13. Aug 2009 - Camping in Skihist and Marble Canyon Provincial Parks

Packed tenting gear, clothes and butane stove and headed east by CAR - to camp my way inland to the Thompson, Cariboo and Chilcotin regions of BC.
Of course, as soon as I took that giant leap for mankind, the long dry spell, that literally put BC on fire, came to an abrupt and soggy end.
The heavens opened right on cue.
First, a rain and fog enhanced ferry ride to Horseshoe Bay, then, continuing east on the highway, a typical Vancouver deluge.
The rain drummed so loud I could not even hear the car radio, except for the seconds of silence when passing under bridges. It poured buckets all the way up the Fraser Canyon, the mighty river milky green and foaming below, and the mountain tops disappearing into grey-black clouds above.
Instead of packing a blow up mattress, I should have packed a blow up kayak.
The road offered a few stretches of hydroplaning heaven, lots of darkish tunnels.
The soggy gloom spelled tenting purgatory.
I vaguely remembered 'rainshadow' country around the Thompson River. So I headed up to Hells Gate, where the Thompson River forces its vast volume of water through a VERY tight chasm carved deeply into the towering Thomson River Canyon. The result is a river section of truly hellish rapids - but, people actually raft through there for fun.
The old pioneers had to portage over that maelstrom - along sheer rock walls whilst suspended from ropes - no fun for them.
Just about there the idea of a cheap motel 'somewhere' entered my mind; a dry boring room with a lousy view seemed much better than a dripping tent in a puddle of soupy mud.
And then miraculously - there was the 'rainshadow' - almost desert-like landscape on the 'off-side' of the coastal mountains. No rain!
First campground: Skihist Provincial Park. Beautiful grounds, raked, clean, water-closets, solid picnic tables, tall pine trees (with little bags tacked to their trunks filled with mountain pine beetle poison), vistas of coloured canyon walls and the opaquely green river. Almost each site had concrete steps from its gravelled parking spot down to the tenting sand-pits and the picnic table.
Good enough. Put the tent up in minutes, ready for cooking al fresco dinner, ah nature...and a fine camp meal.
'No bears' the warden said, 'they are further up the mountain'. Fine with me.
One crawls into the tent, floor covered with my Gabbeh tribal rug to create a warm underlay for camp bedding - pretty cozy. Trusty kitchen knife right beside my head - just in case the bears change their mind and demolish my tent, I could cut my way out. Probably useless, but makes me feel 'armed'.
Now the drawbacks of a camp located in a canyon became evident: sound travels uphill. The frequent freight trains screeched their way along the tracks parallelling the river, semi trailers rolled by every few seconds on the highway below. Cars, motor-bikes, all travelling at high speed along this major artery connecting BC and Alberta.
The RV 'rig' a few sites away started a generator, aircraft passing through or over the canyon sounded as if flying next to the tent. Two couples in vans with about six free range small kids and a dog between them enjoyed high volume fun until late, howling toddlers and all....ah, nature...
One slept anyway.
Packed up the whole bit again next day under a brilliant blue sky.
I heard that last night's planes were water bombers (BC is still burning) working all night...heard later, that one firefighting helicopter crashed nearby, into the river, sweeping the wreck and pilot down the Thompson without the faintest hope for rescue, despite desperate efforts to 'bucket' the crashed pilot out of the torrential river with help from another helicopter.
I had been unaware of the drama outside. In retrospect, all that noise seems trivial compared with a tragedy like that.
Dry desert like country all the way to Cache Creek, except for vast areas of corn and hay fields located in the river flats, almost Astro-turf green, all irrigated with water from the mighty river. The scant scrub on the mountains looked straw-coloured. Vast stretches of brown-black pine trees, devastated by the rapacious and unstoppable mountain pine beetle, gave the landscape a desolate feel.
I headed west towards Lytton, passing through steep somewhat more verdant valleys to Marble Canyon Provincial Park.
Empty, picture perfect tent sites with views of the crystalline emerald coloured lakes to one side, and multi hued almost vertical canyon walls to the other. Lots of healthy trees everywhere. Selected a spot, put up the 'house', checked the biffies (clean) and paid my dues at the self-registry.
Notices - absolutely NO fires, candles, torches - nothing! Local dangers: occasional black bears and wasps.
Hiked around, explored Pavillion Lake next door, dipped an extremity in the Lake (warm) - got hungry. Asolutely not a good place for aromatic food stuff - the wasps were indeed plentyful. No problem - munch cold stuff - surrepticiously.
Long warm sunny late afternoon, with a bit of wind funneling through the canyon, which caused me to tie down the windward side of the tent extra strong.
A slight shift in the wind, and a strong odor of wood smoke settled into the valley, the sun changed to a fiery red, and the shadows of the trees turned blue on the stones all around, and the valley filled with a thick smokey haze. Apocalyptic colours.
Oh no....just my luck, if not rain, then fire.
Chatted with another camper: 'Oh, that one is over 40km away, on the other side of the river, they let it burn, kills the beetles, it won't get here.'
And yes, the smoke cleared after a while, the air smelled pure again....velvety dusk.
Better night sounds this time: loons called each other, owls hooted, the last lost wasp smacked into the fly-leaf, the wind breathed in the tree tops - ah nature...