seaweed beach

Looking west from the point.

Looking east from the narrow finger of their seaweed garden.

May 17
On Saturday we went seaweed picking. We were invited by G's friend G, who's daughter and son-in-law are fisher people. We met on the wharf at 7:30 and piled onto the aluminum, flat bottomed, herring skiff. G's daughter T looked at me dressed in my warmest (only) sweater and worn out leggings and rubber gumboots and asked if I'd brought those Viking rain pants. Oh... I didn't know to even bring those from home! I've never done this before! G lends me hers, which is sweet since it rains a little on us on our way down the channel, enough to get the top of us soaked while she hides her legs under a coat.
We load up and push off to go get gas across the water at Shearwater. Then we go around the corner, south. We go past Grave Island, and G tells us a story of when she lived up on top of the hill here and her brother was taken to this island and left there for misbehaving. Her and her guy were out on her deck, having first smokes of the day and she thought she heard someone crying out her name, like in real distress. P, do you hear someone yelling my name? No. Wait... yes. Her brother R goes down to the water and they figure it out, he's stuck  across there on the island where the chief was buried. All they had was a dinghy, so out R went to the point and pushed off to get him. 
We go down the channel a ways through a minor squall, G points out her family's fishing grounds and camp. We go past it and turn right into some really cool channels. Beautiful places. Then around the bottom of somewhere and out into the open. Into a little opening in the rocks where the kelp is so thick it almost looks like there is a beach and you could walk on it. But we bump the skiff up against the barnacled rocks and climb out over the bow, with our bags. Its slimey, and slippery, and barnacles are sharp under the palms of my hands as I grab on for balance to climb over to the good home base spot. We immediately are given a lesson in which seaweed is which and where to pick it from and the best way to grab at it. 

We spread out and go to work. Basically sliding on our butts over the slimey low-tide places, picking where there are masses of it, and not where there is patches. I go around in a big half circle, working my way across some serious crevasses, from one side of the narrow point to the other, through the middle of the point. The others worked their way right around the front where it poked out into the channel and the waves were riding right up it. I found a system after T came and showed me how to tell the seal grass from the good stuff. If you put the seal grass in your mouth, it expands, it grows, she says as she shows me and tells me to try it. I can't bring myself to do it! 
Until a few minutes pass and I'm suddenly unsure about whether Im picking the right stuff. Then I pop some in my mouth... hm.... nothing... I go up a bit and try some that I'm sure is the wrong stuff, so I can find out the difference. I feel it! Its slimier! It not shrinking when I chew it, its... its... hahaha, eww.
So I work my way around, every time I look up I see a better spot! Sitting, sliding across the top of ledges, leaning over them seems to be the best way to go. Sometimes sitting right over the rising tides! Best spots are in those channels where the water rushes in.
I keep stopping and just sitting, feet splayed out in front of me like a kid playing in mud, looking around just not quite believing where I am, what I'm doing. Take a few flicks of the scenery and the happenings, pick until I feel like my knuckles are all scraped off from catching them on the rocks. Finding clumps of nice long ones, I keep going after I stop. Keep starting again where ever I go to relax. There is just so much everywhere!

Eventually, my bag is full and after some sitting in the sun that has come out, we decide to go out. The tide is starting to come back in, it's time to go. We sit out in the open channel while G's son-in-law jigs and we eat our picnic food. The sun is so hot and I lay up on the bow, soaking it in, knowing I might be getting too much, and not really caring. 

We go back up a ways and get out on the beach where G's son-in-laws fishing grounds are, and their cabin is secretly (awesomely) tucked in to the woods. I go up into the trees, it's thick with bushes and every branch sticks n pokes me. My heart hurts with the adrenaline for a second as I pass a great big burrow under a tree. I push my way up past it and stamp out a place to pee. Of course I have my period so its this nightmare of too late mess and a pee that never ends, as I'm squatting pretty much in plain sight in spite of my bushwhacking, hurting my knee and ankle in this position. Find an abalone shell on my way out and ask if I may take it with me, I've never found one before.

Next we go to a cave and climb out of the boat and walk into it. The ceiling is dripping quartz and red agate. There is a ream of clay.There are markings above the cave mouth, a line of red dots high up on the wall as well as two spirals with lines that join in a v at their ends. 

Next stop is a midden beach where there are campsites and hammocks and trails. The white beach made up of crushed shells is beautiful.

Then home. I'm so tired I fall into a super deep nap for two hours, waking groggy and dumb, just to eat and then go back to sleep.

May18
In the morning Im not as sore as I thought I'd be from dragging myself around the rocks. I go for my walk as G makes a big breakfast. When I come back she says its time to go lay the seaweed, but I'm starving and need a shower and to stretch. So I do that. 

I miss the women laying it out, but add mine to the pallets and catch up with one of them on my walk into town. I joke that all the boys I meet are telling me they are from a chief's family. I tell her that I tried to read up about the town and the Heiltsuk, so my head wasn't empty when I got here. She liked that, the way I put it. Went to the free store after town and got two pairs of jeans that fit! How is that even possible?! I shop all day in Vancouver, forcing myself to go into annoying places I hate, and find nothing that I can squeeze past these thighs, but here I don't even try them on first and they're great?
We go back over to G's later to eat the mussels we got while out and have a campfire until the sun goes down. The seaweed has dried into squares and the pointy bits are really sharp. G and I carry our share home between us on a cedar pallet to finish drying overnight in the oven.

When I get home I watch the sun go down from the front porch and the wolf-dog who I love comes by the house! I'm going to feed this guy chicken until he loves me and wants to be mine, unless he is someone else's. But I'm still gonna make him my wolf-dog-pal!

waterfalls

Looking up at the wall mountain in front of me today, there are three waterfalls free-falling like a thousand feet down the front of one mountain. I nearly drive off the road staring, marveling at the sight of it. I get my head together and keep driving. I see it another three times, on three other mountainsides. Three water falls, falling falling falling thousands of feet through the air or running down the face of the bare rocks. Is it always like this? It just turns into Rivendell every time it rains?

Well this is where my travel journal becomes a field manual for my practica workdays, so there's a lot of information about stuff and things that I will not share publicly and isn't that interesting to hear. I'm sure there are some parts that will be interesting, but alot of it is just figuring out my place in all of this. But my central coast adventure continues and I am certain that my weekends will be filled with adventure.

May 16,
day 4 on job, day 8 out
9 hour ferry ride to Bella Bella!

Packed the car last night and tried to wash it. I couldn't find the hose, so I used a bucket. By the time I got to the trunk, I was feelin done, so it isn't that pretty back there. Load up the coolers, get some groceries for myself and for G, throw the stick for Lucy. Cook myself some meals to use up the leftovers, take out the garbage and clean up the kitchen. I try to put away my things, take some stuff out of the camper which is full of empties to return. I had planned to return them after work, but the depot is only open Fridays and Saturdays. So I am leaving them in the camper, with the windows open since it already smells. I feel like I'm leaving G's place nicer than I found it. Good, thats the right thing to do. Now to pack my clothes, bathe and sleep finally. I realize now, riding the ferry, that I did not bring seaworthy sweaters. I have three at G's, but was really warm and tired when I was packing. I watched some tv episodes, too excited to sleep, tossing until midnight. Wake up in a sweat, what is this? Yuck, then my alarm is bleeping at me and I feel poopy. I sit up and grunt and groan my way to my feet, half dressing, then wandering around for a minute. Do I want to drink coffee? No, not yet, I intend to get back to sleep as soon as possible! I pack the last of the bags, putting the gourmet travel food I cooked into travel containers that won't matter if they are lost. Putting lids on the cold coffees I have ready to go. Finish dressing, squash bathroom stuff and housecoat into my gym bag, and snap out of it as I'm driving. Looks like a full moon is making the sky bright, it beams into my eyes as I look up. It is resting between Nooklikonnick and Snootli  Peaks(I am determined to at leaast learn the names of these mountains if not climb them! I might make a few mistakes until I get a more accurate map).
I park at the ferry and roll over until a knock at the window wakes me to check ID and load me up. The tunnel is what they call the side lane on the boat, and it's more narrow than what I'm used to! Navigate into my place, climb over into the passenger seat, grab my snuggly housecoat as a blanket and my pillow, and I'm lights out again, feeling conflict tugging at my heart since I will miss out on watching some of the voyage. But I decide I must rest or I won't enjoy any of it. Four hours later, I wake up exactly at the place that Alexander Mackenzie touched Pacific Ocean water in his crossing of the continent by land on July 22nd, 1793. In Dean Channel, at Mckay Bay, north of King Island. I drink one of my coffees, watching the sunny scenery, then wander around, looking for a bathroom. This ferry is so strange. I go up one stairway to a roped off sitting area, no way to get to the other side but down and up some other stairs. People are sleeping on the benches in the other sitting room, and still no bathroom. This is an adventure! I come down the stairs again to find K, L's husband, who I had met on the way to drop off G at the airport on Monday. He says he has just woken up too, and tells me where the bathroom is.

The sun is bright on the water in some places, illuminates the green of the trees that climb and fall n climb all over the round peaks all along the edges of the channels. It rains a little and the whiteness of the clouds on the water hurts my eyes. We come around a bend, past abandoned cottages, into Ocean Falls, where there was once a busy mill. Abandoned now, with only a handful of restored houses where people still live, it is perfection for photographs of decay. But I'm only given two minutes before I'm called back to put my car back onto the ferry, facing the opposite direction in the tunnel. There is a hydro dam there now that generates power for Bella Bella, Shearwater, and whatever other lil places are hiding around here. The raging waterfall comes right down to meet the ocean...yeah, hence the name.

Ocean Falls

Back out into the Fisher Channel, we pass through a narrow place, called the dogleg channel, maybe informally, which we can only do in this little vessel. We are nearly to Shearwater now. It is similar here to my ride to and from Sonora Island. It makes me feel happy, and like I'm in the right place. What if this was your ride to work? Almost at Shearwater. We will leave our cars and catch a water taxi over to the marina at Bella Bella. The ferry workers have to have a shift break of eight hours before they can continue, so the boat sits there, full of cars, until ten pm, when it crosses the channel. You have to come and get your car at midnight. Crazy.
Guess I should get my carry off stuff ready. 

Shearwater

Got off in Shearwater and went to catch the water taxi. I was actually really glad when it sped off without us, which meant we would have to sit at the pub, in the sun, for two hours. Rough life. After lunch, we walked down to the dock, to find out about the boat. We talked to boat people and the guy who had been wandering around the place, P.V. He didn't smell like drink, but he acted it. Talking about the dog he used to have, miming this action that appeared to be the way he used to lift it by its neck to talk to it. At one point he showed me his knife, then brought his face close to my face to look in my eyes. Nice eyes, he says. Nice teeth. I wasn't afraid of him at all, but thought it was time to uninitiate the conversation. Who knows whats going through peoples heads. I felt glad to have K there, as he stood and stepped between us after that. Like a man should. Not aggressively. Just being a presence for me. What a good guy. I decided to look after myself anyways and moved to sit on the boat, but I appreciated that gesture. We arrived across the water in about twenty minutes, the town sits on this one shelf, and the trees are stunted like in Uclulet, with rolling, rocky bluffs. There are wolves here, I keep repeating to myself.
I meet up with G, and she shows me around. We do a home visit almost immediately to assess the safety of an elderly woman's home who has just had a bad fall, been discharged from Vancouver General, and will be on her way home soon. Then we are done for the day and we ride around from end to end of this place. I wonder if I'm on the moon. It feels like another planet, it looks like Uclulet a little with its stunted, coastal bonsai trees and rolling rocklands. G talks so fast and tells me about all of her plans for me. Writing proposals, attending a women's group, a supper club, working with a young family... she does alot and I wonder if I can keep up. I know that at one time I felt a need to do this much. But I don't really feel that it was a healthy time. Driven to distraction I believe is the saying?


Stories about dogs up on the Chilcotin, taking on grizzlies, getting caught in trappers' traps, the deer that went up a tree and didn't fall out.

buzzing and disconnected

 I'm sorry, but does “Feel free to use the jacuzzi tub” mean the same code to every woman?

G gave me today off to equalize and she flew to Bella Bella, she could probably feel my crazy-brains vibe. PMS and days of travel and new have me buzzing and disconnected again. Focus focus focus!
She said I should do my “windshield survey” and rest.  The sprain on my ankle is swelly and it hurts to do some steps, but it's less bad than I thought it would be. Still, the hike I had wanted to do is out of the question. Maybe I could pedal, but I'll have to get new front brakes since they got eaten when the front tire came off the damn thing -poor BanaN! There aren't any hills really, so I could go anyways and use the crappy back ones. I should. I just found out that there is no gym here, no rec centre. Why no one answered me that question before I came I wish I knew. I could have brought some weights and my ball. Damn physio anyway. SO I should scan the town and look at its services, its amenities, and its population from a strangers perspective. So I'll go for another drive.

Groceries on the right, hardware on the left!

No milk at all!

 The weather is different today, high white clouds. The sun that received me into this place yesterday is resting. Epic work, sun. I feel like not doing much of anything. I feel like losing my thoughts weed whacking, but I can't locate the gas one, and the electric ones are so not fun, but I might go there later. Constructive exercise. Then cars to wash, and maybe I should take the camper off the truck. Or maybe I'll leave it awhile. Stay slow.

Library that is open three hours a day, three days a week, two grocery stores. The prices aren't so much higher than in Courtenay, but some shelves of necessities are empty, just like I've heard that sometimes there is no gas. Garage and car wash! Washed the old girl. Ambulance. A hall that says it has a fitness centre but there's no number or info. Drove past three schools, one college, four churches. A beautiful Big House.  Went past the Walker Field, where the mother's day bbq was and baseball games will be starting soon. Saw a rodeo grounds next to it. Looked into the window of the old church turned thrift store, no idea when it opens. I see a legal advocacy centre, a community support centre (I'm dying to know what that means, but of course I have an idea), the hospital with clinic, one residential care facility looking manor type place for the elderlies, the liquor store, the post office, a service BC place... Hm I can't recall them all now. Should have taken notes!

Anyways, I then went around to take a few shots and then sat myself down for dinner and people watching in the window at the Cedar Inn...or Valley Inn or whatever it is with the big restaurant. From what I can see, it is a pretty healthy place. Lots of happy faces, kids roaming free, dogs cruising around. I saw two dogs at once running alongside, trying to bite the tires of a truck as it slowly drove by. That was odd. Came home by seven and turned on the TV. First time I remember doing that in.... uhhhh. Dunno. Turner classic movies, Mitzi Gaynor marathon. I enjoyed it very much. The I Don't Care Girl and Les Girls. I kept feeling like I should be doing eight other things, but reminding myself I was supposed to be slowing down now. That's what I've decided my ankle sprain was for. A memo to me, a reminder to slow the fuck down. To get focused again, to get clear. SO I slow down, sip wine, and watch movies with a three year old lab puppy laying on me.
                                                                                                                                                 

May 13
9-5= 8hours=17total

First day and I can't wake up. I've woken up at 6 without a clock for the past week, but today? No no, my body wants nothing to do with it. Let the dog out and put coffee on. This is some peoples every day, but it's all novel for me. Try to decide whether to go for a pedal, but I've slept into the sevens, it takes half an hour to get to town, and I'd wanted to start at eight thirty. I also want to make a lunch and breakfast. Lumber the big truck n camper into town. I need to ask G if I can use hers, this is a long commute! Show up and stumble around the hospital, forgetting to say hello sometimes, then other times forgetting to say who I was, but I soon got into the swing of introductions, remembering the spiel I decided was vague enough yet informative enough to satisfy curious people. It got longer with each telling.
I decided I really need to get it straight, what it is I want to say, what it is I want to do here. I've never explained my goals so many times in one day to so many people. It came to mind that I ought to make a list, write it out. I remember a release of information form that I am supposed to fill out and send to C, my Uvic supervisor, and another that specifies my learning goals for both G and C.

I am paired with the field nurses who run the Adult Day Program, a respite service for people who live at home with other caregivers. It's also a time to get them baths in the proper facilities, lab work, Doctor's appointments, social time, physio, prescriptions, meals, and other small personal care stuff. Two of the women play cards, another couple draw. I ask if I can make myself a place-mat, since they all have one, and I am given boxes and boxes of scrap-booking materials, stickers, paper, glue and felt pens. Oh, this will be fun.

I sit and chat with the women, one of whom has done work with Dale McCreery on Nuxalk linguistics and used to teach the language to the kids at the school. After lunch, I go with one of the nurses to a few appointments, just as an observer. No one really knows what I'm doing here. The woman asked if I wanted to interview the clients, and I told her no way, that would be a huge intrusion and breach of ethics. I know that that is not why I'm here. If I was going to interview anyone, it would be her, her coworkers, and other service providers. The clients I would just be hanging out with, and if they chose to share stories, then great, but I would not be putting them in any kind of place where they thought they had to tell me about themselves as though I were the working social worker here in town. Just an observer.
What I did tell people was that I was interested in how limited services in such a small place worked together to support people. I wanted to see the hospital side of care, as I had been working in community care for some time and was curious about it 'from the inside'. I wanted to explore my interests in working with addictions counselors. I wanted  to try on as many hats as I could since in a larger place I would do one thing and one thing only at one agency, while here, I could float around the different arms of health services and experience them all. Or so I hoped.

This picture had been hanging upside down for a long time before I noticed it was upside down.

I go on three home care visits with J. The first is at a retirement facility, an interim place closer to the hospital for people who need more attention, or possible attention than they could efficiently receive in their home. B told me of the big house they have up the valley that is now sitting empty, and how they had to move quickly into this small space. She asked if I was looking for a place to rent. D, her husband was a teacher here for fifteen years and told me how nice it was to have known so many students who grew up to be community leaders. He came from Port Alberni and told me stories about his time on the Island. A story about how Courtenay got its name.
The next place we went to was a big wooden house 16kms up the valley, off of the highway. J lived there supporting her daughter who has mental health issues. She is from Lancashire so we talk about our families. Her house has that smell. The one I remember, having been left with so many older people when I was young- it triggers something. Some yucky uncertain feeling combined with that: I'm a little kid and life is so exciting feeling. I feel like there are pages to be written about this smell, this feeling, but I can't locate them just now...The front room and kitchen are two enormous, old-style, open rooms with thin, marbled, pea green carpet laid over linoleum. The walls are wood-board. There are bird-feeders outside the front windows so we watch the Stellar Jay, the Robin, and the hummingbirds that are fighting over their places. Five children, one dead, one struggling with mental health concerns, three living on Vancouver Island. She is very much with us, very quick witted and chipper. 
The third was further out, and had the same big front room/kitchen setup. That was a quick one, I wonder how she bathes people so quickly, but then remember I don't take so long myself either...

I'm exhausted by the end, and I go home and ride the bike up the road to the bridge with the dog. I throw the stick a few times, then race her back to the house and go to the basement to do some exercises. Then I pass out cold... after a relaxing jacuzzi bath!

wiped out and dumm-dum

May11

 

Damn. Woke up to birds pecking at the roof over my head, scratching around all over it. Rolled over three or four times, then watched as the sun lit the corner of the curtains. Might as well squeeze out of bed, I've been suppressing this pee for hours now. Scramble out from the foxhole and struggle to get my housecoat n sherpa socks on fast. It's cold! There's rime on the grasses and pick up stick ice on the puddles. In the bathroom there's a sign that says you must keep your pets quiet and under control at all times. Where is my pen, I would like that to say 'children' instead.

I sip my coffee on my step all wrapped up, watching and listening to the birds on the lake. I want to get a move on, get back down out of this cold and into the coastal atmosphere. I remember I have over a quarter tank of gas and look at the maps. It's only about 100kms to the bottom of that big hill and the next marked town. So it is on. I get driving and the concrete ends as soon as Anahim does, just metres further than I drove last night. The gravel road is really good, smooth. Going eighty is easy so far, but my truck still mostly wants to go seventy. After about 18 kms, I hit a good bump. The camper begins its vibrations, and -fuck!... my gas gauge has dropped to the empty line. Awe shits. Still driving, I try to estimate how far I've gone. Fifteen minutes at seventy, well damn that is only...awe, I'll never make it. Turn around, back to the high plains, dirty town. I park next to the gas pumps, I see they open at eight Monday to Friday, and it is ten to. But it's Sunday, so I'll be waiting... until ten?! Awe damn. And no reception... and my computer battery is dying too, so no flicks. Just sitting in the cold. Least I got my ipod to sing to. Toes are numb, everything is so cold. I sit in the sun when it comes and eat some crackers and cheese. A few of the dogs that jog past as though they're going somewhere smell the cheese and congregate. When I talk to the closest one, he growls at me. But he ducks his head, weaves away and around the back of me. I worried for a minute that they'll get the pack thing going, but there are only two of them now, some others jogged off like I'd been holding them up on their way to work, and the one other old dog that stayed has laid down in the sun. This lil furry one is eyeing me. He brings me a stick after sniffing the air all around me. Obviously he smelt that I love him and I'm the throwing type.

The gas station opens at ten. I have a laugh reading the paper sign on the door that says that the hours change tomorrow, eight to eight. Of course. I play solitaire sitting in the cab cos it's warmer in there, and talk to myself. Some people come and go, walking, but most everyone rides quads here. The police scan me as they roll past. The heavy eye. I get a bad feeling about that one. 10:11 Finally, it is open and I'm on my way. Old school pumps, bathroom out of order. This place is gnar. Fly back down the good gravel highway, looking for the spot I turned around at. There isn't any real elevation gain to meet Heckman Pass, which I was worried for.

Then “The Hill” begins and it's steeeeeeeep and awesome. I can see the road following the mountainsides over and away. I go into second gear, but that's not slowing me enough, so I use my low gear for the first time ever. Thirty is just fine here, there is no traffic pushing me around, and the drop on the one side gets to be thousands of feet at some places. Thirty is just fine. I stop and say hello to what may be a grizzly bear. He flaps his lips at me, so I raspberry him back and roll on. After the first set of switchbacks, I wonder, is that all? But there are more. The immensity of this drop is overwhelming but I am at the bottom, back to concrete, before I know it. Weaving along, following the river. The road is bouncy and lovely. Big trees, I'm still in Tweedsmuir park. Every one of the provincial rec sites down here is also gated and closed.

The mountains are steep on both sides of me and I wind through between them out of the narrowest beginnings of the fjord. Three miles wide at it's widest point, the rest of the valley is more narrow than that. Everyone who passes me waves. I keep waving back too late and wonder, do they know who I am? Are they super excited to have tourists? What is this? Before I know it I pass Hagensburg and am in the downtown core of Bella Coola, pulling up on the reins suddenly. This is it? But I can barely see the water!

All I can think of is peeing and eating and how grimy and tired I feel after only a two hour drive. My brain is mushy and panicked without proper breakfast. I pee, I eat, I let G and Y know that I'm here. Y says he is coming to meet me and I groan a little since I feel so yucky. No one should have to meet me right now, I think, and wish I could just shower and nap. He takes me to a nice waterfall and beach, out past the ferry and government dock. I notice no seatbelts, no speed limit. The waterfall is awesome, and I can see that it's a good swim spot when the water isn't raging like it is now. I roll my ankle stepping off the viewing platform but just a little and I don't feel like making a deal about it. He brings me back to my camper and invites me to the Williams Field Mothers Day BBQ, but I am too wiped out and dumm-dum, so I crawl up for a nap. Of course I can't sleep, my ankle kills! I want to see this whole place. I know I cannot socialize right now, not really. And now I cannot walk either, so I lay there up in my camper for an hour, using my new phone's data; such novelty!

 

Head back down the valley to my supervisor, G's house. She is making a turkey dinner and I'm so excited to eat again. She had mentioned that she was getting another mower and when I arrive I'm not sure if anyone is home, there's no car in the driveway, but the lawn is halfway mowed, so I put my gumboots on and start one of the two mowers. I need to get physical, I've been sitting for too long. I go to my happy mowing/moving place, using my whole body to push this old crappy (compared to my old commercial one) mower around the bumpy yard. Oh, I enjoy this. In no time there's a wiggly bodied black lab shifting from foot to foot looking up at me, so excited. Hello hello hello hello hello he says. I stop the mower and say hello to him and G. Have a glass of wine and chat, G talks about the differences between Bella Coola and Bella Bella. She find higher rates of obesity, blood sugar levels, just poorer health in general in Bella Bella. She thinks they have the same access to care, resources, and food over there as they do here, but people manage better here. She mentions that there feels like there is more cultural connection over here, and more groups and programs to help people deal with the effects of colonization like the sexual abuse and losses. In Bella Bella, she tells me, they don't want to talk about that stuff. Classic example of our secrets making us sicker. 

Some neighbors and old friends come over, and with a mug of vodka in one hand, this guy helps me to mow some more. I feel good having got a sweat on, and comfortable in the company of easy people. Finally, I shower. When I washed my hands at lunch, the black water didn't stop coming off of them for two soaps, I can only imagine my body is much the same. We eat, I listen to the three of them tell stories about this place, they have been here for more than twenty years, lost loved ones to the ocean, and pieces of property to the natural disasters like fires and floods that came in '09 and '10. Glenda and I are going to dry some seaweed in Bella Bella for sauces and salty snack flakes! Then I finally get to lay my body down. I'm so excited to be here. My head is a mess, though. Too tired for so much excitement!

 PO Box 752

roll my body around all over

May 10

SO Williams Lake made me a little crazy. Dropped my laundry with a sweet lady named Julia and went for breakfast. The eggs tasted like chemicals or something, everything was weird. I got some writing done, then came out to get gas. While I was eating, the price went up by 7cents. I was all excited like it was going to be cheaper here! Went to the gym but ran out of time, so half shower in a hurry- very unsatisfying. Tried to pick up a few things and got a little loco in the mall. Ran crazy back to the truck, need some food supplies. The Save-On got me even more bunged up! Tipped the camper up onto its tippy toes for the first time leaving the parking lot. Definitely time to go. Decided I do not like this town. At least not today. The people are so so friendly, so I'll give it another try another day. 

 

Ride up the big leaving hill with Amelia Curran, and over into the breathtaking Fraser River canyon where there are grassy benchlands that then drop away into the river chasm. SO many incredibly green, green fields. I wanted to roll my body around all over every one of them. Another giant switchbacked hill after the bridge means I'm taking my time, letting my truck cool a couple times, having a picnic on one of the ledges, sitting in the sun. Finally, the sun has come so I don't mind the time now, I'm not stuck inside out of the rain at all, getting some good walks in. Hoping to walk to see some petroglyphs further up the road, but Ima have to get a move on.

This valley blows me away. Reminds me of the book, “A Recipe For Bees”. Man I wish I still had that! The woman lived outside of Williams Lake, but a good distance, married to a sheep herder who went away in the summers, up into the mountainsides with his herd. Set in the early 1900's, very historical drama-romance stuff. But I love stories about places I'm from, can go see, and imagine it as the author described.

After that big hill, it is just as I'd imagined, a high, flat, rolling pastureland, with rocks dropped from outer space moonscapes all over the fields. Or glaciers left them behind. Either way, really cool. There was a sign right at the top about poaching, slaughtering and stealing horses and cows, and the penalties attached. I guess it's a big enough problem to warrant that. But I'm sure it's the aliens doing it. Or the bigfoots. Further along, after a long steep descent, there are lovely river valleys. I have a soft spot for these meandering grass strips, with the softly curving roads that accompany them. I wish I had a fast car or was on my motorbike. 

Wyld Stalyns!

Farms n greens

The road is so straight in th alpiney places that it gets somewhat boring. But after awhile, the road has no more lines, so I'm free to read and wander and weave all across it no foul no harm. Carefully watching for oncoming traffic from both ends of me of course. My speed is averaging eighty, everyone is passing me at 300 kms/hr it seems. The camper is pushing the box against the cab again, and it's become a hammering sound. I crank the music louder and try when I stop at Bull Canyon to push it back off a bit. Not budging. I took a break and hiked the river trail for a while.

 At one point in Redstone, I got out, and hurt my shoulder, leveraging my body sideways, holding onto my windowsills, trying to push the camper with my feet. I keep forgetting I'm not a hundred pounds and wiry anymore. By Tatla Lake it's an artillery firing behind my ear. When I pulled over to take in a mountain range viewpoint on an uphill gravel pull out, it shook itself back a bit I guess, and was quiet. But it didn't last long. I've slowed down to sixty to try and keep it from hitting so hard. When I hit the bump on the bridge, it stops and I have sweet silence for some time. I had turned off the stereo ages ago since I couldn't hear it over the banging. Then I hit a speed bump and it started up again until just before Nimpo Lake. At one point just after Kleena Kleen I pulled over on some gravel and tried to accelerate and bump it back. It did not work. Two hours of slow going, worried that the place it was hitting was going to be ruined, thinking how to solve it without too many supplies or hassles. Best plan I could think of is jacking it up prying it back out, and slipping half a pool noodle in there. Alls I need is a pry bar and a pool noodle. If you were here, you would look around and realize how futile this plan feels right now. 

 

Once again I hadn't intended to keep going for as long as I have , but I really wanted to sit in a pub to finish this day. A roadside saloon, man! But in each little town, everything is shut down, for sale, in decrepit disrepair. It makes me sad that there aren't enough visitors anymore to these wild and amazing places. I see lines of cattle here, lines of horses there, following one another back to the sleeping or feeding places around six pm, starting just after I took these ones of them all foraging for roadside McDonalds garbage.

Dean Lake, my camp destination came so fast and there were so many bugs hitting my windshield, I thought I'd just see if there was a pub in Anahim, or a rec site there. This rapid gunfire noise onslaught was traumatizing.

Anahim turns out to be the same as all the others, even though it takes up more space on the map and has shading on it like Williams Lake, which I took to mean it is a more populated centre. But maybe I didn't go far enough. I turned around and sped back to Dean Lake for sunset. Time for my jammies and reading and sippy times. 

 

Looking forward to the descent to sea level, this high, dry air always fucks with my sinuses for a week. I hate the getting used to it feeling, my whole face hurts. Eyes forehead cheeks n jaw. Hard to believe I'll be arriving to my destination already tomorrow, given that the box of my truck does not somehow shake itself the fuck off the frame. I have to try again in the morning. To fix it better. Wash the mud off the jacks with lakewater, back the chains holding it on, off, and push with all my might again. Also need to get rid of these bubbles in my radiator fluid, the noise is too peculiar every time I shut her off, sucking and bubbling and sucking...er. I think have an idea how to do it. The one solution I was told didn't work at all and I'm not sure if my way will ruin it somehow, so I will run it past a few people who know better first.

It is so nice to get in before dark to set up! I counted three long steeps to get back to Williams Lake from here, in case I plan to go to the -([secret])- Springs with the friends I imagine will be coming to visit... I mean, not imaginary friends, I mean... I'll do it either way... with whoever shows up, imaginary or not!

Man, I wish I had time to throw some cool filters on my pictures and make them look more badass. Not tonight, the battery's dying...