Bullhead Mountain, August 20th, 2005
Earlier in the morning of August 20th 4 of us headed out on the
Hudson's Hope road to make our way to Bullhead Mountain,
located just East of Williston Lake and the site of the WAC Bennett
Dam.
Along the way I saw sign of a car that had rolled over, off the road
and into the ditch. Pulling off into an access drive for a field I
headed back to check to see if the occupant was still around. The
car had completely rolled over, and the skid marks on the road
showed that the driver had lost control, swerved around and flipped
into the ditch. The passenger-side window was completely smashed
out, and there was no sign of the driver, so I assumed that (s)he
had gotten out and gone for help. Inside the car I could see a couple
of open and empty beer bottles, giving me the opportunity to note to
Michael, my new coworker, that there do tend to be a number of
alcohol-related traffic accidents in the area.
As there was nothing we could do, and there was gasoline leaking
out of the fuel door, we got back on our way and eventually made
it to the trailhead.
Starting up the trail we quickly realised it had not originally been
designed for casual hiking, taking a straight line up the side of the
mountain, creating a fairly strenuous hike, although the path was
very easy to follow. About halfway up the trail I saw some tracks,
which Pierre and Tara identified as being from a bear, and not a
barefoot human. The tracks were about the size of my fist, so we
figured it was still a fairly small bear. Further up the trail, just past
some fresh saskatoon berries, we found further evidence of the
bear, in the form of scat.
Beyond the tracks and the scat we saw no further sign of bear,
and the rest of the hike went by relatively quickly, leading us up to
the top of the mountain and giving us a beautiful view of the surrounding
area. We grabbed an easy lunch on some rocks with huge fissures in
them, overlooking Portage Mountain and the Peace Canyon. After
lunch we made our way to the lookout point, giving view of Williston
Lake and the WAC Bennett Dam. It also gave a good view of a bay on
the lake, which was absolutely filled with tree trunks - driftwood that
still remains from the flooding of the reservoir. You see, when they
built the dam they didn't clear the trees from the full extent of the
area that would become Williston Lake. As a result those trees
remained when the largest man-made lake was created, and
they've been found on the surface ever since. Mind you, some
of the trees floating in the lake are of more recent origin, falling
in as the banks of the lake erode away.
After that it was time to hike back down the trail, marvelling at the
changing strata of rock.
Once we got back to the base of the mountain I asked Michael if
he would like to see a bit more of the area, and ended up taking
him on a quick tour of the WAC Bennett and Peace Canyon dams,
also pointing out Alwyn Holland Park, the Visitor Info Centre, and
the Hudson's Hope Museum, suggesting that he come back some
time to explore them in more depth.
Back to Chris's Adventures in BC
