, or just get to where
you have cell service, you are not going to go any
faster than those cows are. It's not your boss
slowing you down, rush hour traffic, the really slow girl
on the till at the grocery store, or even just a line
up somewhere....it's a cow. And even as dumb and
ornery I personally consider cattle to be, it's pretty
hard to get mad at a cow. Especially when they're
being herded somewhere. They're just doing their job,
plodding along, most of them going in the direction they're
pointed hemmed in by dogs and horseback riders. They're
just doing what they've been told to do and they're doing
it at their best speed.
So next time you get held up by a herd of cattle, put
yourself back in time about a hundred and fifty years,
and enjoy the moment. And for those of you who
have never had the good fortune....you just don't know
what you're missing.
And on that note, the famous Picture
of the Day is going to be
Dodge Stealth Sneaking Up On Cattle.
Thanks Ted!
|
28/05/2006
10:07 AM
|
A Glorious Morning For Fishing
|
A
few boats, and a canoe are slowly gliding around Nimpo
Lake for fish this morning. There's a gentelman in a one
man pontoon plying the reeds with a fly rod while the
odd loon cruises around and swifts chatter to each other
while diving over the water. It's one of those flat,
calm days after a rain when you can see big trout doing
slow rolls in the water and a quiet voice will
carry nearly the length of the lake.
We had a good rain yesterday, something we very much needed
for this time of year to cut the risk of forest fire and
bring on the plant growth. Yesterday thunder and lightning
boomed and rolled around the area causing the odd fisherman
to get the heck off of the lake and beat a retreat for
moorage. I don't know how many times I turned off my computer
yesterday and the day before. Even though I have an excellent
battery backup and surge protector, there doesn't seem
much point in taking a chance with blowing the thing up.
There's something special about Sundays.
Even if you're retired or on vacation, and days of the
week no longer make a difference. Maybe it's because we
all spend so much of our lives working and that is one
day that throughout our lives that has been reserved for
relaxation. Except for the resort owners, of course. That's
probably their busiest day of the week and may not be
one they always look forward to.
The remote resort owners have been getting their
lodges ready. This week Eliguk lodge owners flew
a few floatplane loads out with Tweedsmuir Air to get
their outfit prepared for the summer.
The owner of Crazy Bear was in Nimpo Lake as well
but I don't know if he will be operating his fly-in lodge
this year. Although his outfit wasn't burned out
in the big Lonesome Lake fire of 2004, the surrounding
countryside was. He was very disappointed in how long
it might take for regrowth when I last spoke to him. I
personally feel it might have been an ideal opportunity
for him to advertise to guests the world over that
would be highly interested in the effects of a monster
forest fire. It would simply mean that he would
be marketing to a different type of clientele.
Well, it's two hours later and I spoke too soon. A big,
black system just rolled in and started dropping a little
hail here and there. According to the fishing magazine,
around 1:00 is a prime fishing time, if you follow those
things. Unfortunately, you'd get awfully wet if you went
fishing now. I just watched a boat make a beeline for
shore with one of the occupants wielding a brightly colored
umbrella. You don't see that very often out here!
Some votes have come in regarding what you would
like to see on this blog for the summer while we are in
Alaska. Although two have opted for articles about
both Alaska and updates or stories for this
area, most votes are resoundingly in favor of adventures,
mishaps and more during our trip in Alaska. If
you want your say, don't forget to send a note to this
email address articles@resortsbc.com.
And thanks loads to those of you who have
already let me know what you would like!
|
27/05/2006
9:27 AM
|
Connection
|
And
here I thought it was going to be difficult to connect
to the Internet in Alaska! No Alaska communications
portal could possibly hope to be as bad as Telus in British
Columbia.
For those of you that live in a city or a larger urban
center, it's probably not too bad because if you don't
like one Internet provider, you can go to another.
Here in the West Chilcotin, we are stuck with the
Telus monopoly. A company that is far more concerned
with spending a fortune advertising on television to convince
the kids to buy every cell phone feature known to mankind,
rather than on upgrading what is obviously overloaded
and tired servers.
Telus is not even remotely interested in upgrading their
equipment because they don't have to. We don't have another
internet provider so if our present service is barely
adequate, then that is what we're stuck with because they
already get our money for that service. They won't get
more money from us as users if they improve the system
but they will from the yuppie kids buying the latest in
cell phone features, podcasting, tvo, whatever, whatever.
Ever since Christmas, internet service has gotten so bad
where ever you have a dialup connection that getting
online now is based more on a hope and a prayer than
it is on anything else.
In fact, I am writing this article a day late because
I didn't have a hope of getting online last night. I can't
get on this morning either, but perhaps later there will
be some chance of getting online long enough to upload
this.
I have spent the past week trying to upload information
onto the Internet. It has taken me an entire week and
I am still not finished. The job should have taken me
less than a day.
I have gone through email, spoken extensively to snotty
customer representatives and smug techies, each
time forced to wade past Telus's ridiculous voice automation
system, and not one can tell me what the problem
is.
Oh they all start out quickly blaming my equipment, modem,
etc. Except that I run three computers, all
with different modems, and different operating
systems and a different phone line from
my partner, who is having the same problem. I've also
discovered that other members in the community are having
a problem with busy lines, being disconnected or their
line simply locking up and no longer sending or receiving.
The problem has been getting steadily worse since Christmas
and is particularly bad during peak times such as just
after 9 in the morning, noon, just after school gets out
and after supper. And I can tell you for a fact, as can
my partner, that my level of frustration is above and
beyond. I've been so furious at times that I could easily
throttle someone. Unfortunately, writing letters to the
CRTC doesn't even do any good because they will no longer
look into complaints regarding Internet connection because
they claim the market is so competitive.
Yeah, maybe elsewhere. Certainly not here.
The most frustrating aspect is that almost two years ago
it was reported on the news that Telus had been given
the contract, worth millions of dollars, for all communications
in government buildings throughout the province in exchange
for guaranteeing that all areas of the province would
have highspeed Internet connection by December of 2006.
Obviously there is no hope in hell of that happening and
Telus gets away with breaking yet another promise.
So I'll keep muddling along here for another two weeks
and then once we get back from Alaska, we'll be buying
a satellite system and hooking up to Internet that way.
I look forward to being shut of Telus.
In the meanwhile, this blog will only go up on the 'Net
if I can connect. I'm not going to hold my breath!
Oh,
if I can get it loaded, you really must check out the
Picture
of the Day.
It's hilarious!
|
25/05/2006
6:37 PM
|
Natives Or Indians?
|
It's
not my intention to be politically incorrect but I do
have to wonder at some of the contradictions our 'native
brethren' bring out. I was watching a newscast about Bear
Mountain Estates down on Vancouver Island tonite where
the Native Indian Band was in a meeting over the building
going on there. Media interviewed members of the band
who complained that the builders were disrespecting burial
grounds, cairns and caves in the area and that they were
going to do something about it. One of them said
that not only was Bear Mountain for the Indians but for
the wildlife as well.
It's funny, but it's been against the 'rules'
for years now to call these people Indians. Instead, we're
supposed to call them Natives because that is their preference
and it's considered the only 'politically correct'
term for the alleged 'first' North Americans.
My question is...why is it okay for these natives to refer
to themselves as Indians, but not okay for the rest of
us to refer to them as anything but Natives?
I continue to ponder as to why the local 'Native' Band
waited until many hundreds of homes had already been built
by the contractor and the area developed on Bear Mountain
before they complained that they and their culture was
being disrespected?
The developer insisted that he knew the area well and
at no time had his crew ever come across
burial grounds, cairns or caves in the developing area.
He also said that he invited the band to meet him at a
set time today to show him exactly where these burial
grounds, cairns and caves were supposed to be in relation
to his development. No one arrived from the band
office to show him where these 'precious' cultural artifacts
were. Instead, they complained that he had been
disrespectful to them on the phone and now they were going
to cause him a problem, whether by blockades, or otherwise.
They intimated that theirs was like a poker hand and they
weren't going to show their cards before the right time.
It seems odd that there is only now a problem.
Was a member of the band fired from the construction crew?
Has the band waited until a considerable monetary investment
is tied up in the project and five years has passed before
making their move on the premise that it will
be worth a lot more money to the band for the developer
to settle a dispute with them?
Interesting how the world works, isn't it? Because today,
29 Caucasian folks that have been disputing a highway
going through a rare conservation area were arrested by
the police when they refused to remove their blockade.
I'll bet that doesn't happen at Bear Mountain if a blockade
occurs there.
On another topic. I found an extremely interesting
link with a map showing global warming and how
it's affecting Canadian regions, and ultimately, the rest
of the world. For those of you interested you can click
on Arctic
Climate Change and once there, click
on the link that says Interactive Map (requires
flash) on the right hand side of the menu. There
are some very interesting observations. I think you'll
enjoy it.
Don't forget to send your vote on articles for the summer
in this blog by emailing articles@resortsbc.com
as discussed below. Only two weeks to vote! Thank you
much to those who have already replied. I'll reply to
your emails as soon as I can.
|
24/05/2006
10:13 AM
|
Birthday Week
|
My
apologies for no article yesterday. It was my sweetheart's
birthday and sitting cuddled up comparing last year's
and this year's MilePost all evening seemed like a more
important past time. We don't seem to get a lot of time
together, even though neither of us is working out this
year, so it's good that birthdays come along and remind
you of the important things in life. Besides, I was hoping
that the long stories about the water skipping event would
hold everyone for awhile. Isn't that some crazy event?
It almost makes you want to go right on out there
and drown a $15,000 snowmachine! (grin....)
The weather has not been particularly great lately. I
suspect it's because the jet stream has dipped way south
of us bringing cool, windy, and some rainy weather. There
sure has been a lot of fishing boats out on Nimpo Lake
the last few days, though. Today is one of those
still overcast days with the odd sprinkle of rain and
perfect for fishing. Folks in their fishing boats are
bundled up in slickers hunched over their lures as they
head out.
We watched one boat yesterday that comes every year slowly
head out toward the middle of the lake. They weren't but
a a couple of hundred yards out from in front of our place
and the woman was fighting a nice sized rainbow
trout.
The Natives have been fishing off of the bridge on the
Dean River outlet on our road for the past several weeks.
Many of them don't bother with rods but rather fish with
line wrapped around a pop or beer can and do quite well
at it. The fish there are pretty black though because
most are spawners.
Weather throughout Canada has been a little strange this
year. We all got that short heat wave that melted snow
too quickly in the mountains and has resulted in a lot
of flooding in southern British Columbia. The prairies
has had some pretty hot weather lately as well. I spoke
to a lady in Anchorage yesterday and she exclaimed that,
"Spring had finally come!" I guess they've been
experiencing a pretty cool, wet spring throughout Alaska.
That's okay. More mosquitoes for us when we go there.
We're still working on getting ready for our trip to Alaska
this summer and I'm still working on what to do about
these articles. Since I won't be in the Chilcotin
for the summer, it's going to be difficult to write about
the area. I have petitioned resort and other accommodations
owners to send in articles that I can use, but nothing
yet. That leaves me either writing condensed versions
of books written about this area, or writing about our
travels in Alaska, or both. Any feedback on that
would be much appreciated so I've set up an email
account strictly for your ideas that would bypass having
to fill out the usual contact form. You can reach me at
articles@resortsbc.com
and let me know what you think!
I know that quite a few of you great folks have been regular
and faithful readers of this blog and I thank you. However,
I don't know if you read it because you like to keep up
on what's happening in the area, or just like the
doofus stories. If the latter, then maybe you
will enjoy reading about our adventures in Alaska because
I'm sure there will be a few!
I will be taking my laptop with me but it remains to be
seen how often I can access the Internet. It does
seem that Alaska is wired a lot more than many places
in the interior of British Columbia and certainly more
so than in the West Chilcotin so it may not be
that difficult to upload a blog quite often. We shall
see.
In the meanwhile, please let me know your preference sometime
within the next two weeks before we leave. Oh, and rest
assured that your email address will not
be given out or used for any purpose whatsoever. In fact,
I'll delete the messages as soon as I tally up the vote.
Be heard!
Thanks to all of you and a special thanks to Texas, Bavaria,
Vancouver, and Quesnel for your kind letters of encouragement!
|
22/05/2006
2:43 PM
|
Water Skipping Continued
|
This
article is continued from yesterday. The beginning of
this article starts below.
Most of the snowmobiles look somewhat ratty and
you wonder why until you get closer and realize
that a vain attempt has been made to seal the holes and
joint between hood and engine compartment with 'Tuck'
tape (more waterproof than Duct tape). Of course there
was one snowmobile that wasn't just ratty, it was decrepit.
Called Frankenstein by everyone, apparently
it's a communal river racing machine. Everyone brings
parts for it and it's so old and messed up, even the most
inexperienced driver is welcome to practice on it because
you just can't mess it up any worse than it already is.
If a racer is not successful and sinks in the river,
then there is a motorized raft and several fourwheelers
ready to get him out. The organizers are all equipped
with radios as are observers placed along different points
on the river. Where someone goes down, he's spotted right
away and the rescue machines move in. I watched
one unfortunate go down on the worst corner and
he was gasping for breath. It's still spring here and
the ice just went off the lake and river a couple of weeks
ago. That water is cold! In addition to
that, the air temperature wasn't that much above freezing
Saturday and it was raining off and on, so a sinking was
a miserable experience.
Tied from the front of the hood to the base of the windshield
was a triangle of ropes. This is what the rider grabbed
when his machine started sinking. The river is murky
and if you lost touch with your machine in a deep hole,
it might be a real job finding it again. In this
case, the hole was deep and the rider was trying to tread
water, keep hold of the rope on his sunk machine and keep
a heavily helmeted head above water and gasping with the
cold. The fellows in the raft finally got to him, lifted
his helmet off of his head and once the fourwheelers got
there, he got a rope hooked up from one of them to that
triangle of ropes already hooked to his snowmobile.
This line of events repeated itself time after time as
rider after rider sank on one corner or the other
although there were some very successful runs in between.
Unfortunately, it does drag things out when there is a
'sinker' though because the river has to be cleared of
man, raft and machine before the next racer can come down
the river.
Pulling a snowmobile out of a river lined with willow
covered banks with a fourwheeler slipping and sliding
in mud is no easy feat, so it takes time. The fourwheeler
then has to drag the sled back to the starting point and
the rider works on getting it running again.
Some of the guys running this race have run it for several
years in a row and everyone claims that Sullivan usually
wins it. This year he came in second at 3 minutes and
10 seconds while young Charlie Williams came in at 3 minutes
and 9 seconds. Chris Jimmie came up third at 3 minutes
and 34 seconds. Some of the guys trying to race this year
had never done it before and most took a drink of river
water.
One fellow in particular decided he was going to take
a run at the river. He's actually a surveyor that comes
into the area in summer and a bit of a cowboy.
He took a few practice runs on the meadow, and then off
of the meadow onto a short length of the river back to
the start point. He did well on that part but I figured
for sure that he would lose it on the first corner. I
would like to have gotten over there to take pictures
but it was a fair bit of slogging across a water logged
meadow. The guy slapped his cowboy hat on, grabbed
a big chew and headed out full speed determined to ride
that river the whole way. He was doing pretty
good but sure enough, you could hear the machine die just
around the first corner and he got soggy. He was lucky
because where he went in was only waist deep.
There are so many great pictures and a short movie that
I can't possibly fit onto this page, but I think I'm going
to set up a separate page for all the images of the waterskipping.
Just give me a day or two and I'll have a link on here.
And on that note...Happy Victoria Day to all you Canadians!
|
21/05/2006
10:57
AM |
Water Skipping West Chilcotin Style
|
Saturday
was the 9th Annual Anahim Lake Waterskipping Races. Waterskipping
has been a popular sport here for much longer than that
though. When we used to have snowmobile races
in the spring in this area, there used to be waterskipping
back then, and that was in the late 80's and early 90's.
Only one machine runs at a time because otherwise it would
just be too dangerous. When they ran the race years ago
on Charlotte Lake, they used to run a line up all at once.
For any of you that don't know what waterskipping is...I
can only point out that it has nothing to do with skipping
a rock on the water. Rather, you drive a snowmobile
on the river as fast and as hard as you can go
from the Native Indian Reserve in Anahim Lake down to
the rodeo grounds where you turn around on a large, wet
meadow, and rip back as fast as you can to the starting
point. There are two points to this exercise in
insanity. The most important point is to not sink
your snowmobile in the river and the other is to get the
fastest time. Since over half of the contestants sank
a machine and only one won the $1,500 first prize, your
odds on either score are obviously not very good. But,
as one fellow in earshot said, "Don't ever
let fear or common sense hold you back!"
At best guess, the course is about a mile long. I did
ask one fellow who participated years ago in measuring
the length of the river involved in the event but he couldn't
remember how long it was. I actually think that it is
much further than a mile just to the rodeo grounds, much
less including the return trip. I guarantee you this,
it probably seems like a hundred miles to someone
trying to keep their snowmachine afloat.
The river takes several sharp bends that the rider must
negotiate. He has to be able to slow the snowmachine down
enough to take the corner, but not so much that he loses
momentum and sinks. Our local RCMP was out with the radar
gun and put it on some of the machines, and although she
didn't get there in time to record the speed on some of
the bigger snowmobiles, she still recorded most of them
taking off of the ramp or entering it at between 30 and
40 miles per hour. That means they're probably averaging
30 mph on most of the river. That's pretty good
considering the tremendous resistance of water on the
skiis and track versus snow. I know that you can
definitely feel a machine bog and slow down when you hit
overflow on a lake so I can't imagine what it would be
like to be running on water the whole way.
You'll see that most of the riders stand way back on their
machines to keep the weight to the back and the skiis
up. The primary reason for this is to keep the front engine
compartment as far up and out of the water as possible.
Once you get water on the drive belt, you're hooped. You
sink. Higher in the front also gives more turning ability
on the skiis. If the skiis are in the water rather than
on top....yep, right again...you sink.
Actually, the mechanics of the whole thing more or less
guarantees that your chances of sinking are much better
than your chances of completing the race. The main reason
for this is that no where on the machine, absolutely
no where, does it say, "This machine is intended
to be used in water."
That's what they make Sea Doos for.
So as a result, a machine that is not waterproof, without
a sealed compartment, has a very high likelihood of getting
water in the engine compartment and....there you go again...sinking.
Combine that with the fact that it takes a hell
of a lot of strength, agility, and excellent balance to
ride these things on water, and control them going around
corners, and you have a fascinating sport!
Within a large bend of the river near the entry point
onto the river is a water sodden meadow with a water filled
track through the middle. Here the contestants practice
with their snowmobile just to get the feel of it on water
because this is, after all, only done once a year and
it's impossible to practice on the river itself. There's
no danger of sinking in this water track so once they
get the feel, they take another track off of the meadow
onto the river itself that goes straight onto the landing
for a distance of probably only a hundred yards. You
are on the river proper but not trying to negotiate any
corners. This gives you more of a feel for running
on the water.
Many guys that sank their machines racing on their run
on the river used the meadow track to see if they could
run again, after taking out the plugs and clearing the
water out of the engine.
Wow, this article is getting really long already, and
I haven't even started. See you tomorrow!
I've started a new week so last week's articles are at
Wilderness
Adventure May Week Two.
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The purpose of this web site is to draw attention to a
remote area of west central British Columbia. It is a
beautiful area that relies heavily on tourism. The search
engines don't know much about the West Chilcotin, Anahim
Lake, Nimpo Lake or any of the other small communities
in the region and I hope to change that! Even as large
as this site will eventually be, there just isn't enough
room or time in the day to fully describe this incredible
country but I am going to try scraping away at the tip
of the iceberg, so join me!
Follow
the links, and see what the West Chilcotin is really like!
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