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I visited Trail, BC in the summer of 2004. I was mesmerized by the Columbia River and the beauty of the Kootenay mountains. Trail, BC has a place in my heart that is never going to go away.
Coming into Trail from the East Kootenay pass, we saw a mountain sheep standing in the middle of the road. He just stood there and if you wanted to get by him, he wasn't going to move but you had to go around him.
I remember it was 40 degrees Celsius when we arrived in Trail. I can also remember being able to sit by the Columbia River at 10:00 pm at night and enjoying the evening because there was not a mosquito to be found. Coming from Ontario, Canada, mosquitoes always swarm you to death and make it miserable. However, this did not happen in Trail. No mosquitoes! It was heaven!
We camped at the Beaver Creek Campground. It is situated on the eastern shore of the Columbia River. This campground is clean and quiet and we pretty much had the whole campground to ourselves for the few days that we spent there.
The first day that we were camping, we saw a bald eagle fly right over our heads. That bald eagle was the very first wild bald eagle that I had ever seen in my life and it is burned into my memory forever.
I would recommend Trail, BC to anyone that wants to discover the Kootenay mountain range in British Columbia, Canada.
This is Frank Slide in Alberta, Canada. The Frank Slide occurred in 1903. Turtle Mountain came smashing down on the village of Frank. A lot of people died in this slide. There is rumors of ghosts frequenting the area and while I was there I saw a shadow of a miner on the rocks and it looked like he was holding a pick. You can see him if you look really close. It is kind of eerie visiting Frank Slide. It kind of gives you goose bumps when you realize that what you are standing on is the remains of a town that was buried in about 90 seconds.
While traveling through northern Ontario we found one of Ontario's best known secrets, quite by accident. We came across Ouimet Canyon.
It was 6:00 AM in the morning and we had been driving all night long. We were looking for a campsite so we could crash for a day or two. We saw the sign for Ouimet Canyon Provincial Park and pulled in, not knowing it wasn't a campground. We soon found out in a hurry that it wasn't and pulled back onto the road. We were fascinated at what was in the Provincial Park and made a promise that we would come back and visit it later that day.
We had no idea what was in store for us when we went back to visit it later that afternoon. We walked the trail through the park and saw lots of different flower species. We then came across the bridge. We walked over that and looked down. It was a long ways down. However, it wasn't until we got over the bridge and to the lookout point that we realized what was there.
What we saw was a large canyon. It wasn't as big as Grand Canyon, however, it was still pretty big all the same. I was definitely impressed. You could see for miles in both directions. To the south, you could see a swamp land, a river and then large hills in front of you. To the north, just more canyon. Straight down, a long steep drop.
Just to the right of the lookout is a statue of an old Indian made out of rock. There is some legend about this statue. I'm not exactly sure how the legend goes but I do know that it is something about a giant and a princess.
It was pretty awesome finding this canyon in northern Ontario and I definitely know it is a place that I will never forget.
