BC witness Posted March 7, 2022 Author Posted March 7, 2022 The weather finally co-operated this weekend, and the whole group got out for a while on Sunday morning. Thomas. Magniaesir, Alohacop, myself, and my youngest son, Rick, all met at Tim Hortons for breakfast, then headed out to a location where an encounter had been reported to Thomas back in the fall of '07, the day after it had happened. The encounter involved a First Nations hunter looking for bear on the first day of open season. While walking an old logging road through a swampy area, he caught motion out of the corner of his eye, and turned to see a rock, larger than a softball, arcing towards him. It hit the water just 6 to 8 feet away, and he caught a glimpse of a dark shape in the brush on the far side of the weedy pond, disappearing deeper into the timber on the hillside above. Thomas and the late Bill Miller investigated the next day, and found tracks where the hunter indicated he saw the figure, and Thomas got one fairly good cast. Our trip today was to show the location to Alohacop for a future book project. When we arrived at the spot, which I had visited with Thomas several years ago, we found that the area had been dramatically changed due to 2 large sets of high voltage powerline towers having been run right through the swamp, and the adjacent hillside was recently clearcut. Further exploration found the road completely washed out a km further on, from our drastic rain storms of last November, which have damaged many of the resource roads in the region, and may take years to repair. The rest of the group headed back home in the early afternoon, but my son and I chose to explore further. We found the next road system to the East had suffered a similar fate, with about 100' of it gone off the face of the mountain, just 4 km from the highway, and another, 10 km further up the highway was blocked by wet spring snow about the same distance in. After those disappointments, we started heading west, towards home, but took one final FSR, which turned out to be a good choice, as it climbed a SW facing slope, and was almost completely free of snow, with only a few easily handled patches in shady stretches along the ridge at the top. It wandered past a hang glider launch point, where we watched them for 40 minutes or so, then continued to a lake that I could see on Gaia. Just before reaching the lake, we met a man on a trail bike riding out, with a pack and fishing rod on his back. I asked how the fishing was at the lake, and he told us he limited out on 12 to 14" trout through the ice on the lake. We reached the path to the lake a few minutes later, hiked the few hundred yards to the shore, had a quicl look around and took a few pics, and then called it a day, heading back to home and supper.IMG_0967.HEICIMG_0963.HEICIMG_0969.HEICIMG_0972.HEIC 1
SumEd Posted March 7, 2022 Posted March 7, 2022 Spectacular views BC, too bad about the man made changes to the area. I’m sure everyone was excited and full of anticipation over breakfast. Still never a bad day out in nature.
BC witness Posted March 7, 2022 Author Posted March 7, 2022 Right on both counts, SumEd. Magni got his first trail run in his new-to-him Nissan 4x4 pick up, as well.
norseman Posted March 9, 2022 Admin Posted March 9, 2022 Took a spin on the property today. Found what was left of a whitetail deer. Hair everywhere. Finally found part of the hide. Snow is hard today. Its colder. Suppose to be 10 tonight. But wont support my weight yet. But Grizzly goes anywhere. 1
BC witness Posted March 9, 2022 Author Posted March 9, 2022 Definitely still winter there. What's the elevation at the property? There's no snow here in the Fraser Valley below 2000'.IMG_0962.HEIC
norseman Posted March 9, 2022 Admin Posted March 9, 2022 3 minutes ago, BC witness said: Definitely still winter there. What's the elevation at the property? There's no snow here in the Fraser Valley below 2000'.IMG_0962.HEIC You last two posts I cannot see your pictures or open them bud. The Newport property is 2400 feet. Which is deceiving because it’s so flat compared to the ranch. The ranch is like 1500 feet to 3000 feet. On the ranch you feel like your in the mountains. But in reality both houses are at 2400 feet. But being only 6 miles from Idaho we get more moisture here than they do on the upper Columbia. One step further from the Cascade rain shadow I guess.
BC witness Posted March 9, 2022 Author Posted March 9, 2022 Sorry about the pictures, norse, they're from my new Iphone 13, and in HEIC format, which I've never seen before. I'll have to figure out how to make it produce jpeg pics. Some others here have opened those pictures, though.
norseman Posted March 9, 2022 Admin Posted March 9, 2022 13 minutes ago, BC witness said: Sorry about the pictures, norse, they're from my new Iphone 13, and in HEIC format, which I've never seen before. I'll have to figure out how to make it produce jpeg pics. Some others here have opened those pictures, though. Im running an IPad. And when I click to download the image it just sits there.
BigTreeWalker Posted March 11, 2022 Posted March 11, 2022 BC, I was able to open the pictures only by downloading them 1st. Never seen that file format before. But I'm on an android device.
BC witness Posted March 12, 2022 Author Posted March 12, 2022 Found it in my camera settings on the phone. HEIC is a "high efficiency" setting, apparently needed for 4K formats. I've turned it off, and set it to "most compatible", which will use jpeg files, so my next pics should post up so we can all see them in the thread. I had no idea my new Iphone 13 had that weird default setting before I took the pics in my trip post above. 2
norseman Posted March 13, 2022 Admin Posted March 13, 2022 Crossed the PO river at Usk. Went up Skookum creek. And then south to Indian creek and Marshall lake. The lake is still froze over. And really cannot access the NF yet. Just bumped along the border in a few spots. Saw turkeys and whitetails. 1 2
Popular Post BC witness Posted March 28, 2022 Author Popular Post Posted March 28, 2022 The rain that was forecast for today held off, so after lunch I grabbed the Hummer keys and headed out to a nearby mountain trail. I had recently heard, through a local 4x4 forum, that a branch road off a well known FSR was now open, after being gated for years. I got there about 2, and found the narrow road to be in pretty good condition, due to recent logging near the summit, but right from the start it was steep enough to be best climbed in low range. At about 2 km up, I saw a very scenic small waterfall, and stopped for the photo, of course. At km 3 the grade lessened to a more normal climb rate, and I continued all the way to the recent logging show at the end of a nice hanging valley at 800M el.(about 2500'). There were still patches of snow, but the road was bare, with a thin layer of mud from the snow melt, so I had my eyes peeled for tracks, but only saw lots of bear scat, probably from last fall, before the snows came. After a break to stretch my legs and have a snack, while glassing the clearcut, and a talus slope at the foot of an impressive rock bluff, I headed back down the trail, exploring a couple of older deactivated branches along the way, and taking a few more scenic pics. Since the start of this route is only 40 minutes from my home, I was back in time for dinner at 6. 1 4
PNWexplorer Posted April 8, 2022 Posted April 8, 2022 I see someone copied my method of painting factory rims a bronze/gold color to make a white vehicle really stand out, lol... Beautiful weather here today at 67 degrees, so rode my Harley to work. I've been working on it and improving it ever since I got back from Arizona. I was hoping to get into the woods this weekend, but snow is in the forecast for tomorrow and Saturday. Might go anyway. 1
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