Community greenhouse construction

Bears and cherries

Off and paddling

The second team through CheckPoint 6 heads out on the lake for a 23 km paddle after spending the past 26 hours trekking and mountain-biking through the mountains from the north.

Raid the North Transition Area

Bikes are left in the transition area by teams who have taken up the first paddling leg of the race. GPS navigation is not allowed so traditional compass and topo map navigation skills are required.

Raid the North

An array of 39 canoes awaits the arrival of teams participating in Raid the North Extreme, a 6-day, 500 km adventure race.

More Lupins

The lake is so high right now that the lupins have wet feet.

Secret Lupin Garden

Little shop of horrors?

This is the back window of the hardware store annex, the part of the business used for storage of little-used stock. What is going on in there?

Polar Pete

???

I guess we'll know next Saturday.

Groceries

The new grocery store is open, floors gleaming and shelves well-stocked.

Carpenter Creek

That tiny white stripe, up close. Islands swamped by logs and rushing water, cold and clear and flecked with glacial silt.

Looking down Carpenter

The tiny white stripe is Carpenter Creek, which runs into Slocan Lake from here. 

Alamo

The town once known as Alamo, BC, gateway to the boomtown of Sandon, once stood here on a railway siding.

First Friday Market of the Season

Soccer

Warming up for a soccer match at Centennial park, with lake, mountains and clouds in the background. 

Kids on Parade

Children on a float in the May Day Parade.

RCMP

Leading the May Day parade in their red dress serge, the two officers who staff our local Royal Canadian Mounted Police detachment.

Royalty

An anachronism about which many have mixed feelings to say the least, but the May Queen Pagaent is a local institution that continues strong.

Bubble World

Today at Centennial Park during the soccer game, kids of all ages on the sidelines were blowing and chasing bubbles. The day was dreary but you would never know it from the reflection of trees, houses, hills and sky in this bubble.

May Long Weekend

A Better Bosun

The restoration of the facade is almost complete. A great improvement from what was there last fall!

Kohan Pond

Oregon Grape in bloom

Cherry blossoms 3

Waves

Willow at the Kohan Garden

Cherry blossoms 2

Cherry blossoms 1

Cherry tree reflected in a window at the hospital.

Unfurling leaves

Car free

Considering that our towns have no local public transit and only occasional (a couple of times a week) inter-village buses, an impressive number of people manage without cars.

Bosun progress

Ahh, that's better. The blank flat facade of the Bosun Hall is getting a roof to cover the entry.

Almost a grocery store

I like the way the roofline fits in with the tree behind it. Apparently the floor has had its 28 days to cure and they're moving in shelving and coolers. They expect to open by early June.

Please don't eat the crocuses!

Fences are necessary protection for the crocuses from hungry deer.

Opinions, attitude, etc. etc.

Construction on Main Street

The new craft store is getting its porch built. Construction of the building began last fall. 

The Esso

One of the things I find endearing about small towns is how long the collective memory lasts. There's a crumbling corner in our town referred to as "the Esso." Years ago it was an Esso gas station but the gas station closed, though an auto service shop continued for some years in an adjacent building, eventually dwindling to hobby status for the owner and closing entirely more years ago than I can recall. The buildings have since housed a succession of failed businesses including a video rental place, convenience store, pizza joint, bakery and warehouse space for an African import business. But although it hasn't been an Esso in more than 20 years, maybe closer to 30, people around here still call this The Esso.

I think of it as a decoy that keeps the tourists from moving in wholesale. It's ugly as anything, and it graces the intersection of Main Street and the highway through town. I suspect a lot of people miss giving our town a second glance as a result of driving by this empty lot.

My Aunt's Place

This is the formerly-crumbling building that used to house "My Aunt's Place," an ice cream store, gift shop, lottery ticket agent and a surprisingly terrific little yarn store. The owner retired several years ago and the building had sat dismal and empty ever since. It's the left-hand building in this photo. Now it is on its way to becoming something new. We're not sure what.

Tom on display

Turkeys

Wild turkeys. These two toms and their wives, scratching nearby.

Bosun Hall facelift, continued

Sun, melting and steam

The whole canyon fills with steam when the sun starts really melting the snow.

Facelift

The Bosun Hall is getting a long overdue facelift. 

Leftovers

An entire winter's worth of parking lot plowings, minus 95% of the snow. Ewww.

State of the Season

Even on the lakefront there's plenty of snow left.

Laundry and snowbank

The snowbanks are almost as high as the laundry lines, but spring is in the air.

Valhalla View

Service Station

Whether you need gasoline, antifreeze, new tires, a new timing belt, your headlights pointed or your brake discs replaced, our town's service station will look after you. They also have host one of two remaining payphones (beside tires). Payphones are quickly going extinct across Canada with the advent of cell phones.

Wells in the snow

The dark wood of the bushes reflects light and melts the snow.

Foul weather blowing in

Weather comes from the west here. Which means we see storms coming "from the Valhallas," meaning from the Valhalla mountain range on the west side of the lake. When the Valhallas start to disappear in clouds of precipitation you have just a few minutes to take cover.

Pebble beach