The Stawamish Chief and Lighthouse Park

The Stawamish Chief is a 600m tall granite massif rising above Squamish, the self-proclaimed outdoors recreation capital of British Columbia. Considering the mountain biking, hiking, climbing, skiing, fishing and other sports that it is ideally suited to it certainly has a stake on that claim!

We had noticed a decent weather window and decided the night before to head through early in the morning to hike up the Chief. Geoff has never climbed it properly (i.e. with ropes), and longs one day to do so, but this time we were just excited to be on this very special mountain and play on granite!

Breakfast at Porteau Cove Provincial Park (if it looks familiar, we stopped here on our way to Keith's Hut too)

The Chief as viewed from Squamish. We climbed the right hand summit.

The front face of The Chief is very well known for its excellent granite rock climbing.  We walked up the back.

Christopher found a den beneath this cedar tree.

We started our trail at the 300m high Shannon Falls. Easily accessible from the road it is remarkable that we got this shot without a host of tourists in the background.

The first two thirds of the hike you head up through forest before emerging onto the exposed granite which has ladders and chains to aid in the slightly trickier bits.

The granite near the top was fantastic!

Looking directly north towards Whistler.

A 'friendly' chipmunck who wanted to share our lunch...

Looking across at the central peak.

The view from the summit of Howe Sound was well worth the effort. We ran out of time however and settled for summitting the first peak only. 

Late afternoon on Howe Sound as we drove back.

As we drove back it seemed we were destined to sit in afternoon traffic so, considering the beautiful late afternoon light, we headed down to Lighthouse Park in West Vancouver. Geoff had been here once before to climb the rocky crags at Juniper Point, but had never explored this lovely park.

Captain Vancouver, back in the 1790's decided to place a lighthouse at this point, named Atkinson Point, in order to warn other ships of the dangerous headland.  In order to ensure that the lighthouse was visible at all times he declared the area around the lighthouse a conservation reserve in order that the trees would remain a dark background to the white lighthouse.  As a result this park has some beautiful old growth forest, most noticeably many trees of enormous girth and thick mossy undergrowth.

Apart from the beautiful forest we were thrilled to get within a few meters of a pileated woodpecker who was digging beetle from dead trees. Christopher too was mesmorised by this completely foreign bird, tap, tapping away and dropping woodchips all around us.

A real log cabin!

The lighthouse at Atkinson Point

A peaceful sunset after a good hike.

Lion's Gate Bridge with Northand West Van on the left and Stanley Park on the right. It is an impressive structure, but even more impressive is the inevitable traffic. Cycling is certainly the quicker means of getting across the bridge for most of the day!

Chilliwack

Chilliwack is a city of ~80,000 people at the head of the Fraser River Valley. The mountains that border on the north and south of the valley converge just past the town. The town is a lively combination of services and agriculture and appears to be little understood by most other Canadians. It is passed quickly on the Trans-Canada highway and is known for its excellent corn, and distinct agricultural scent.

Geoff was sent on a Rotary Student Exchange here in 1999. He stayed with five families over the course of a year and attended one of the two local high schools - Sardis Senior Secondary. Geoff learnt quickly that within this town there is a distinct sense of community, pride and culture. In particular there is a strong culture of music within the community, whether in school bands, singing at Rotary Meeting, barbershop quartets or Jazz and Bluegrass festivals.

The qualities of community and pride seem, to us, to be lost in the bigger cities that we have lived in, but seem to remain intact in Chilliwack through the various institutions and community service organisations. 

The rotary exchange was a very influential and formative period of Geoff's life. He fondly remembers the role models of many individuals within the community that invested time in him, and gave him options of the kind of person he could be. 

As you mature you change and we find that people we have known in previous periods of our life become benchmarks. They remember you as you were and are a better indication of how you have changed than the people you see on a regular basis. It is always interesting to see how they have changed, and what changes they perceive in you.

We spent a week in the town touching base with the wonderful people we know in Chilliwack. We also had the opportunity to introduce them to Christopher and we visited some special places. 

Geoff and Marie Goldfinch, his first host mom. We used her house as our base and can attest to it being solidly kid-proofed by the time we left!

We attended a rotary meeting with the Chilliwack Rotary Club (there are three rotary clubs in the town). Playing in the Rotary "Discount Band" again - Geoff just slotted right back in! 

With Brett and Jo-Anne Klassen, classmates of Geoff's from school days and two of their three kids. 

Chilliwack has a very lively cycle culture and Geoff's school-mate Brett Klassen introduced us to all sorts of bicycles and associated accessories.  We took a ride along the Vedder River with Brett riding a dutch "bucket-bike". It effectively has a wheelbarrow bucket in front sufficiently large for three children to ride up front!  He introduced us to long wheel base bicycles - with a long pannier sufficient for two 80 litre pannier bags, or three children, or both. He had a phenominal 3m long flat bed trailer suited to his bicycles to allow him to transport larger items and lent us a Chariot which allowed us to cycle around with Christopher. Phenomenal!  We are so inspired to look at bicycles differently when we go back home. Chilliwack is a reasonably flat town being based on the valley floor which of course works in cyclists favour!  While in town we also discovered "fat-bikes" which are quickly becoming the next big thing for mountain biking - well at least here in Canada.

Along the Vedder River Trail. It had been an excellent run for the Sockeye Salmon that year and the fishermen were still out, despite the rain! Christopher is in the Chariot.

A happy little boy, fast asleep in his chariot!

One of the Rotary projects that had been underway when Geoff had been an exchange student was the development of a walking trail along the Vedder River. There were basic paths, but nothing suitable for cyclists, prams or wheelchairs. The trail is now typically 3m wide, gravel and level and sees on average 18,000 visitors a month. The trails make use of existing dykes and have extended them, while also providing side creeks for spawning and rearing of salmon and trout.  Despite some heavy rain we headed out to cycle the trail with Brett and Jo-Anne Klassen and two of their kids. Christopher did admirably well and we learnt how effective Cheerio's are at placating a hungry and cold child!

Rotary is responsible for driving and fundraising for a number of public projects, however we were interested to note that the City of Chilliwack has agreed to take over and maintain such projects in order for them not to be a burden on the club.

Since we were last in Chilliwack in 2008 the City has, through the influence and vision of a number of individuals and organisations in the community, built a new cultural centre. It is a wonderful facility boasting a beautiful and modern 575 seater theater, a smaller theater, a music academy, an art gallery, art workshops and many other assets. Of particular interest to us however were two memorials dedicated to individuals within the community who had meant a lot to Geoff.

With John Blessin at the Chilliwack Cultural Center in front of the water fountain memorial to Charlie and Mary Young. Charlie was saxophonist and a musical mentor to Geoff. He passed away earlier this year aged 94.

Also up in the Cultural Center is a memorial to Ron Goldfinch who played a piviotal part in the development of the center and particularly in fundraising for a concert grand piano. Ron was also Geoff's first host dad and teased him mercilessly!

Mt Cheam (pronounced chee-am) is a 2,100m peak which rises prominately above Chilliwack. Every time we are in town we try to ascend it, however due to poor weather conditions we didn't make it in 2008. The common access is via an old logging road above Chilliwack River which takes you to 1,400m. You then continue on foot through alpine meadows and eventually screed to the summit. The drive up is half the adventure (and half the time!) and needs to be done in a high clearance vehicle, preferably with 4x4 capability due to the steep grades and loose gravel. A friend took us up with his 1970's short wheel base jeep which was lots of fun. Christopher only managed to get half-way up the hike before the ripe and abundant blue-berries side-tracked him and Lucy, while Geoff, Brett and Lance continued to the summit.  It was a terrific day out up on the mountain!

Brett and Geoff on the summit of Mount Cheam

Jones Lake was part of a reserve managed by BC Parks. Aparently apart from free camping they would encourage folks to stay up there by offering them free firewood! Not so any longer!

A happy boy stuffed with blue berries in the alpine meadows

The view down the meadows from above. The colours where quite spectacular. In the background is the massif of Mt. Baker (3,300m) in the States, in the foreground are low lying blue berry bushes... Yum!!!

Hiking through the glorious meadows.

On the trail with Lady Peak in the background.

Lance is a friend of Brett's who joined us for the hike and drove us up the rough route to the start of the hike. Christopher was very happy to be in a loud vehicle on a bumpy road!

Settling in for the hour long drive down to the tarred road. Once the sun had gone down it was going to get quite chilly. Note that little boys can happily fend of cold with a blueberry bagel in each hand!

We were based at Marie Goldfinch's place for the duration of our stay in Chilliwack. Behind their house is a small farm run by Bill and Renee Higginson. Geoff had got to know the Higginsons during his exchange and years later had joined them for a trip to the famous Calgary Stampede.  Bill was minding his delightful granddaughter, Harper, and Christopher and her got on pretty well.  Bill introduced us to his sheep and the two toddlers were soon tearing into bales of hay to feed them.  Christopher was very content to play amongst the old farm equipment and in particular enjoyed an old John Deer lawnmower!

Christopher and Harper Higginson feeding the sheep

'Mowing the lawn'

Happy warm fall days in Chilliwack

End of September swim in Chilliwack. The water was about 18 degrees and Christopher was very happy to be in the water. This is good news with summer approaching.

We spent most of our time catching up with contacts of Geoff's - host parents, siblings, councillors, friends, etc.  We didn't manage to get photos with all of them, but it was really lovely to see them and to catch up with them again.

Herm and Brenda Kovits.  Herm was Geoff's councilor when he was on exchange.

Perfecting his walking and stair climbing!  We lost track of how many times he went up and down!

With Marie Goldfinch. 

With Joy St John

These Chariots are terrific. We'll be on the lookout for them back home.

Father and son riding through town

With Sam and Liz Dunbar

The obligatory jumping photo outside the Goldfinches house.

Like the name Chilliwack (which means Meeting of the Waters), many names are Anglicized from First Nations 

The mighty Fraser River

Dave and Gil Alford had lent us their van for the duration of our stay in Canada. It was a huge help. Thanks so much!

Keith's Hut: Joffre and Duffey Lakes Region

After our brief stay in Vancouver and a very busy weekend, we headed out into the mountains north of Vancouver for a few days. We packed the car and had left the house by 6.30am Monday morning to miss the Vancouver morning traffic. It was great to be out in Howe Sound heading north as the day woke up. We were headed through to the Joffre Lakes National Park area and would pass through the famous centers of Squamish (climbing and mountain biking) and Whistler (hiking, biking and skiing).

And we thought Gaelic was hard to read on a street sign!

The Chief is a huge granite peak that looks over Squamish at the head of Howe Sound.

Just before Pemberton, we went for a little walk to Nairn Falls to stretch our legs.  It was amazing to see the fast flowing river and know that it is at its lowest flow of the year!  It was a 1,5km walk up to the falls where the river flows through some big pot holes - many of which are connected under water and you only see churning and bubbling - not somewhere you want to find yourself in a small boat!

It was a lovely easy walk to the falls.

The falls were flowing fast, despite this being the driest time of the year. We could only imagine how fast the river would flow in a couple of months time once the rains really started falling!

At 'low flow' times like this, the river looks blocked by rock walls.

The jade coloured water is wonderfully framed by the dark stone and imposing forest on either side.

We picked up supplies for a few days in the mountains in Pemberton and headed north again to find the gravel pull off point at our trail head.  We were originally going to head to Joffre Lakes to camp and to see the glacier there, but the weather window that we had was relatively short, so we headed on a bit further to hike up to Keith's Hut just below Anniversary Glacier.  Liz and Bill had given us valuable information on finding the correct trail head - and a really good map to guide us. Joffre Lakes looked pretty busy when we drove past and the weather looked ominous. It was great to be in a hut in the rain with a toddler and not in a small tent!

The beautiful and large Lillooet Lake

The trail starts with this little bridge over a quiet river.

And then it headed up through beautiful autumn forest.

Lucy carried the kids and Geoff carried the big pack.

Further up the mountain the terrain got steeper and it was nice and cool in the forest.  The blueberries and huckleberries were also out....

Beautiful views of snowy mountains and little streams.

The autumn colours were really lovely!

A log bridge made this stream crossing pretty easy.  (We'll come back to this stream further down.....)

We could not get tired of this view!

Coming up to Keith's Hut and the Anniversary Glacier. The blueberry bushes were all in red autumn colors.

Keith's Hut was erected as a memorial to Keith Favelle by his family and friends.  He was a mountaineer who died in 1986 while descending the east ridge of Mount Logan when he was 22.   Mount Logan is the highest mountain in Canada and the second-highest peak in North America, after Mount McKinley (Denali).  It is however extremely remote and is seen as one of the great mountaineering challenges of North America. 

The hut is large and has a wood burning fire place, lovely stoep and solar lights! It is maintained by Keith's family and friends and each year they fly in firewood and do maintenance on the hut. Coincidentally the work party had been the weekend before we arrived. It sits on the edge of the tree line at about 5500 feet and in winter apparently the snow gets up to the eaves and visitors may have to dig down to get in to the hut.  Geoff was here in February 2004 for a back country skiing trip with friends.

Keith's Hut (Image from Google as we didn't seem to take one!)

Detail on the door of the hut.

Anniversary Glacier in the background

Two happy boys - one to be free of a heavy back pack and one to be free of the confines of a backpack!

We'd arrived at the hut on Monday afternoon and went on to explore the glacial moraine just in front of the hut.  It is amazing how tall and steep these get!  Christopher loved playing in the gravel and fine dust of the moraine and once we were back on the mountainside he decided the best way to get rid of the pale grey powder coating that he had on him was to bum slide or front slide down the alpine vegetation till he was clean(ish)!

Up the slightly vegetated outside of the moraine

The contrast between the inside and outside of the moraine was distinct.

Up where the trees end, its much easier to get a good view and boy, were they good!

The landscape was totally foreign for Lucy.

A happy boy in the dirt.

The colours in the glacier are fantastic.

It was spectacular being up close to the glacier.

Heading back to the hut we walked through the meadow areas around the hut.

The picturesque lake in front of the hut.

Tuesday morning the cloud had started coming in and we had a spectacular sunrise while having tea on the stoep.  Geoff and Christopher headed off to the saddle on the way to Vantage Peak to look over into the next valley and to try to follow the route that Geoff had taken 10 years earlier.  Lucy enjoyed a morning of peace and quiet!

Sunrise

Morning Tea

The view from the stoep.

Snow Spider Mountain is framed in the centre left of the image above. At the base of it is a second smaller hut that had been the second night of Geoff's backcountry trip. The Metier Glacier is visible on the right. It is spectacular but is receding at a rapid rate. By the time Christopher gets to come here again on his own steam it may all be gone!

Twin One lake with Snowspider Mountain behind.

Christopher bravely put up with his father despite some icy winds and deteriorating conditions.

That afternoon the weather closed in and we were grateful to be in the relatively large hut.  The hut is open to the public and while we were there 2 groups of students doing tertiary qualifications in 'Outdoor Guiding' (or something like that - skiing, hiking, rock climbing, kayaking, etc) together with their instructors were using the hut as a base and camping in tents in the surrounding meadows.  Christopher did a good job at charming the students to play with him - a good change from his parents!

It was still raining fairly heavily on Wednesday morning so we kitted up and walked out anyway!  Luckily the weather was warmish.  Christopher was a star and didn't complain about the wet.

All dressed up and ready to go!

The little stream wasn't so little after all the rain that we'd had and the bridge was mostly washed away which made for a damp and rather exciting crossing!!! (Geoff fording the stream)

We were glad to be able to strip off our wet things and have space in the van to sort our things out - thanks Dave and Gil!  Then we headed north past the beautiful Duffey Lake and up the Kayoosh Canyon to Lillooet where we turned south down the mighty Fraser River.  As we pulled back onto the highway, the weather started clearing and we had a beautiful drive on to Chilliwack.

Duffey Lake

The 'plug hole' end of Duffey Lake.

The road north

As we reached Lillooet, the area got notably drier.

We were surprised to find the Seton Lake as we approached Lillooet. Its turquoise water was striking and after such a harsh climate it was a wonder to see such a beautifully calm body of water. The dam serves as a source of water for the lock Hydro-power plant which services the area. We've copied the following blurb from a local signboard verbatim: "Nestled on the banks of the Fraser River and at the confluence of the Seton River and Cayoosh Creek, Lillooet is uniquely situated to be a biodiversity hotspot in BC.  The Fraser River is the province's longest river.  The deep valley, carved by its flow along its 1400km journey to the sea, serves as a major corridor for migratory birds and bats.  The area surrounding Lillooet is indeed rugged - steep slopes climb quickly from the river valley."

The Seton Dam is part of a hydroelectric scheme in the Lillooet area.

Massive screed slopes, on steep mountain sides pretty much guarantee that very little will grow on these mountains!

There's no 'tide' in this hydro dam! Note the railway line, literally a meter above the water level.

Driving along the Fraser River heading south

The Alexandra Bridge over the Fraser River is an engineering marvel. It enabled road traffic along a very challenging section of the Fraser River. Currently there is now a highway and two railway lines that run up the valley which was at one stage a vital economic link between the Lowland around Vancouver and the Interior.

The Fraser River Valley