Sept 24th-Sept 28th
Kaslo, BC

S.S. Moyie in Kaslo, BC

A beautiful small town full of history!  We took a tour of the S.S. Moyie, the world's oldest intact stern paddlewheeler.  What a treat!  It's loaded with artifacts and kitted out to look as if you were stepping on board to head out on a voyage.  Wonderful museum - very informative!

Cedar Bay camp

We stayed at the Cedar Bay RV site - which is right on Kootenay Lake.  Nice site - full hook-up but no other amenities.  We were the only ones there which is a bonus - perfect time for camping out here!
We didn't end up going for a paddle here tho ... the wind kept coming up and as Kootenay Lake is 97 miles long, it can get pretty gnarly!

Museum at Sandon

Instead we headed out to Ainsworth Hot Springshttp://www.hotnaturally.com/our_water.php and soaked for a while.  What a treat!  Then headed back to the campsite to read and relax!
Sept 25th
Took a drive out to a cool ghost town - Sandon, BChttp://www.ghosttowns.com/canada/bc/sandon.html and toured the museum there.  WELL worth a stop ... it's a long, bumpy gravel road off the beaten path, but very cool.  There is still a mining operation up there but not much else.
Then back to the camp and out to the hot springs again!  Back at camp - dinner - campfire in a can - quiet - stars - beautiful night!
Sept. 26th

Bruce at beach on Kootenay Lake

Took a walk to the falls near here.  What gorgeous weather!  Sat on the beach for a while, then back to camp for some housekeeping.

Bruce at Kaslo Hotel and Brew Pub

Later we drove in to Kaslo to eat at this hotel/brew pub we'd seen.  It's got a patio overlooking the lake that looked to be a perfect place for a beer and some good pub food.  Well, the view is spectacular - no question.  Unfortunately, the brewing side of things wasn't 'up and running' yet, so we had some other local beer which was good.  The food however wasn't really that great.  But the view made up for a lot of it!  Back home to Dora and another episode of Eureka.  BTW ... if you've never seen that TV show - it's well worth a look.  Very quirky show about a town full of brilliant people who're always creating some kind of weird problems that the not-so-brilliant sherrif has to sort out.  Funny, gentle kind of humour.

Kaslo at night

Sept 27th
Decided not to head up to Nakusp.  It's getting colder up here in the mountains and there's not much more to do.  Decided to head back to Christina Lake where we know we can paddle, bike etc.  So Bruce drove while Linda white-knuckled it thru some of the most twisty-turny, dippy, bumpy and patched up roads in BC.  I think there was some good scenery out there ... but I was too busy hanging on for dear life to notice!  BTW ... Bruce is a marvelous driver ... I'm just a very poor passenger!
So we're back here at Skands at Christina - but someone else has scooped our perfect spot looking un-obstructed at the beach.  But we've got a good site ... still looking at the lake but a bit more treed.  If the other people leave tho ... we'll be over there in a flash!
So think we'll go out for a morning paddle, then perhaps some biking this afternoon!

Sept 24, Nelson, BC

Nelson city Campground

We pulled into Nelson on Saturday and spent 2 nights at the Nelson City Campground.  Right in the heart of the city ... not the greatest but we wanted walking distance to food and drink!
Spent yesterday driving to Trail & Rossland.  Nice drive, but forget visiting anything if it's a Sunday.  Everything's closed!
Anyway we walked around Nelson and the waterfront is quite nice with a path that goes a long way.

Nelson Waterfront walkway

Then Sunday nite we hit it big with my 60th birthday dinner at a restaurant called 'Bibo'.  What a find!  It was probably the best meal we've ever had!  I had Duck Confit which I've never had before and it was heavenly!!  I must learn how to cook that!

Dinner at Bibo

We're heading to Kaslo today and some more rural camping.  I'm looking forward to visiting the Ainsworth Hot Springs ... after all the wine last night I could use a long soak!


TTFN!

Sept 21,
First of all HAPPY BIRTHDAY LORNE HOLLAND!!!
We're still here at Christina Lake.  Can't beat it for location, weather or peace & quiet!  We're heading out tomorrow tho - to Nelson, BC.
We took a drive yesterday for something to do - towards Grand Forks and Greenwood.  We'd read some interesting stuff about Greenwood and their ghost town and deserted mine and it sounded interesting.
After arriving in Greenwood we dropped into the Visitor's Information Centre to get directions.  What a hoot! 
We were met with a big smile and hello from a lovely older gal.  She wondered what on earth brought us to Greenwood and told us right away:  "There's no shopping here today!"  "Hmmm" we said "we really weren't interested in shopping so that's ok".  "There's no restaurants open today either!"
"Hmmm ... ok ... is there at least a coffee shop open?"  She looked genuinely confused and thought a bit.  "I don't think so".  Now ... Greenwood is small.  VERY small.  And the information lady doesn't know about a coffee shop?  And why is everything closed?? 
Finally she offered an explanation of sorts:  "Our water has been tampered with!!" Oh?  "Yes, all we can do is flush our toilets!!"  Seems like that would have been a good place to start but hey ... she was very nice and really sweet so how can you be grouchy with her?

Linda Prospecting

Okey-dokey.  What about Phoenix Road up to the abandoned mine?  We got a blank look, then she proceeded to rummage around in the pamphlets and produced one with a flourish.  "Here it is!!"  Ok ...not much of a map ... how do you get there?  After a puzzled look she started telling us to "go down the road and turn at the place where there's 2 stores for sale ... although there IS a lot for sale right now so you might not find it."  And:  " then go to the old smoke stack - but don't go in there - and then turn and go up that road on the" (here she proceeded to start turning in circles trying to figure out if it's right or left.)  Ok ... no problem we said ... we'll find it.

Water bomber

Well, we did but after about an hour of roaming around very BAD logging roads we found a memorial to the lost town and that was about it.  We had to ask directions from some German tourists in a camper for directions on the way down.  But we did see a momma bear and 2 cubs! 
We also find some spots where there was old tailings from the mine and I found some interesting stones ... copper?  Gold??  Don't know.
When we got back to Dora we had a good show of water bombers scooping water for the nearby forest fire.  They went all day and were quite noisy but entertaining!

Trestle on Trans Canada Trail

Bruce got out for some mountain biking and said it was spectacular - neat trestles and magnificent view.  Good thing I didn't go as it was close to 30C and the trail went up for about 2km before leveling out. 

Wonderful night!

That night was spectacular with our Campfire in a Can, a glass of wine for me, Scotch for Bruce and a calm evening looking at the lake and watching the bats do their ballets in the sky!

Sept 18


Arrived at Christina Lake on the 16th.  It's a small town between Grand Forks and Castlegar, BC.  Small now but we hear that in summer this place is polluted with people who occupy the zillions of cottages that ring the lake as well as the numerous campgrounds.  And it seems that they all have at least one power boat or jet ski.  Luckily the season is over for the year and it's pretty quiet. 

camp at Skands

We got a nice spot in Skands Court RV Park which is situated right on the lake.  As there's hardly anyone here we got the prime spot parallel to the lake.  So sitting outside under our awning is a wonderful unobstructed view!

Kayak God

The lake isn't as warm as Lake Osoyoos but they bill themselves "The Warmest Tree-Lined Lake" in Canada.  Hmmm.  It's sort of 'warm-ish' I guess.  But I must say it does feel good on these truly toasty days we're getting.  Yesterday we recorded a temp of 35 outside our mo-ho!!

Linda before she melted

We've gone for a few paddles and yesterday we tried to bike a section of the Trans Canada Trail.  Tried I say as it's not only quite rough (for me) but there's that 35C temp to deal with.  Bruce finally had to leave me in the one shady spot we found and bike back so he could rescue me with the car!  Nice try ... and it's a beautiful panoramic view ... trestles to cross and all ... but the heat is just too much.

Linda at Christina Lake

Today we drove into Castlegar to see what we could see and had a very nice and interesting time at the Doukhobor Village Museum and The Railway Museum.  Had lunch at a Greek place sitting outside.  Very pleasant but noisy!  Man there's a lot of noisy trucks and motorcycles in Castlegar!!
Back home to Dora and sitting outside.  Picked up some Scotch in Castlegar so may sit out and use the 'campfire in a can' sipping a wee dram tonight.  It gets cold at night so might just be the thing!
Bye for today!

Sept 15th

Bruce squeezing his tomato!

Started the day with a nice bike ride into town.  Stopped at a pretty cafe and had some coffee in an outside patio.  We then scoped out the town to try and find a possibly Mexican restaurant for dinner that night but no such luck.  You'd think with so many places here called 'Casa Del so and so' and 'Costa del so and so' that there'd be something resembling Mexican but not so much. 

It got pretty toasty today - around 25C or so - so mostly just lounged around campsite.  We then biked to the fruitstand for veg and fruit for the next few days.  Lots of local produce to choose from!

Back 'home' with our goodies

The wind picked up hugely just around the time we were going to head out for a late afternoon paddle so instead we battened down the hatches and secured the mainsail etc. for a long nights' buffeting.

Tomorrow we'll head out for possibly Christina Lake ... not too far from here.  We'll see how that goes.  Good night for now!

Sept 14th

Linda

You sure can't beat the weather here ... hot in the day and nice and cool at night.  We got out for a couple hour paddle yesterday morning - the lake was mill-pond calm and not a cloud in sight.  Certainly not as much to look at as paddling in the ocean, but then there's the bonus of not having to deal with currents, tides etc. which I like!  I think that we'll probably head out again this morning as the afternoon might be hot enough to be a 'beach day'.  The temps are expected to reach 29C - but it usually gets hotter than forecasted!

Bruce in his ww boat

It really feels like you're in a desert here (which you are!) except for this beautiful lake.  We're in the heart of the fruit growing area of BC ... we can walk to several fruitstands and are enjoying eating MANY local peaches, nectarines, pears, plums, cherries and of course the veggies are good too!
We're starting to look at where to go next.  We thought originally of Nelson/Nakusp etc., but there doesn't seem to be many RV parks around there.  We found that Christina Lake - near Castlegar - looks pretty nice so may go there first.  It's not far from here which is nice. 

Catching up ...
Sept. 9th

Bathing beauties!

After picking up Mary & Steve, got to camp around 2-ish and sat around in the sun and played in the lake.  It was up to 31C so that felt good!  The lake is very shallow and that works for me as I can walk forever and the water is no higher than chest height!
We decided to go out for our anniversary dinner tonight as the weather's supposed to turn snotty tomorrow and we really wanted to sit on the balcony.

Happy 17th Anniversary!

We took a cab to Burrowing Owl (no one wanted to volunteer to be the designated driver!) and it was a perfect evening!  The weather was absolutely perfect, the wine was amazing (Cab/Franc) and the food was wonderful.  We shared some appies, then main courses of either halibut or steak.  Couldn't have been better!  A superb anniversary ... happy 17th!

Sept. 10th
Had an ok sleep ... Dora is quite tight with 4 people.

NK'MIP Desert Cultural Centre

After a light breakfast we walked over to the NK'MIP Desert Cultural Centre which is quite lovely.  There's quite a walk around the desert with lots of interpretive signs etc.  Then we got to see the snake show which was cool.

Grasslands Protected Area

Back to the mo-ho for an appie lunch then off to the Grasslands Protected Area.  A VERY bumpy, un-marked road leads you to the most amazing place.  Beautiful grasslands where you can get out and walk forever it seems!  It was quite cool and windy tho so didn't stay too long.
Back home to steak & pear/pecan salad for supper.
A 'rousing' game of dominoes and early to bed.

Sept. 11th

Bruce with our 'booty'

moocher dog

Lake Breeze

After we all got up and at it ... began our drive to Kelowna to take Mary & Steve back to the airport.  Along the way we took a detour up to Naramata to do some wine tasting!  We visited Kettle Valley Winery, Red Rooster, Hillside Estate and Lake Breeze - where we had a very nice lunch.  We were joined by the owners dog who proceeded to mooch from one table then the next - but he was VERY cute!
Then off to the airport and a very sad good-bye to Mary & Steve!

Sept. 12th

Bruce on the canal bike path

A 'domestic' day today.  Laundry, cleaning, in to town to pick up a part for our bike rack, a stop at a fruit stand for dinner 'fixin's' then home for lunch.  After that we went for a bike ride along the canal and had a great time.  Would have been greater if I'd have remembered to put on my padded bike shorts tho - OUCH!!!
The weather is beautiful again ... not so hot ... only around 22C which is perfect for me!
Bruce is out paddling on the lake right now so time for me to relax and read a bit!