First Snow on Northshore, Oct 27

First substantial dusting of snow yesterday morning on the Northshore Mountains. And a beautiful fall day.

Evolution in Action - Adams River Sockeye, Oct. 23/24

What an incredible spectacle! Amazing colors. The river red with salmon, working their way upstream, resting in the eddies or already dead on shore (where the red fades away).



This year’s Sockeye run is a dominant run occurring every 4 years. But it’s also the largest run in almost 100 years (since 1913 when a man-made rock slide at Hells Gate put a temporary stop to the migration of fish on the Fraser). 9 million fish are expected to return to the Adams River this year.



We checked out the viewing points at Roderick Haig-Brown Provincial Park, watched the fish mill around in the spawning channels and walked down to Shuswap Lake, where the shore was covered with rows of dead fish (and some divers were getting ready to push their way through floating carcasses for a dive with the living fish).



The piles of carcasses are less disturbing when one considers that this is evolution in action: the salmon's strategy of survival to produce an enormous amount of biomass for a short period of time - more than predators could possibly consume.

Before we left, we paddled our kayaks down a section of the Adams a ways above the viewing area. We found an never-ending stream of fish, fish darting away as we floated down the drops and the eddies were red with them. It occurred to me then that our salmon runs really are one of nature’s big spectacles, comparable to the big animal herds of the Serengeti and the arctic caribou.

Surf-Lions at Skookumchuck, Oct. 15

What a beautiful October weekend! Sunshine and blue sky for our Skookumchuk trip. But it wasn't only us who had the idea to come for some surfing. Quite a few other paddlers showed up. And a couple of sea-lions, but they waited with their surf session until we kayakers got off the water.

Dolomiti Moments

Two magic moments of the Dolomites trip: The last flight from Pordoi Pass when the rest of the gang had already flown out to land but Pete and I stayed and played some more in the smooth ridge lift. Cloud level was just above us and the rising air was condensing at our altitude. Wisps of cloud streamed by as we were flying in and out of them.

The last day of our trip did not look promising for flying. Low clouds were hanging just above Pordoi Pass. For lack of better things to do (and since our pass was still good for one more day - compared to BC lift prices are an amazing deal: 35 euros for 3 days), we took the gondola up to Sass Pordoi into the coulds and fog. Magically, we popped out into blue sky and bright sunshine about 200 meters below the top station. What a sight! Like islands from the ocean, Dolomiti Kofels and Spitzen peaked out of the thick layer of clouds. Marmnolada, Langkofel, Rosgarten and in the distance even see the summits of the Ortler Alps and the Grossglockner.