in Nakusp yet again

I think this is my fourth time stopping through Nakusp...Several reasons, for one it's the largest town around (maybe even a thousand or two!), it's at sort of a crossroads between a number of interesting places, it's a friendly little town with a nice beach, on Upper Arrow Lake, and plus there's free, unlimited internet use in a little building next to the library. So, a pretty good place to stop through. I camped just a few miles away in a free campground last night (thanks to my new book, "Camp Free in B.C.").

I was here on Monday as well, but didn't get around to posting a message. So I'll try and wrap things up fairly quickly....I left Achille and Francoise's place, where I was working for a little over a week, last Saturday morning and caravaned behind Achille to the Little Fest music festival, in the Slocan Valley, near the town of Slocan. Achille had arranged for me to be a volunteer, so that I got into the festival for free. The volunteering actually turned out to be the funnest part. And camping there was included, so I spent Saturday night there.

The next day I was a little undecided as to my plans, so I went to a nice spot on Slocan Lake, Banoch Point, where I had camped once before, to swim for the day. As it was a good place to camp, I decided to stay there for the night. The next morning, I decided that I wasn't quite ready to commit to another wwoofing situation, so I headed north (up to Nakusp) and decided to hike a mountain, Saddle Lookout, which I'd heard about when I was in the area previously. There were two free campgrounds mentioned in my book in that area. So, after doing assorted business in town, I headed south and then took the free ferry across Arrow Lake, which deposited me at a gravel road, which I then followed a ways out to the campground.

The campground was right on Whatshan Lake, and since it was free and quite picturesque, I decided to stay there a couple of extra days; in which I didn't do a heck of a lot, other than assorted reading and writing, swimming and a bit of hiking around. Then yesterday, Thursday, I got up and drove to the trailhead for Saddle Mountain, hiked up and down in about 3 hours, and then came through Nakusp last night, and found that nearby campground. The hike was truly spectacular. The wildflowers were in full bloom, and the views down to the lakes, including a 360-degree view from the top (it was previously a fire lookout, and there's a cabin-like structure on top complete with an outhouse) were amazing. I got a number of great photos on my cell phone, but unfortunately there's no cell phone service here, so I can't send them to my email address yet to be able to post them. But I will whenever I get the chance.

And the other, more unfortunate thing is that the hike caused my leg to hurt again, the same one that left me in a bad situation out at the Kalalau Valley in Hawaii a few months ago. It was an intense uphill hike the whole way, so if it was going to happen anywhere then that would have been the place. But it's a bummer that it's still an issue, whatever the problem is (possibly tendonitis). But the bit of good news is that, whereas originally my right leg was the problem, now it's switched over to my left leg. So hopefully that means that my right leg has healed entirely, in which case perhaps that will happen to my left leg as well at some point and then they'll both be healed. In the meantime, I have to factor that into my hiking and especially backpacking plans.

So as for what's next, I still have to make up my mind. I'd like to head north from here to Revelstoke and then east towards Banff and Jasper, which would be the most direct way to go; except that I'm waiting for that SIN card to show up in Nelson, and it could arrive any day now at this point. So I'm thinking of calling the post office there and seeing if they would be able to forward the mail to me elsewhere, i.e. Jasper. And if not then I'll plan to get that before I head for the national parks, since part of the point is to look for work in that area. So that might make up my mind. Either way, I may stay in this area at least through the weekend. There are several hot springs around, which would be nice since the weather has been coldish and cloudy lately, and in fact it rained on me in my tent all last night. And there are plenty of hiking opportunities, as well as several more free campgrounds. I'll be pondering the plethora of possibilities over the next day or so. This internet office is closed over the weekend, so not sure when or from where I'll be writing next...