Great Copper Rush July 30, 2010

So up the next morning, a quick, very hot shower, meet up with the group and head out to our first cache. We grabbed our root beer float ticket and then headed off to A&W for breakfast. We then took our traveling gang on the road. We started off with a few easy ones and then headed over to the connector road. This was a fun little cache. The road had I am sure the only standing water anywhere in the Princeton area, and of course it was full of mud. BajaBetty being the mature individual that she is and having so much respect for her vehicle decided that she would daintily drive through the mud puddle, thus keeping her vehicle clean, NOT!!!!! Note the only vehicle which is dirty.

We then headed to August Lake. Tycoon (Auto)Otto was the first to find on this one. We had a great dayof caching with our group. It did get a little warm out there; everyone started to take their clothes off. Luckily it ended before we saw too much. We tried our own version of naked cacher.

Now to get back from August Lake we had to come back on the same connector road and I being the bravesoul (nuts) that I am decided that pictures had to be taken going through the mud. BajaBetty was off again. Now of course everybody had to get in on the act. TycoonOtto(Auto), ClintsTaurus, and Groundhog and Shadow( a little timid). Everyone has a little bit of inner child in them. Oh and TycoonOtto(Auto), I still have the other pictures to show the car rental company. Thanks OilCanMan for one of

the best caches of the day.

We then headed further up Copper Mountain for more caches. We were caching machines this day. There were five vehicles and we followed each other over hill, over dale, over roads with varying degrees of wash boarding and dust clouds. It was a great day had by all. We all survived with only two flat tires and a long scar down my arm that I acquired while tripping over my own feet. It really isn’t a good caching weekend if you don’t go home with any battle scars. We left the group as we headed back to town with BajaBetty and her Mom and I staying out a little later caching until it was dark and then tried to find a place in Princeton that stayed open past 9:00pm. We managed to convince the local Booster Juice to stay open for 10 more minutes so we could get a smoothie and a sandwich. We liked them so much we went back the next day for another energy smoothie. Then it was back to the fairgrounds to check in and mark down our first to finds for the day.

Great Copper Rush June 29, 2010

I missed the Great Coal Rush last year in Tulameen, BC, and it didn’t work out going to Seattle for Geowoodstock, so I decided that I had to go to the Great Copper Rush in Princeton on the August long weekend. My friend Kathleen aka BajaBetty and her mom Val aka BajaBetty’s mom were going so I asked if I could bunk in with them. Len wasn’t too keen on going for a whole weekend and he had some friend from Kelowna stopping in and he also had to get the motor home ready for Aaron and Chelsea to take on their vacation.

So I left Thursday afternoon to meet BajaBetty and her mom at the Nancy Green Junction. Well three hours later, no BajaBetty I decided to go into Rossland and see if I could find them at BajaBetty’s moms place. I did get a message from Kathleen saying that they had left from Trail and were on their way. I drove back to the Junction waited a little longer, they weren’t there so I headed to Christina Lake. As I was coming into Christina Lake my cell phone rang with a message from BajaBetty that they were in Grand Forks and were headed to the city campground to see if I was there. I phone them and got their answering machine. Headed towards Grand Forks, got into town and the cell phone rang again with a message that they couldn’t find me so they were head towards Osoyoos. I tried them again and had to leave another message. I got to Midway with another message, saying that they were in Rock Creek. Tried again, left a message that I would meet them at the Best Western Motel, coming into Osoyoos. Finally caught up with them. Lesson learned from all of this is that if you plan a meeting spot in the Kootenay’s make sure it is in a spot that has cell service and not out in the middle of nowhere.

Now that we had found each other we decided to continue on into Princeton because according to the GPs we were only 1 ½ hours from Princeton and it was only 7 pm, so back on the road we went, stopping for a quick cache between Osoyoos and Keremeous . We then stopped at a late night fruit stand in Keremeous for some breakfast snacks and then onto the campsite in Princeton. We made it into Princeton with lots of time to spare, found a place to park, set our stuff up inside and out and then headed into the fairground to find out who was all there. We met up with Pappy90 and Dyelo from Salmo and Groundhog and Shadow from Vernon. A couple of new cachers that I had never met, ManyMutts and Chet and Jane from Cranbrook and Mach2003 and TycoonOtto(Auto) from Kelowna. We all made plans to register the next morning and then all head out as a big group. So back to the trailer we headed for a good nights sleep.

Down River Days

Well we made it home from Nakusp and then took off the next Friday for Cusick, WA. Turns out it was their annual Down River Days. We stayed at a nice little campground right on the river between Ione and Cusick. The first day we went Geo caching and did a series called Tiger Clues. It is a series of caches that go along the Tiger Highway all the way to Colville. When you find each cache there are clues that take you to a final mystery cache. So we spent the day travelling from Ione to Colville and managed to find all the caches except for one. We did however manage to find the final cache even with out all the clues.

On Saturday we headed into Ione for the parade. They closed down main street and the Kimberly pipe band opened the show. I guess they come every year. They also had an float from Cominco in Trail. I didn’t know that Cominco supplied all the metal for the Olympic medals in Vancouver 2010. A gentleman sitting beside us on the street said that it was an election year, so this year the parade would be twice as long because everyone who was running would be advertising in the parade. Well he was right they had all the candidates for sheriff, county clerks and other political offices.

After the parade was over we headed down to the town park where they had a wake board completion going on. They also had a craft fair, beer garden and a variety of concessions at the park. It is a very nice location, right on the river. The kids doing the wake boarding were actually very good. It was a little warm that day so we headed back to the campsite and proceeded to suntan by the river. The dogs even went for a swim.





On Sunday they had Snowmobile Water-cross races. They actually take snowmobiles and race them across the river. We got to the park early so that we could get good seats. The snowmobiles start on the beach, rev their engines and then start off across the river. The event started off slow, with the first two snowmobiles sinking to the bottom of the river in the first ten feet. They had to get a small backhoe out in order to pull them out. They also had a boat out in the middle of the river, it looked like it came from the local dam, it had a big hook on it and each of the snowmobiles was equipped with a buoy so that they could be located if they went down in the middle of the river. It took them a couple of heats before one of the snowmobiles made it all the way across. It was pretty cool. After the first guy made it across, everyone seemed to be able to do it.It seemed that as long as they had the snowmobiles revved up they seemed to get across the river. There was one close call when this young fellow started off pretty slow and his engine coughed a couple of times while he was going across. The whole audience seemed to be holding their breath until he made it over the other side. Then everybody cheered. We watched a couple more heats, and then decided that we should probably get going. We had left the dogs in the motor home with the fan going but we were parked on the street and we didn’t want to leave them for too long in case that they started barking.We then headed back to Canada through the Port of Nelway. The motor home performed well over the summit and we made it back home in good time.

Nakusp Music Festival

Our next adventure this summer was our annual pilgrimage to the Nakusp Music Festival. It was a very good lineup this year. There was Bachman & Turner, Eric Burdon and the Animals, Corb Lund and the Hurtin Albertans, The Mudmen, Doc Walker, Bif Naked and my new favorite band Delhi 2 Dublin.


Delhi 2 Dublin is a Vancouver based band that combines Celtic such a fun band to watch and very original. Bachman & Turner were also very good. It is such a nice relaxing weekend. Len and I take our lawn chairs and get to the front gate and as soon as it opens we head to our usual location and proceed to stay there for the day, until the last acts ends for the night, then we walk back to our room at the Leland Hotel. Luckily the weather was good again. We had a few showers but overall we were fine, it wasn’t too hot this year.

Our friends Bob and Diane from Creston were there as well. Bob and I had a good time going up to the front of the stage during Eric Burdon. He is pretty old but he can still sing. Can’t wait to find out who is playing next year. We will probably try and plan our holidays around it, so we can take the motor home up and stay in the area. We found a place in Nakusp that will look after the dog for the weekend.

Summer Slow Pitch

Len played slow pitch this year with two teams. He was in the A division with the U-Betchas and the C division with the Coffin Dodgers. It was pretty busy for June and July between practices and games. He had at least two games per week and the Coffin dodgers practice twice a week. He usually pitches but sometimes he played in the outfield or third base. He also is a very good umpire, when he is not in the field; he is usually behind the plate.

The pictures are of Lenny pitching, umping and my favorite of him running the bases. He tried to tell me that the ball was in his way and he was jumping over it but I think he just runs the bases funny. He is known for running them very quickly, he is known for taking a double and extending it into a triple. A lot of times once he gets running it is difficult for him to stop so it is easier for him just to keep running. Usually it works for him.

On the July 8 weekend he had the A division tournament, they unfortunately lost the first game, so the second game was out in Canyon. I didn’t get to see the whole game because one of the female players took a ball to the face and I had to take her to the hospital emergency room for stitches, by the time we got back to the field the game was over and they had lost. This however this wasn’t surprising considering that the team didn’t win a game all year. The team is hoping to get moved down a division next year because the A division was not for them.

I did get to play a game during the tournament because they were short handed. I actually managed to hit the ball, catch it and not make a fool out of myself. However the next day my butt was so sore. I think my sciatic nerve was acting up. I have played a couple more fun games during the summer, it is actually quite fun. Len almost has me convinced to play next year. Not sure what team I will play for, but it does mean that I am going to have to get in better shape. I might also have do some more practicing, I haven’t really played since high school.

Thompson Mountain

Well my summer has been very busy, I transferred over the Kingsgate for the summer. My schedule was straight days, Monday to Friday. This was great because I had weekends off and evenings. Len thought this was great because that meant we got to spend more time together but this meant that there was less time to spend on the computer. So I am now trying to catch up for the whole summer.

The beginning of the summer seemed to start when Tanis and Adrianne arrived from Virginia. They came for two weeks and we started off their vacation by taking the Jeep up to Thompson Mt. We were lucky that it was only slightly hazy so we could see for miles. Of course I had to take my GPS with me to see if there was a geocache at the top. No sense going all the way up there and finding out later that there was one there. Actually you can get to a couple from up that way but we didn’t feel like walking the long trails. It was a fun drive up only a few muddy areas because there was still snow up there.

Montana Vacation Day 4

Well today was a busy day. We started off early again and headed East towards West Glacier. We went through Columbia Falls and Hungry Horse again. We stopped in Hungry Horse to do a geocache at a large 4 tonne silver ball. The logging crews would place several of these balls, chained together at the top of an area and drag them down the hill with tractors. This would create a handy clear cut area where the crews could move in and pick up the fallen trees. The process was much faster and oddly safer than the usual method of having the crews go in and saw the trees down one at a time. The ball weighs 4.5 tons and measures 8 feet in diameter. It was first used in 1950 and eventually helped clear about 6,207 acres in the reservoir area.

We then proceeded to West Glacier and into Glacier National Park. The entrance fee is $25, which is good for 7 days or you can pay $35 for a yearly pass. We ended up buying the yearly pass because we decided that we would come back this way for our two week vacation in August. The Road to the Sun was only open up to 11 miles on the west end and 16 miles on the east end. The Logan Pass was still snowed in. We did manage to get some great pictures of the rivers and the mountains for this time of year. The rivers were very high because of the run off and were moving very fast. It will be interesting to see what they look like later on in the summer. After we went as far as we could on the west end we drove all the way around to East Glacier and up to St. Mary's and started up the other side. We got up about 16 miles on the east side, saw some great views of St. Mary's lake and some very interesting Red Rock.
Also got some great pictues of the Jackson Glacier.

On the way back to the east enterence we stopped at the world's largest woodspoon store and saw the world's largest purple spoon. Very cool. We made the trek home just before it got too dark to cook Lenny burgers and call it a night.