Is That a Horse?

Dugan Lake campground was quite full, especially when compared to the isolated spots we'd been enjoying. It also had houses quite nearby, some of which had significant numbers of vehicles in various states of disrepair and/or decrepitude, and a float-plane on the lake. I wasn't expecting the best night's sleep I've ever had.

In the end, though, all was quiet, all night, and the only thing that stopped us sleeping well was me, waking up and checking the watch, sure that it must be almost time to go to the graveyard meeting. At 0330. And then at 0430. Again at 0450. And at 0530. Then someone suggested that I should consider getting the hell out of bed so she could sleep.

On the way in to Williams Lake, we heard an item on the radio about BC's legislative shenanigans around caring for the elderly; apparently in the early 2000's, the province set out to reform laws around guardianship, with specific focus on elder care. It was ground-breaking legislative development work, and the suite of laws they came up with have been widely-copied and implemented in provinces across Canada and in a number of other nations. In BC, though, the passage of the reforms into law stalled in 2007 as a result of the less-than-favorable economic winds then blowing. This means that today in BC - the province that started it all, bore the expense of the research and the difficulty of developing the legislation - the laws governing care for the elderly are still the bad old laws; the laws that are based on 1960's definitions of lunacy, and which have been shown time and time again to benefit the so-called carers at the expense of the best interests of the oldies. Essentially it's really easy to swipe the assets of your elderly relatives. We'd like to invite all those of our parents not yet resident in Canada to come join us in BC as soon as possible.

We met Scott (Hi Scott!) at the graveyard, and set off down the Boy Scout Trail to the valley floor. The trail from there once zig-zagged across the pond on a raised boardwalk, but a few years back the beavers got extra busy and raised the water level higher than the surface of the boardwalk. Now the trail goes around the pond before crossing the river and starting the long but very fun haul up the Spokey Hollow and Crankcase Alley trails. A quick stop to take in the views out over the lake and the town (and catch our breath - Scott wasn't hanging about on those steep uphill sections!), and then we were onto the Ravin trail, which started vehemently and got better and better before dropping us into the Max trails (Middle and Lower; Upper is still largely buried under deadfall from the last big ice-storm that blew through), which provided a fast but technical blast along the face of the hill, across a number of fallen trees with angled chocks tucked into their downhill ends, and then through a wonderful section of forest full of twisting, undulating terrain where we dived and swayed between trees at high speed, all the way back to Spokey Hollow. Which was even better riding downhill than it had been riding up. Even the horse-sized dog we met along the way was in a good mood (I'm assuming this, based on it not eating my leg).

We spent the next hour or two at Barking Spider, getting today's busted spoke replaced and acquiring a fancypants new bag to replace the one that disappeared at Whistler. Then we ignored the best-coffee advice of Scott and Mitch (Hi Mitch!) and went to the Gecko Cafe, which had truly appalling coffee and tasty food, although I'd've preferred a slightly bigger portion. Then we hit the road north to Quesnel, with some fairly mixed impressions of Williams Lake: great riding; grim industrialism; a sizeable underclass; some intelligent, interesting people; poor town planning; shitty coffee; no good beer; lots of wilderness close at hand; lots of wildlife nearby; lots of signs warning about auto theft.

We'll go back, but we're not planning to settle there.