Road Apples

One of the great secret places of my youth was Top of the World Provincial Park.

It's a little remote.

If you have a look at an aerial view, you'll note that there are sort of roads kind of near it... but not too near it.

Interestingly, it's nearly exactly between the Sticks and another of the great camping spots of my Childhood, Wasa Lake.

I may have mentioned that it is the nature of travel in the interior of British Columbia that locations that are not very far apart as the crow flies, are some distance to drive. Wasa was like that; It was a pleasant drive, but 90 minutes from home. And it was close to Gramma Jay's.

And we could swim, with a sand beach and everything. And it had a fantastic little Ice Cream shop/Candy/General store that kids just loved.

But today, we're talking about Fish Lake.

Wasa was a drive, but Fish Lake, the main feature of Top-of-the-World as far as I was concerned, was an excursion.

It required rather serious preparation, both in gear and psychology... because, to paraphrase Boromir, One merely walks into Fish Lake.

For about 2 and a half hours, on average.

So, it isn't exactly a day trip. You usually plan for at least one overnight, so you have to carry in a tent.

And a bedroll. And food.

You get the Idea.

Naturally, the first time we went in, Dad and Uncle Crazy Legs planned it as a day trip.

The clans had gathered, as we frequently did in the summer. Uncle Crazy Legs, also a teacher, had exposed my cousins to the same sort of youth I had, with the only real difference being location. They ended up in Dawson Creek in 1979 or so.

Yes, it's a real place. No, it was there before the TV show. No, it has nothing to do with the TV show. And, yet again, I digress.

As a matter of fact, the clans had gathered in a marvelous clearing just under the bridge across the Lussier River - the same Camp spot Dad, the Artist, and I would later eat peaches. We were to be there the better part of a week. As it turns out, it's about 20 minutes from the parking area at the trail head to Fish Lake.

That's right; Parking Area. At the time it was a rough-hewn rail fence abutting the Primordial Forest, with a wide track of gravel to park on, just off the Whiteswan Forest Service road.

I recall that the day trip had been part of the plan all along; Dad had made some arrangements. The greatest of these were apples.

To this day, I don't know where the idea came from. He had Mom pack a couple dozen large Red Delicious apples, several tubs of peanut butter, and bags of mini marshmallows, chocolate chips, and trail mix in the tent trailer.

The day before Fish Lakes, camped en masse on the Lussier River, we all went to work. Under the direction of Dad and Uncle Crazy Legs, we cut the tops off the apples like one would a Jack-o-lantern, slanting in so that the top could be re-installed later. Then we spooned out the apple cores. You had to be pretty careful not to scrape too deep, or you'd break the skin of the apple. That would ruin it.

Once the cores were out, Mom had mixed the other ingredients together in a large bowl, and we spooned the mix of peanut butter, mini-marshmallows, chocolate chips, and trail mix into the apples, and pushed the tops back on. The peanut butter makes them stick.

Usually.

What you get is a highly portable, ridiculously highly energy- and protein-packed snack suitable for eating while hiking.

And no trash. The whole thing is biodegradable. It's about as perfect a Back-Country hiking snack as you can get. Fills you right up, too.

I was ten at the time. I don't recall which of us coined them Road Apples - so I won't take the credit. And yes, we all thought the Irony was pretty funny, too.

Tragically, my Beautiful Wife is deathly allergic to nuts. So is my niece. Subsequently my opportunities for making them again are pretty thin. That... and I live in Ontario now.

See, I only ever made Road Apples for the hike into Top of the World. The two seemed to just go together, like London Fogs on Christmas Eve. Ask Lange. She knows what I mean.

Late one summer in my 20th year, my friend The Angry Scientist wanted to do some High-Altitude Hiking and Photography, and, since the plateau is at about 2200 metres (that's about 6700 feet for you southerners),  we decided we should trek in to Fish Lake. I'm pretty sure that's the last time I made Road Apples. I don't recall his feelings about them.

I'm also pretty sure that's the last time I saw Top of the World. I think that was after the one where Mr. Bill couldn't resist a 4 am taste of Porcupine... But THAT is a story for another time.

Low Tech

I remember my first computer.

Touchstones like that are more commonly the First Car, First Pet, First Love, First Kiss.

Of course I recall all those too - but household computing defines the turning point in the information age. And that's where I live.

My first computer was an old 286 clone that I was given by friends in trade for services as the Gardener at Chez Graham. This may be where I developed my affection for making thing grow neatly; I certainly fought the Idea at the house in the Sticks. Mom kept a pretty extensive vegetable garden. Weeding it was one of the worst menial chores on the docket.

Things change.

Dad took some time to embrace technology, but not so long as you'd think. His office at his elementary school in the Sticks picked up the education standard in the fall of 1982; the Apple //e.

I'd had a marginal amount of experience with them at that point; friends of mine had parents who were notorious early adopters of technology - especially that which would benefit the advancement of their children's scholastic educations. They were both teachers. All three boys have degrees. Two have Doctorates. They're all extremely intelligent, well-rounded and successful in their fields.

Just sayin.

The first time Dad went to take a poke at his office Computer, he called me at the house.

"How do I get this thing to work?" He asked.

"Well, just type MENU, and hit the enter button."

"Ya, I know about that. How do I turn it on?"

And that was my first experience as Tech Support. It wouldn't be my last.

One notes that the next generation of personal computers had the power switch up front, and labelled.

Go figure.

Dad loved computers. He had, prior to that, an electronic chess board that had 10 levels of play, and he played it a lot; none of us could ever present much of a challenge for him. It got to the point where he would routinely beat it on its highest setting.

He had other challenges, as all working folk do. He loved his students, school, and staff, but had... challenges... dealing with a School Board rife with political agendas - especially his Superintendent at the time.

He was discussing his frustration with that particular person on Saturday afternoon in my 14th year, when I had a (for me,  exceedingly rare) Moment of Clarity.

"You know that chess game of yours?" I asked him. "I think it's kind of like that. You're playing at level 10 against a level 2 opponent."

Dad stood there looking at me for another one of those Longest Moments in Recorded History. It would not be the last time I saw that look... but it would be infrequent.

And then he started to laugh.

"Kid, you're exactly right, you know that?" and that was the last time I ever recall seeing Dad stressed from work.

It would, of course take me many, many years to understand the truth which I had, in my naïvety, spoken. I have since become a student of Hanlon's Razor and the Dunning-Kruger Effect, but I, as I occasionally do, digress.

Anyway, Dad also saw fit to let us have a really cool, second generation Video console in the mid 80's, under the rationale that it was good for hand-eye coordination, and problem solving. We got a little Intellivision II console... and played it until I had to re-engineer the hand controllers so the buttons worked.

I Loved Sub Hunt. Atlantis was pretty cool, too.

Dad would eventually commit all his writings and gaming to a third- or fourth- generation Mac. He spent a lot of time on it until the fall of 1997. I've salvaged what I can of his writing over the years, and have, on more than one occasion, threatened to publish it out here somewhere where it can be enjoyed. He'd like that.

And I like to think he'd really get a kick out of where his Mac home computer has taken western Society.

Well... maybe to a point.

I call Mom once a week, every Friday evening. Depending on how tired she is, and how much stimulation she's had through the day, her memory is either crystal - or not so much. Less of both is usually better for lucidity. For the most part, I get to repeat the same jokes, stories, blog posts, and she always laughs. I find it rather cathartic, and pleasant closure to a usually hectic week. I always feel like she's happy to hear from me.

This last time, she said in an offhand sort of way "Well, My watch does everything..."

I chuckled a little at that. "What?" she said. "It tells me the time, the day, the Date..."

This is a digital she's had for probably a dozen years. Mom was never quite so interested in technology as was Dad.

I've seen my Mother's cell phone. From a couple years ago. It was a ridiculous, obsolete brick then, too. She only ever turned it on when she wished to call out.

I said Mom didn't particularily embrace current technology. I didn't say she didn't have good ideas.

So I explained the current level of technology that is the Standard Issue Smartphone. Calendar, Address Book, World-Wide Instant Communications portal, Library, Encyclopedia, Phonebook, Interactive Map, Camera, Video camera, Stereo system, Music Library, Entertainment platform, Voice memo recorder, GPS Unit, and on, and on, and more computing power than NASA used to send Neil to the Moon in '69.

All arranged neatly in a package sized to fit in the palm of your hand. It's very nearly miraculous.

Mother was suitably impressed. Or perhaps asleep. I was almost assuredly Oxidizing by then.

As a matter of fact, I've been watching a series of television programming from the BBC dating back to the mid 70's called Connections. It's an excellent series starring James Burke. I highly recommend it.

The fact that I watched it in my home, on my wireless network, using my hand-held tablet, merely enhanced the delicious irony of the content.

I must admit, also, that I wrote the majority of this posting lounging beside the pool at my Brother- and Sister-in-Law's house.

On that same Tablet.

It's awesome. I used to tell people right when the Internet got interesting that I didn't know everything... but I knew where to find it.

And THAT is the other side of the sword. Smart devices are going to make us all Dumb, I swear. Nobody has to remember anything any more.

Kids don't know their own phone numbers because it's speed dial. #1.
Can't read a map because the GPS tells us to turn in 50 meters.
Can't look up anything unless it's on Google.

And most recently there's been an alarming trend of kids walking into disaster, Ears budded, eyes down.

And sometimes... driving.

Man, don't even go there.

And -  Pretty Soon we'll be wearing them... or they will be integrated into us.

It's gonna make us Dumb. Maybe that's how SkyNet wins.

Evidently Mom's been making noise about wanting a computer. I think we'll check her out on an iPad first. See how it goes...

Peaches

It's a rare day when I leave a place once, and once only.

Very often I get to the threshold of too far to turn back when I realise I've forgotten something reasonably critical; you know - wallets, keys, Children, clothing, stuff like that - and, thus, return to collect said forgotten item.

It's likely that this after-the-last-minute remembering is a learned behaviour from long association with befuddlement - mine now... but first, my Dad's.

Dad's befuddlement was insidious because at no time did he seem befuddled. He cruised through the chaos with an air of supreme confidence and je voulais faire cela such that the unsuspecting kid did not see the hardship coming - right up until he'd utter the infamous "No Sweat for a big operation like this" curse.

Fortunately, hardships make for great memories.

I may have mentioned that Dad liked to camp.

Well, actually, Dad liked to hunt and fish - and remove himself from the stressors of civilization - which pretty much amounts to the same thing; so, in order to accomodate those preferences with the maximum efficiency... Dad camped.

And it was good, because we camped with him. Most of the time time we took Mom, but sometimes we left her at home to her devices - but only when she had done something especially deserving of that rare treat.

Another rare treat Mom was especially deserving of was a tent trailer. Dad bought it from a friend of his in the Old Country early one summer, after a particularly odious camping trip to Kaslo, on the shores of the Mighty - and, ultimately, Unfathomable - Kootenay Lake.

It rained that trip. Rather a lot. I was about six, and I distinctly recall the bread floating out of the canvas cabin tent that was swamped in about five inches of water.  Mother Packed me and my little sister over to Gramma Jay's Camper - sturdily housed on the back of a 1962 Chev Pickup truck - and gamely said nothing to Gramma and my older sister calmly drinking tea and playing cribbage in the dry warmth. Her eyes bulged a little when Gramma indicated it hadn't occurred to her it was raining that hard - but I, as is my custom, digress.

 Mom had emphatically stated that she was interested in sleeping in a moldy canvas tent Never Again. So dad bout the trailer in an effort to woo her back to the campground.

Admittedly, it wasn't much of a tent trailer, but that was the beauty of the thing. It was beds, storage, and a table, arranged 20 inches off the ground with a reasonably water-resistant roof - which is really all Mom wanted. She set to its organisation, even including little lists taped to the underside of the bed lockers describing what the proper contents should be for a standard trip.

It was also small enough that Dad could easily maneuver it around without using a car. As it took him several years to master reversing a short hitch trailer, this was a Good Thing.

We dragged that trailer everywhere.

One Labour Day weekend, after Mom had given up camping for the season, Dad decided my brother and I should join him in a trek up to the Lussier River for one last Fish before school set in for the winter.

Dad made a list of the things we ought to pack, and we set to work. The nice thing about the tent trailer was that its standard load-out saved half the packing time.

Friday afternoon right after school we hook up the tent trailer and roar off. It's a drive - 45 minutes south, and then an hour north, half on paved roads, half not. That's typical of south eastern B.C. - a 200 km drive gets you 45km as the crow flies.

We were at our usual location on the bank of the river, down in a draw basically under the road and bridge before dark. We set camp in a hurry; Dad wanted to cook dinner. That's when we made the discovery.

The tent trailer was great as it stored almost everything you would need camping.

You know - except when Mom has, unusually, already commenced cleaning it out for the winter.

The critical issue was Pots. and Cutlery.

Cutlery was okay. Dad and I had our schrade knives, and we could use those to whittle forks and spoons for the three of us. I defy, however, even the most seasoned mountaineer, survivalist, man-vs-wild aficionado or Queen Scout to whittle an effective Cooking pot.

And this is where I learned that It Ain't Over until you have exhausted all the possibilities.

Dad found a big tin of canned peaches. The can opener was in the cutlery box back home, though.

Ever open a tin can with a folding knife? It works alright if the blade locks, like these, fortunately, did. Terrible for the blade, though.

We ate dessert first, and then used that can to cook our meals in for the next two days, and had a stellar fishing weekend.

To this day, when the Avoidable Sideways Slide happens in my own endeavors, when I just plain screw up by forgetting something critical and my learned after-the-last-minute-remembering magic fails me... well.

I'll just wing it. I'll think of something.

I prefer to do this with just a touch of panache and  je voulais faire cela - it's fun to watch my Beautiful Wife's eyes roll like that.

The trailer hitch broke on the way down the mountain. Dad had to chain the thing to the truck, and I hung out the back window watching it to ensure it didn't jump off. Ate exhaust fumes until I was car sick. I think the hitch ball had lost its nut, but I don't recall.

That would be typical. Dad was aggressively unlucky about vehicle maintenance - acerbated by burgeoning indifference - and the tent trailer, and the K5 Blazer took the brunt of it when I was a kid.

But those... those are stories for another day.

Lessons

I taught myself to ski when I was 17 years old.

You tell people that you grew up in the mountains in British Columbia, and they make assumptions. Truth is, I've been skiing maybe a half-dozen times in my life, and I'm not very good at it.

All my contemporaries growing up in the Sticks skied, or played hockey, or whatever. I never did. I always presumed it was because the gear was too expensive. For one reason or another, we grew up poor-middle-class, but that's a story for another time.

We could actually skate on the street most days in winter. The snow was usually compacted to the point of ice, and the plows didn't scrape it down so as not to rip up the gravel shoulders of the streets. The Municipality installed gutters on the streets in the early 80s, and that signaled the End of That.

At the time, not skiing and not skating didn't really bother me. Well, that's not true; the not skating kind of did. I had Dad's old hand-me-down skates and they obviously fit me horrendously badly. I tried going skating on my own a handful of times in the Sticks... but those stupid skates had nothing for ankle support, and were more a detriment than anything else.

At least I always thought they were Dad's; they may have been my brother's once - that would certainly make sense. Suffice to say they were very old, and a little too big.

I suspect that a good skate swap for kids - like we have practically everywhere now in North America - would have really done well for me. It's one thing to build a bike out of spare parts... but there isn't much you can do for skating.

Looking back, I know for a fact that if I really wanted skates, I would have got them. But, as stated - I didn't care enough.

We've been taking the little kids out to Brimacombe for skiing lessons on Saturdays.

This is something I'd never did as a kid - organized lessons in a sport - except for swimming lessons at the wading pool at Kin park when I was five. I rather like the fact that we are able to provide things for our children that I never had... but then I think about it.

I spent winter weekends icefishing. And snowshoeing. And hunting. Snowmobiling. Sledding. Shooting. We played shinny on frozen ponds with rough-cut hockey equipment that dad made on the fly. Meals involving roasting home-made elk sausage on willow sticks over the open fire (yes, lit with One Match). Winter drives to explore. Camping occasionally.

Whatever my childhood lacked in financing sporting lessons - my Dad more than made up for in time and effort. Nobody could ever complain about that.

The result of that breadth of experience, courtesy of Dad, is that I've done - and am comfortable doing - things that make some of my Contemporaries go all bulgy-eyed. Butchering an elk on the kitchen table and making sausage comes immediately to mind - but I digress.

So I taught myself to skate on rollerblades at 27. I bought good ones. I still have them. Funny thing - the difference between Ice Skating and Rollerblading is Hills. I believe I still have the scars...

But when I was 17, I went on a school skiing trip to Fernie. As I indicated, it was my very first crack at skiing. It turns out they teach kids what they called "snowplowing" - nowadays they tell kids it's a pizza.

I never did that. Couldn't for some (knees) reason. I went straight to the proper turning method by watching people who knew what they were doing - and mimicking them.

Of course the down side is when you're a novice, they set your bindings to come off the boot really easily so you don't hurt yourself - even if you are roughly gorilla-shaped. They don't expect you to turn properly. I sheared my skis right off my feet a couple times before I figured that out.

I'm hoping that in a year or two my eight-year-old will be a better skier than me. It's not much of a stretch.

Maybe he'll teach me how to ski backward. In the mean time, the Saturdays out have been excellent.

When Lawn Chairs Attack!

Dad had a long-standing, near-legendary problem with folding lawn chairs.

Wait, What? Lawn Chairs?

Yep.

Looks innocuous enough, doesn't it? Woven polyester/plastic slats, 1mm thick rolled aluminum molded into 2.5 cm diameter formed piping, riveted together in a fashion ostensibly designed to provide hours - years - of support as you are entertained in the Great-Out-of-Doors.

But there's one thing the packing label won't tell you. It hints at it nowadays - but doesn't come out and say it directly.

Turns out Dad started to expand a bit once he hit 30. He always, in his own writing, would refer to himself as Slim Hunter - as, in his late teens and early 20s, he was certainly beanpole-esque at a long 193 cm and barely scratching 97 kilos.

For those of you for whom Metric is so much gobbledygook,  that works out to 6'4" and just a touch over 210 pounds.

And by 30 - getting larger. Interestingly, his limbs remained lean and very strong. Unfortunately that meant that all his weight gain for the next 30 years was in his chest and gut. He managed it by remaining active, Hiking, Running, Hunting, and eventually Cycling. I think he probably got back down to 105 kilos from cycling by the time he was 55 - but still had the legs and arms of a leaner man... so still seemed bulky.

Yes, I know Dad always swore he was 6'5". He also always wore cowboy boots. It's easy to add an inch to your height when nobody can see the top of  your head.

At any rate, I was looking Dad in the eye by the time I was 20 years old - and I've never made it past 193cm.

Let's just say that Dad was pretty freakin' large and leave it there.

I don't remember where we were the first time it happened - but I wasn't very old. Probably around 8. That would make Dad 38, and in the worst of his paunch development. He was in a lawn chair, as shown above.

On Grass. On the tiniest slope backward, and to the right. The conditions, as they say, were perfect.

The lawn chair, sensing that Dad was at ease, and therefore vulnerable, suddenly, maliciously and without warning threw him to the ground and clamped its ravenous jaws upon his buttock in an effort to eat him whole.

Dad, never one to be ignominiously eaten by mere furniture, fought back.

This did not appear to be the case from the vantage of the casual viewer, of course. The scene was more reminiscent of an upside-down turtle trying to get clear of a set of bagpipes - and it sounded imaginably similar, too.

After a few minutes of flailing around and some mildish cursing, Dad rolled to his feet, victorious, the mangled carcass of the lawn chair laying in crushed defeat before him. He escaped with only scratches, amidst much tittering from various onlookers.

I said that was the First Time. There were a few others; details mostly the same until the last one which actually drew blood in an attempt to relieve Dad of his kidneys. He liked to show people the scar.

But that was that. Mom found a different brand of lawn chair in Better Homes for Ogres and went shopping, coming back from the Outdoor Shop in the next town... which was in the next province... with four sturdy, thick-rolled, thin tube, very, very sturdily (and therefore, tame) framed chairs.

Which had canvas seats. Nice striped ones.

The canvas on the chairs suffered Dad and weather for a single season, and then promptly split on the first trip the next spring. Dad,  his backside on the ground, arms akimbo and feet dangling, sputtering and cursing somewhat less mildly, fought his way loose form the Very Very Sturdy Frame, and left it where it fell in its disgrace, laying on its side.

Mom looked at the chair. Then back to her spring edition of Ogre Living. Then back at the chair. This went on for some time as Dad, still sputtering, used his chainsaw to cut a stump to sit on.

Well - I presume it was him sputtering... it may have been the chainsaw. The pitch was similar.

Mom eventually put down the magazine with a shrug, picked up the now-denuded lawn chair frame, her bag of macramé cord, and a fresh glass of Sangria from her Camping wine box, and went to work.

Mom macraméd. And Knitted. Pretty much if it had to do with knotting up fibers, she built stuff out of it. We all had really warm sweaters. Nice ones. We had furniture, planters and wall hangings littering our house in The Sticks.

Speaking of knotting things - she also used to cut our hair. But that's, as I like to say, a story for another time.

She also liked to take a box or two of Sangria on camping trips. She says it helped drown out all the sputtering.

At any rate, over several days she built a seat and back out of the macramé cord, weaving and knotting and creating pleasant patterns in tan, cream and green. I suspect it was of her own design, I can't be sure and she can't recall. Eventually, over that summer, she had re-upholstered all four of those chairs.

And they were brilliant. They lasted forever. And superbly comfortable. But there was a drawback... and it was why they were superbly comfortable.

Macramé cord tends to stretch. A few seasons of Dad sitting on them, and the chairs were like little hammocks slung in an upright frame. You get in, and if you're under a certain height... your feet no longer touch the ground.

But you're comfortable. Especially when the backs got bent a little further back from use so your chin wasn't crammed into your chest. It's impossible to get out of the chair without help, but it's okay... you're comfortable.

Just don't decide you need to pee.

One thing though - you couldn't manage a plate in them. Your knees were usually about chest high. Balancing a plate on that was not going to happen.

I haven't sat in one of those chairs in 15 years. Now lawn chairs are geodesic arrangements of piping covered in ballistic nylon - no way you're getting through that. But I said they come with a warning.

Maximum weight 225 lbs.

Dad would love that.

As such, I'm very careful sitting in them. I'm pretty sure that tag means that if you're less than that, you aren't a worthy meal.

The other day when I was thinking about this, I thought, "no way..." and then Googled Macramé Lawn Chairs. Yep, They exist. She could have made a fortune. But probably not.

I'm pretty sure I saw a Macramé Lawn Chair peeking around from a dark corner in the basement of Mom's house when we packed it up last June.

Wouldn't surprise me. It was probably pretty hungry.

Ghost Stories

I learned a lot from my last camping trip with Mum and two of the boys. Mostly that campfire Ghost stories are just as tough as I thought they would be. I have a new appreciation for the Imaginations of my predecessors.

The best part about camping with Dad and Uncle Crazy Legs had to be the Ghost stories. They had a vast repertoire; from the Humorous to the Benign; all the way into tales that could make the blood of the most worldly seventeen-year-old run to ice.

And you always knew when it was time; the fire was brightening against the chill of the mountain summer's eve, and Dad or Uncle Crazy Legs would start like a distant howl on the wind...

"WhoooooHoooooooooooo..."

It was campy, but it always worked. Every kid, any age sat with rapt attention until the story was done. Very often one or two had eyes squeezed shut, or left in fright all together. It was glorious.

Naturally the mark of success for a ghost story was how hard it was for which kids to fall asleep. You'd be amazed at how much spookier the bush is at night after one of their better tellings. I hope you went to the bathroom before it got dark, because, believe me... you aren't interested in leaving the camper now.

A little taste of moonlight plays through the trees and throws faint shadows that move with the boughs in the breeze... really - just stay in your sleeping bag. The terror is delicious.

We actually tried, as kids, to record some of these stories for posterity, with varying success. I must admit though, that success has diminished given that those recordings, to my knowledge, have passed into legend along with the stories themselves.

Dad did start writing a manuscript about 20 years ago. He never finished it; there was always one more hill to hike up, one more trail to ride down, and that's really the way it should have been. I have that manuscript now, and the technology to convert it back to a usable form... and the collected memory of a dozen now-adult cousins to flesh out the stories. And, it turns out, I have something else.

I was sweating bullets, and I had researched the history of the area for three days... but on our last camping trip, I told my boys a ghost story of my own devise.

Kid Two didn't admit to much, but it kept Youngest Kid up that night.

Thanks, Dad.

Red in the Ledger

I don't remember when Dad taught me to fish.

There are a couple ways to take that statement. SomePeople might take it to mean that the actual event was so traumatic that I've put it out of my mind. That may be true; as stated, I don't remember. I prefer to think it the more benign of the possibilities, of course... that I had been fishing with Dad since I could stand up.

So we're clear, my memory is shockingly good for someone of my evidently advanced age; I can name all of my teachers and most of my classmates all the way back to grade one, nearly 40 years ago.

My lovely wife, of course, would disagree, given my propensity to misplace things. But - this is about Fishing, not Recall.

I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I went fishing alone - or, better said - "without Dad."

I have stories. Lots of them: the time I hooked the gigantic cutthroat trout and fought him at long hole for 40 minutes before we pulled him in; jumping in to the Elk River in February (hey, it was only 8 inches of water, relax) to scoop Dad's even-bigger-than-my-cutthroat Dolly Varden on to the bank; Dogs chasing down wildlife, trying to eat porcupines, and stirring up hornets, and long, lazy summer afternoons thigh-deep in a mountain stream, fly fishing.

I even fished a hundred-pound kid out of the Elk River one October... but that's his story to tell, not mine.

I feel like I've done my boys a disservice in that I have not yet passed along the knowledge and pure joy of spending a day on the river, and leaving your prized Schrade Old-Timer on a rock somewhere about five meanders back...

Well, okay, that part sucks, but it's all part of the experience.

The biggest thrill I ever got fishing was seeing the one skirt around the shore under the rocks above the Rock Creek rest area - and then i just dropped my bobber where he was, and Bang! I was eight - and caught the only fish that day.


Truth be told, I haven't cast a fly in fifteen years. The last trip I went on was with Dad... up the Bull River headwaters, fly fishing for Labour Day in 1997. It was an annual thing for us.

I just haven't really had the desire to go since.

I think it's time though; It's been more than long enough. I have knowledge, lore, and a love for the pastime - I know some boys who need that passed along, and I certainly Owe that to Dad. All things considered, I better get cracking.

Hm. I better start collecting some gear.

Pancakes

"Uh, isn't it a little early to be drinking a beer?"

Kid Two asked me that one on our last camping trip. It probably had something to do with the fact it was 9 am Saturday Morning.

It occurred to me then and there that that wasn't the first time I'd heard that particular question.

But not the way you're thinking.

I had heard it last uttered from my own lips, in the dim, distant past during a camping trip, querying my Dad. I would probably have been nine or ten at the time. Probably younger.

The fact that it took Kid Two until nearly sixteen to ask that of me - well, that just means I've been embarrassingly slack in the camping department.

Dad was in charge of breakfast on the family camping trips - and on most hunting camps. One of the most memorable Breakfast dishes he whipped up was "Ranch Style Eggs - " a concoction of stewed tomatoes and bacon with eggs poached in it - best served to hangover sufferers. But that, mercifully, is a story for another time, and I digress.

Dad made Pancakes.

Looking back, I realize that this was a skill he acquired throughout the historical course of our outings. I recall the first few batches weren't all that great. Tasty, sure, but commonly a mangled lump, occasionally scorched.

This is not to say I have not scorched more than my share of pancakes. It does turn out, however, that I'm much more efficient at scorching Ribs. Into Frustrating Charcoal. But we're talking about breakfast.

To be fair, Dad didn't have the excellently engineered tools I have; Teflon-coated aluminium skillets, carbon-vinyl flippers, and the like. He used an old stainless steel flipper on a cast iron fry pan, with a little butter to keep things from sticking. It's amazing any of his creations came out one-piece, and golden fluffy brown. And they usually did.

The fluffiness was key. And dad discovered the secret to light-fluffy pancakes. No matter what scratch recipe or brand of mix you use, use Beer.

The foam lightens the mix. Dad liked Coyote Pancake flour and... well, honestly I don't recall that he was fixed on a particular brand of Beer. He liked Lethbridge Pil, Black Label, and Kokanee, But it was a crap shoot what you'd find in his Fridge. He even went on an MGD kick for a while.

But always Coyote Pancake Flour.

I'm not so much the purist - I don't really care what brand of Mix I use, and have found it doesn't really matter. I've also found that Coors Lite provides the desired effect for my flapjacks without all that telltale, hoppy taste that one finds in Beers with... Flavour.

Now, I've been cooking experimentally for some time, and recognise that Freshness and aroma are desirable qualities in the ingredients I use in my culinary creations. I'm not above a little preparatory sampling.

So when I asked my dad that fateful question, so long ago, His answer was "I'm not Drinking Beer. I'm making Pancakes."

I, in my foolish youth, took that to mean it was the cook's prerogative to finish off the beer that he obviously didn't use up in the Mix.

Time and experience have taught me otherwise - It's the cook's duty to ensure the freshness and flavourfullness of every ingredient that goes into the dish. To not do so would be a disservice.

"I'm not Drinking Beer," I told Kid Two. "I'm making Pancakes."

One Match

My training in bushcraft started when I was 7 years old.

That was when Dad had me join my brother, sister, and assorted cousins scouring the brush in the area of our summer campsites in search of kindling to start the campfire with.

Pitch was the best. It was also pretty tough to harvest when you wouldn't own a penknife for another two years. Coincidentally, that's also when you permanently crease the print on your left index finger, but never mind that.

The best pitch was found on knots of branches that had broken off a live tree a couple years ago. The pitch - especially on Pine trees - was thick, hard, and had bubbled into a mass that could be conveniently carved away from the bark without seriously damaging a tree. And boy, does it burn.

Dad would take all the sundry fire starting matériel from us kids, and collect it together in a lump at the center of the fire pit, build a campfire in a cross-hatch structure from twigs and kindling around said lump, and light the whole mess up.

With a single match.

Of course, as none of the collected second generation had reached puberty by then, we all thought this was marvelous, especially since the skill came with it's own title - "One-Match Phil."

One-Match Phil was legendary, and made appearances at all camping functions from fishing on the Elk in February, all the extended family camping in summer, right through to elk hunting in 4 feet of snow in November.

And then - he bought a chainsaw.

It took me a long time to discover this was the watershed moment. As it turned out, Grandad passed away when I was about 12, and Dad bought the chainsaw about the same time. It made sense, as I was suddenly occupied with Dad in late summer and early fall from my early teens in the collection of firewood for Grandma.

Grandma had a wood-burning stove in the kitchen in Kimberley that supplemented her central heat. That and she just liked a fire.

What I hadn't noticed at the time - but recognize now - is that whole second generation had aged, and, as a result, had become less interested in combing the underbrush for fire-lighting supplies.

But One-Match persevered. For a long time, He collected his own pitch.

One November, he just gave up the subterfuge. At this point, the Chainsaw had become a fixture in our camping gear - probably because we had denuded the breadth of the Kootenays of fallen scrub kindling by that point.

It had been raining for days, a wet, cold, half sleet soak that permeated everything. Dad calmly cut the top off a pop (beer) can and filled the bottom with chainsaw gasoline from the small jerry can that accompanied the chainsaw everywhere.

He set that in the center of the pit where the ball of kindling would go, and built up the wood frame around it - and lit it.

With a single match.

Good Judgement

I may have mentioned that I traveled with Dad a lot in my youth.

Day trips at any time of year, camping... also at any time of year in random sets of accommodations from tents to pop-up trailers to Grandma's place in Kimberley on any sort of errand or intent you can think of.

We even slept in the back of a '59 Land Rover in October in the mountains. And believe me, that isn't even possible. The last straw for Dad was the night we spent in a tent on opening day of Elk season. We'd packed the tent in - but he'd figured our hunting clothes were such that we didn't actually need sleeping bags.

At that point Dad had about 35 years experience in the bush. Nevertheless it turns out he could still have Very Bad Ideas. That was the longest, coldest night I've ever spent - including working midnights as a security guard over Christmas Holidays some years later.

But, that pretty much killed the tenting in winter for Dad, too. His solution?

Build a Cabin.

He even had the perfect spot picked out - just up the hill a little from where we froze ourselves the prior autumn in the tent with no sleeping bags. We called the little draw up that valley Rum Junction - how that name came about is a story for another time.

He'd decided on a simple A-frame wood construction at about 14 X 10, with the 10 foot axis on the downslope. We would use heavy-grade plastic sheeting to roof it with; and plywood for the walls. Eventually the first 6 feet of the roof slope would sport spiked plywood too - to keep out the porcupines.

All of this stuff would have to be packed in; the road you see on that link wasn't there yet. It wasn't really all that far from the Highway - but the SomePeople that have been there will tell you it's a 20 minute hike... mostly Up.

Yes, it was on Crown land, and yes, technically that made it an illegal structure, but Dad liked to say "No Sweat for a Big Operation (like this)." the Like This was optional, of course. Dad was really good at pressing on through adversity and good judgement.

He did, however, let the guy who had the trap line up there know what we were up to - just so he'd know we weren't up there trapping. The Trapper was cool with that - it actually worked to his advantage to have an extra shelter in the neighbourhood in winter - just in case.

Speaking of good judgement - that was the same year Dad and the fellas from the Old Country decided to go in on a bunch of used oak barrels from a Rum Distillery. The principle was you partially fill a used rum barrel with water, then you set it back on its side - sealed - and rotate it periodically. After some months of this you would have soaked all the residual alcohol out of the barrel into the water, which you could then bottle.

The product was called Swish - and it was actually a lot more potent that you'd think. But it didn't taste as good as you'd think. It was okay with Coke, though.

Right. Building a cabin.

The worst part of building the cabin above Rum Junction on Robert's Creek was not having to pack in what amounted to an awful lot of lumber, nails, plastic, and other hardware. That we did over several trips across a month or so in Mid Summer.

The worst part was that we built it in Mid Summer, in the bush at about 30 degrees Centigrade (that's 85ish F)... and had to cut in to the side of the mountain location with shovels - digging down about 6 feet on the high side due to the slope.

I did most of that, working with Dad's oldest, closest friend. It was exhausting and horrid due to the temperature, terrain, and bugs.

It was nearly 30 years ago, but the memory is as fresh as yesterday. I was roasting, and had probably lost five pounds to sweat. I reached into a backpack and grabbed an ice-cold 2 liter Sprite bottle, and took a long pull off it.

Did I mention Dad liked to bottle his Swish in old 2 liter Sprite bottles?