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Andrew Pearson
Andrew Pearson

Andrew Pearson

Living in: Toronto, Canada Read more🇨🇦Toronto
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  • Andrew PearsonOpeongoTraveler

    Getting there

    August 17, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 17 °C

    I woke up at 7:00 before anyone else had stirred. I drank a coffee on the couch and mentally sorted through the list of things that needed to happen before we left.

    We drove the truck, windows down, radio loud, up the 400 past the green, golden fields of late summer corn. With the sun rising like a yellow balloon the day was full of promise. As we neared Barrie, the sprawling and abundant farms gave way to a brief interlude of marsh and mixed forest before a swath of industrial and retail parks dominated the landscape.

    Keith and Kieran were waiting for us at the Barrie On Route where I had bacon and eggs and Ollie had pancakes from Arby's. We checked the weather to discover thunderstorms were expected later in the evening so we didn't waste any time getting back on the road.

    Soon the 400 became 11 threading through Muskoka and the craggy walls of pre Cambrian rock. The forest steadily grew taller and the individual trees closer together. We turned on 60 with a brief pitstop at Wendy's and the grocery store to pick up supplies.

    As we drove down 60 the wind was picking up and the condensation was gathering in the sky to form billowing mountains of clouds above the trees. We passed into Algonquin park and hit construction all the way through the West corridor. Finally after 4 1/2 hours we reached the docks at the Opeongo access point. Securing our permits, canoes and firewood in haste we took to the water with winds at our backs and set off to find a campsite before the weather found us.

    Our plan was to canoe past Blueberry Island where we stayed last year and look for a site, still in the South arm, but a little further up the West shore. Kevin and Audrey were going to meet us later so we needed to give them some idea of where to meet us. Without cell service they would need to check all the campsites until they found us.

    We told Kevin we wouldn't go past Bates Island but before we knew it, we had blown past the island into Squaw Bay. The skies were impenetrably gray and deepening with every passing minute. They threatened to swallow the tops of the hills and the water got choppier, aggravated by the invading skies. We paddled back upwind pressing against time, knowing that pitching tents in a storm would make for a difficult beginning to our journey. Relief washed over us when Keith rounded the point of an unnamed bay, calling back to us that he'd found a campsite unoccupied. It was around 4:00 in the afternoon. We had arrived.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonHome boundTraveler

    Preparing for Algonquin

    August 16, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    Ollie and I are having a challenge transitioning between time changes. We were up until after two last night. My brain has kind of shut down with fatigue so I took a short nap before lunch.

    This morning I was reading an article on the information integration theory of consciousness in a philosophy magazine when Ollie crawled into bed and asked me to read it out loud. The theory affixes a quantifiable value, called phi, to the level of consciousness experienced by a system. A brain has a lot of phi and a blanket had considerably less, if any at all. The theory fits nicely into the panpsychic school of consciousness research which I've always been fond of although lately I'm more inclined to explore the middle ground between panpsychism and physicalism.

    Ollie had lots of questions and made the connection between consciousness and previous discussions we've had about soul. I was impressed he lasted as long as he did as I read paragraph after paragraph of text steeped in jargon but I got the feeling he likes the rhythm of language and there is an appealing science fictional element to meta physics that kids can relate to.

    Anyways, fatigue definitely lowers my phi and it wasn't until I made a turkey sandwich and ate some leftover Nana chili that I felt myself again. Ollie and I went to the beer store and Bulk Barn for camping supplies. We decided to stop at Value Village to look for board games in case it rains on our trip. I detoured into the book section looking for Madam Bovary and ended up with 5 other books.

    More than anything books give me a sense of identity. More than clothing or a haircut. More than a car or a house. More than my garage. The books I surround myself with mirror who I am or more precisely, who I aspire to be. Jessica saw the books and moaned. She thinks I should get rid of some books as I collect new ones but we look at it differently. I think of books as monuments or landmarks, inukshuks signaling the direction I am traveling in my life. I follow one book that leads me to another on a kind of trail, not a linear one, towards some unknown destination. When I'm lost or need a clue I can revisit the records of like minded but far more accomplished travelers. And like a blind cartographer mapping the mountains and valleys of an invisible landscape I rely on the descriptions of others for a way forward. How could I not pass these treasure maps on to my two pirates in the event that they too one day would journey to unseen kingdoms within?

    All packed up! Got warm clothes, a cooler of beer (I did the food last year), ukelele, a great American songbook, wooden bowls, metal plates and plastic cups. It's going to be a fine trip.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonHome boundTraveler

    The Garage

    August 15, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    Our garage is detached from the house. It is a humble, squat structure, wide enough for a single car and perfectly square. It has an A frame roof, reshingled a few years ago, with black eaves running around it.

    When we came back from our roadtrip, the garage smelled a little stale. We had left some food waste in the green bin so when I opened up the lid, an army of fruit flies exploded from the darkness in a cloud of rotten food. Typically the garage smells of fertilizer and gasoline. It smells of cut grass and spilled engine oil. It smells of wood drying in the rafters and old newspaper. In the summer I'll stand on a step ladder to grab a length of copper pipe or an old pressure treated piece of lumber from up high and my face will heat up with the stuffy air trapped under the roof between the old doors that will never get used and scrap wood lying crookedly on top of each other. The previous owners had fastened nails, screws and hooks into every piece of trim you can find. Hanging on the walls are backpacks, sports equipment, a kite, and gardening tools. You find all the typical things you'd expect in our garage. There are golf clubs, strollers, a compressor, a shelf lined with spray bottles and aerosol cans. Bags of salt, firewood, brooms, jars of screws and nails, tarps, tubing and bins overflowing with plastic toys. I have a giant blue gym mat that we pull out for the kids to jump on.

    At the back of the garage is an old section of counter top complete with two drawers under the laminate surface. Two cupboards open up beneath the drawers and that's where I keep all my power tools in a big pile. I drilled an 8' long solid wood cabinet that weighs as much as a small car to the back wall above the countertop and removed the cupboard doors to make for more storage. The whole makeshift set up works as a sturdy and functional alternative to a tool bench. On one side of the counter I keep a spare set of tires and the snow blower. On the other side is a chest high cardboard box stuffed with the trunk and limbs of an artificial Christmas tree given to us by Joan and Murray.

    It's the kind of garage kids like to root through in search of artifacts to prop up their imagination but the parents have to keep warning them to stay away from anything that might hurt them. It's really a big toy box in and of itself. A man sized jumble of stuff and junk. A repository for things waiting patiently for us to play with them. It is my refuge for all the belongings that don't have a place in the house. The things that are too dirty, noisy, unwieldy, outdoorsy things.

    If you pick your way past the bikes, table saws, lawn mower and garbage bins you'll find the camping gear stacked against one of the walls.

    I pulled out all the gear to do an inventory and start packing in preparation for our canoe trip in a couple of days.

    Later that night:

    When Toby woke up after a couple of hours being asleep he asked me to rub his back and sing songs. After a few minutes of humming You are my Sunshine, Kumbaya and other songs I don't know all the words to I made a motion to leave.

    "Daddy, pet me," Toby said. "One more song."    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonHome boundTraveler

    First night back

    August 14, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 21 °C

    Our gardens are in full midsummer bloom. The zucchini is trailing along the back bench. The tomatoes are bushy and heavy with green bulbs of fruit. The hot peppers are the tallest our neighbour, Cara, has ever seen and word on the street is they are good and spicy as well. We have two large bunches of one eyed Susan's, blooming hastas, ferns that look tropical. The Boston ivy is reaching around the sides of our neighbors garage so one of the first things I did when we got back was to cut it back. The grape vines are presiding over the rest of the gardens and providing privacy to our back porch.

    Dana came over to play with Oliver and Tobin. Corey and Karmeet also stopped by to say hi. We couldn't hang out long because we were due up at Cara and Matthew's place for a playdate at 7. It took me a little longer to get ready so Jessica told me to meet them up there. While walking up the street I was in the mood to take pictures. Cumulous clouds had gathered like a quilt had been thrown over the sky. I snapped the photo and I felt like I was still on vacation, still on an adventure, every moment potentially a story, a picture, a rhyme.

    Then it occurred to me. I'll keep writing and taking pictures at home as if I'm on a grand adventure. I'll post them on the app as a record of life, the good, the bad, the ugly...

    I walked through the driveway gate at Cara's house. A few neighbors had gathered in the backyard. I took out my phone.

    "Who wants to be in a picture?" I asked.

    "Of all strange and unaccountable things this journalizing is the strangest. It will allow nothing to be predicated of it; its good is not good, nor its bad bad. If I make a huge effort to expose my innermost and richest wares to light, my counter seems cluttered with the meanest homemade stuffs; but after months or years I may discover the wealth of India, and whatever rarity is brought overland from Cathay, in that confused heap, and what perhaps seemed a festoon of dried apple or pumpkin will prove a string of Brazilian diamonds, or pearls from Coromandel." Thoreau Jan 29 1841    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    The Long Way Home

    August 14, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    On our final night we drove straight to Point Roberts off the ferry to meet Mike, Natalie and their three kids. We had arranged to meet at Mike's dad's place because it was so close to the ferry. Point Roberts is actually a peninsular piece of America geographically cut off from the rest of the country by Canada. We had to go through the border to get there and again on our way back to our hotel at the Fairmont Vancouver airport. We had a good old fashioned American fried chicken dinner down at the water. The kids played in the driftwood and then we went back to the house for ice cream. We finally got to our hotel around 10:00. Toby fell asleep in the car and transferred to bed for the first time in his 3 years of life.

    Despite the comfort of our room neither Jessica nor I could sleep much that night. In the morning I left with the rental car to return it on the other side of Vancouver and meet Greg with his son Jack. The plan was to drop off the car and drive back to the hotel with Greg where the kids could have a swim together and then eat lunch altogether before checking out. Our plane was leaving at 5:00 so we thought we had lots of time before we had to get moving. When I got to the busy tourist district at Canada Place I couldn't find the Enterprise parking lot so I pulled over to phone them. There was no answer the first time I called so I tried again. As I was listening for someone to answer, I heard the distinctive sickening crack of metal on metal directly behind me. I got out of the car to see what had happened. I wasn't expecting a tragedy but a tragedy was taking place.

    A man died a car length away from where I was parked after being hit by a bus while crossing the street. According to the news, he was 49 years old and on vacation. He had woken up on this archetypal summer Sunday morning, familiar to any tourist; full of awareness and prospects, on his way somewhere new. Natural emotions, hopes, dreams of things he might do and the person he might become lingered invisibly just behind his moment by moment experience. Each step forward out of the hotel was being taken under the innocent presumption of innumerable more to follow. Maybe he had just enjoyed a nice breakfast at his hotel with a coffee sipped from a non specific mug. He had been carefree, jocular while discussing plans for the day with his family or friends. And then half way across the street he was struck by a bus and pulled ineluctably under the right front wheel, tucked into the wheel well. When I rounded the front of the bus I saw his eyes open looking shocked and then his features went slack and like a raggedy doll he stared dumbly into nothingness. On his way back to his god, it's possible he had no time for petty regrets. It's possible his memories of his daughter or son or grandchildren or his wife slid away so quickly beneath him there was nothing to grasp at or maybe there was just nothing, nothing at all where he went. All the metal, rubber, concrete, flesh and bone was on our side on display.

    He went away and all went with him.

    We got home to Toronto later that night around 1:00 AM. While I read a chapter of Charlotte's Web to Ollie, he wanted to hold on to a Canada 150 wand that lights up with flashing neon lights. He got it on a school trip to Harbourfront at the end of grade 1. He said it was his favorite thing even though I know he had never slept with it before. I kissed him goodnight and before leaving his room, I tucked the wand into his arms and asked him not to turn it on until morning. He smiled with his red watery tired eyes. We were both happy to be home.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Denman and Hornby Isles

    August 10, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C

    Sitting in the car on the ferry preparing to cross the Lambert channel, it became obvious that we were ready for our road trip to be over. We we're headed to another beach called Big Tribune, known as Little Hawaii. Both kids had runny noses and Ollie had a persistent cough. We were spending most of our time parenting the kids. Toby is starting to ask to go home again. Even Ollie said he could hardly wait to get back.

    And then we got to the beach! We parked the car on a tree lined avenue between a provincial park and a private campground. Everywhere people were flip flopping towards the water carrying stand up boards or wheeling sailboats (I've seen more than a couple of Lasers out here). At the end of the road there was a cart renting paddle boards, kayaks, and skim boards. A narrow dirt path slinked through some bushes and spilled out into a beach 1000 meters wide. There were some large sailboats moored in the bay and although there were a lot of people, the area was large enough that there seemed to be wide open space. We threw our towels down, effectively setting up shop on the fluffy white sand near the back of the beach where high tide wouldn't reach. The darker wetter sand ran at least a couple of hundred metres to where people were wading and playing in the water. Ollie met a friend, a 10 year old girl, who had a skim board. He went with her and some older kids to see how it was done. He came back and reported he had tried it once, fell flat on his face, and declined anymore attempts. Him and I floated out on our alligator to the end of one of the spits. The whole area was filled with sweeping sculptures of sandstone hoodoos layered in with pock filled mud stone. We watched some boys crab hunting with a net. I heard them say they could get 5 bucks per crab from a local restaurant. Ollie climbed up and down the sandstone monuments. We spotted a bald eagle with a head as white as snow flying over the shore. Toby mostly played in the sand with the cousin of Ollie's friend while Jessica enjoyed an open air massage under a tent for a half hour. Around 5:00 we packed up and drove back to the cable ferry that would return us to Denman Island.

    The next day the boys and I ventured off around noon to look for Tree Island. We heard you can walk there at low tide. We found the trail head and walked down a half dozen or so flights of steep, wooden steps (105 of them)from the crest of the Komas bluffs to Morning beach. Other than some guy swimming nude in the distance we were all alone. We hobbled along the rocky shore which was unstable enough that Toby couldn't make much progress. I would carry him over the rocks and put him down on the sandy parts. We found a patch of sand right at the water edge and we enjoyed a perfectly secluded private pure sand beach until we were ready to move on. Along the way we hunted crabs, squished little spongy things, rock hopped, picked up shells and rocks, having a blast. Then we crossed the channel to the island and we were literally walking on the bottom of the sea. Ollie kept finding moths and naming them names like Ken and Jefferson. Toby wanted to be carried constantly so we made up a song about him:

    It's goody to be a lazy Daisy,
    On a woodsy walk.
    Riding daddy's shoulders,
    Over slippery rocks.

    It's goody to be a lazy Daisy
    On the bottom of the sea.
    Riding daddy's shoulders
    Unless it's daddy you happen to be.

    We were singing this and feeling pretty good about ourselves in our yellow submarine when Ollie stepped up on a seaweed covered boulder, slipped and wiped out slicing his hands and left knee on some gnarly barnacles. By this time we were a couple of km out and neither kids could walk independently over the rocks, both were crying and Ollie was bleeding out on the sand. After some urgent explanation that no one cared to hear I swooped up Ollie and carried him a couple of hundred meters until the rocks became impassable by Toby. I put him down and carried Toby a hundred meters than walked back and picked up Ollie. I repeated this for a good portion of the way back. Eventually Ollie started limping after me when I was carrying Toby so I had less distance to cover when I came back for him. When we reached the sandy area by the water I set them both down on a log and ordered them not to move so I could go swimming and give my sweaty body some relief. When I hiked back to where I left them they had filled my hat with sand and rocks which they placed on my head after asking me to close my eyes and bend down. We made it back to the car and went out for dinner for our last night on Denman Island.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Anniversary

    August 8, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 16 °C

    We drove up the trans Canada along the Saanich inlet and stopped at the BC forest Discovery centre for lunch and a play. We learned some logging history and climbed an old fire tower where we had a nice view of the Duncan Canadian Tire. A couple of hours later we arrived at the Buckley Bay ferry terminal in Baynes Sound. A ten minute cable ferry got us across to Denman Island and we discovered our AirBnB, Hillsdale, on North West Rd. It's a 20 acre farm with a main house and guest house facing each other across a yard of yellow grass. Chickens and a couple of sheep have free range of the grounds. Our hosts are a Polish couple that moved here from the big city 7 years ago. It's a nice combination of rustic cottage life and modem amenities. We have three rooms so finally the boys don't have to share a bed. We bbqed strip loin steak and mini potatoes for dinner. After dinner we went a couple of minutes down the road to a rocky beach armed with white wine and a sand pail. Jessica and Ollie caught a crab in the pail while Toby practiced his rock hopping. A few boats moored off shore bobbed silently against a misty backdrop of the Comox valley hills. Eight years we've been married. Jessica commented that we had never before spent so much time with the kids. I felt so lucky to be out on the road with my family!Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Victoria

    August 7, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 15 °C

    It's our anniversary tomorrow. The song High Tide, Low Tide came on in the car. That was our wedding song. We kind of went up and down today. Jessica is feeling the weight of the kids over relying on her for every little thing. Between the Salish aquarium, the butterfly gardens, lunch at Sassy's and swimming in Hotel Zed's pool we must have laughed dozens of times and snapped at each other just as many times.

    We walked to fisherman's wharf and it took a lot longer than I was told. Along the way the city lost its color and turned flat. We were silently marching through the streets looking for the end, wishing we were somewhere else. The kids alternated between wanting to be carried and rushing up ramps and stairwells.

    Once we arrived at the little village of docks, house boats, restaurants and patio tables we split up to order food. Ollie and I got some chowder, deep fried salmon and halibut tacos. Jessica and Toby got fish and chips. We ate under the orange sun and by the time we were finished eating, colour and dimension returned to the world. We took a jaunty little ferry taxi back to our car and returned to hotel Zed.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Car camping

    August 4, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 22 °C

    Preparations for the big overnight boys camping trip have been made. Homemade waffle breakfast with fresh fruit fuelled us up! Plan to get on the 10:30 ferry which will take us to the peninsula. We made the 11:30. The ferry took us across Puget Sound to Southworth terminal on the Kitsap peninsula. From there we drove to Scenic Beach State Park, just past a village called Seabeck. While driving the turquoise water off the Hood canal and the Olympics Mountains in the distance appeared on our right. We arrived while the tide was still low so the beach was littered with craggy rock and oysters but not the seaweed that the Puget Sound coughed up on the Seattle beaches. After setting up camp the kids played in one of the two playgrounds within the camp. Ollie discovered tire spinning and spun so much that we had to take him back to the tent to lie down. In no time he was throwing up his waffle breakfast in our cooking pot. I was worried it was something else but he felt better after a short rest so we all went swimming. A nutritious dinner of hot dogs, strawberries, carrots and macaroni was followed by a forced shower for the kids. After a sufficient number of Ranier lagers, what the locals call vitamin R, I lost all moral authority with respect to preventing the kids from wrestling in the tent. Their utter disregard of my empty threats combined with the fire ban made the choice to go to bed with the kids a pretty easy one. Camping is such an irrational activity. I slept with a pair of jogging pants as my pillow and every time a kid had to go to the bathroom I had to escort them, half asleep and stumbling out the zippered nylon doorway, over the threshold into the murky forest where they peed on the rhododendrons, in their pajamas and everywhere in between. It's cold, uncomfortable, dirty, and inconvenient. It's a ton of work to set up and tear down. Nothing ever turns out exactly as you planned and you always forget something and break something else. But, I keep going back and now bringing my sons out into the woods is another dream come true. We woke up in the morning and made some pancakes. Ollie is learning how to use his pocket knife by cutting strawberries. We went on a hike through a lush forest with towering trees. Douglas firs and red cedar and Big Leaf Maple look down at us as we pass under smaller trees drooping with old man's beard. As the kids investigated the mushrooms and centipedes, counted rings on fallen tree trunks, banged on bark, slashed at ferns I'm reminded why we need to be a bit irrational at times. How else will they know they are part of nature?Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    A Seattle beach and park tour

    August 3, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    We got up at 5:45 and with the car already packed we were able to get on the road just after 6:00. Our ferry from the Anacortes terminal was cancelled due to mechanical failure so we had to drive up to Tsamussen in Vancouver to catch a BC ferry. The trip went without incident and we made the 9:00 passage to Victoria.
    Leaving Seattle was good for us. We had a comfortable stay and the Edgars were great hosts but the city itself was similar enough to Toronto that I think we lost our sense of adventure. Jessica started missing her bed. The boys had a great time with Zach but they were getting squirrelly, especially Tobin.

    As for me, on our last night in Seattle I felt muddled and confused. My identity as a father, husband, man got all tangled up and sank beneath a senseless, chaotic and unnavigable sea within myself. For awhile I was adrift like a jellyfish, floating on the inky black currents of the Salish Sea.

    Somehow, the next morning, driving north on the I-5 refocussed me and I was able to distinguish between myself and the world again. I was no longer drifting. I was steering. The captain of my ship! And the sun was rising, the coffee was hot, the traffic was clear. We were on our way again!    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    USA USA

    August 2, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

    The smoke followed us across the border. Even in Seattle they are just now getting smoke from Canada roll in. It's not too bad though and we can at least see some blue sky on the crown of the sky. We drove the I-5 down through Washington State, stopping at Whatcom park for lunch and a hike. We found a swimming hole surrounded by cliffs. I borrowed a tube off some teenagers so Ollie and I could bob around near the waterfall. Toby showed some real interest in scrambling through the woods today and he's asking to go home a lot less frequently. When we arrived at Ryan and Patricia's house in Seattle they had a dinner waiting. Quiche and a platter of cheese and olives and peach cobbler for dessert. Ryan and I took the boys to the playground near a Nordic museum for awhile. I think I'll want to check that out again!Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    To Cultus Lake

    August 1, 2017 in Canada ⋅ 🌫 20 °C

    We got a late start and didn't leave Summerland until 11:00. The 97C was to take us to highway 5 and according to our information, we should have expected a scenic drive with unbelievable mountain and river views. As we climbed through the Cascade mountains up to the Coquihalla pass and along the Coquihalla River we were confronted with a different reality. Mother Nature, from Earth to sky, was cloaked in a uniform of opaque gray smoke. All we could see of her were the faint outlines of mountain faces as evanescent as the hulls of ships sunk in a murky sea.
    It was oppressive and disorienting just driving through it. Difficult enough to imagine living under this smoky inferno for any length of time and even harder to comprehend being displaced from your home.

     At some point, perhaps due to the mystifying properties of a world perpetually smelling like a campfire, our communications and navigation systems broke down and we got lost. Originally I was hoping to explore the Othello tunnels on the way to Cultus but by the time we got there it was late and we wanted to take full advantage of the twilight rates at the water park. We drove straight to the park and took full advantage of all their rides. We rode the Collosal Canyon, the Twisters and the Blasters. They had a pirate cove and lots of hot tubs for resting between rides. We weren't quite ready for the Valley of Death or the double black diamond Rattler but right at the end I decided to do the Freefall as research for Betwixtia. From the top of the slide, the smoke in the sky had mostly cleared and the peach colored sun seemed close enough to throw a pinecone at.

    Back at the Best Western Rainbow Country Inn, 20 minutes down the road on Industrial Way in Chilliwack, the only rainbow I could detect was an olfactory one made up of manure, exhaust and tobacco smoke. Jess and I looked at each other with raised eye brows. The facade looked much more modest in person than it did on the internet. I made a mental note to work on my hotel reservation skills and we retired down a hallway colored in many shades of maroon and beige to room 131. As I briefly pulled back the curtains to reveal the side of a warehouse about 10 feet away I felt happy in the knowledge we had completed another day on the Pearson road trip.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Summerland sleeps

    July 31, 2017 in Canada ⋅ 🌙 23 °C

    Between 1910 and 1915 the Kettle Valley Railway was built to accommodate the gold rush. During the same period, Sam McGee developed an orchard and worked on road construction in Summerland. A little over a hundred years later the Pearson's boarded the 3716 in anticipation of the 90 minute tour from Prairie Valley station to Trout Creek Bridge and back again. We were tired, hot and a little cranky after more than a week on the road. Earlier in the morning, a ribbon of smoke having blown in from the BC wildfires had encircled the hills and hoodoos around Summerland. By the time our steam engine pulled up to the old timey platform, the sky was clogged with gray as if trolls had stoked fires under all the fairy chimneys in the West. The train jogged along the north side of Conkle Mountain, overlooking Prairie Valley. A banjo player walked up and down the cars taking requests for country music. By the time we rounded Giant's Head Mountain our kids and many others on the train had decided to revolt. I'd like to share more of what I learned from the sonorous voice of the conductor as he described landmarks and historical points of interest but I couldn't hear much other than Tobin wailing for snacks which we didn't have. At the Trout Creek Bridge I bought a pint of hand picked raspberries for five bucks and Toby ate them all in about five minutes. He and Ollie crawled behind the seats of some folks from Vancouver and we pretended not to notice. Jessica promised that would be the last vintage train ride we ever go on.

    I hit a wall today. We went home for lunch and a nap. After the nap we went to the Sun-Oke Beach and splashed around for a couple of hours. After the beach and a DQ side serve ice cream the kids and I went for a hike on the trails behind our host's house while Jessica made dinner. It was pleasant until Ollie decided to run down a slope of loose gravel and sand followed by Toby who wiped out skinning a knee that was already scabbed over a few times. I had to carry Toby after that and Ollie had to carry both wooden swords which evidently was too much a burden because he sat down in the middle of a trail and refused to budge for long enough that I had to put Toby down at which time he promptly tripped again landing face first on some rocks. We returned, both kids yelling and crying in a way that was clearly blaming me for their suffering. They were at least good enough to contain themselves just as we met our hosts on their way to yoga class. When I asked them if the kid on my shoulders looked ok, Brent said he looked great and Ceri said he didn't look as tired as I did.    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Onwards over Roger's Pass!

    July 30, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C

    Oh the fun is just beginning! What a week with the Bartol's! Ollie and I slept under the stars last night, in the open air of the Rockies. We woke up with the sun warming our cheeks through the mesh in the tent. A couple of hours later we were on the road heading west on highway 1, over Roger's pass. We stopped at the interpretive center with the big howitzers they use to set off avalanches pointing skyward. A little further on down the road we strolled and skipped through a forest of five hundred year old Cedars. These Giants were just seedlings when Colombus was sailing to America and they have been patiently growing ever since. As the sign said, they were there when Da Vinci was painting and Shakespeare was writing. A construction worker named Mike let Ollie and Toby drill a few screws into a board of the walkway. A couple of hours later we stopped again at the Enchanted Forest. Years ago someone had started making figurines of fairy tale characters out of concrete and it has since become an amusement park in the woods. The boys had a great time running into the house of Goldilocks' bears, the old lady's shoe, hanging out with Winnie the Pooh and skipping up the yellow brick road. The three little pigs each had a house. There was a pirate ship, a rabbit hole, and more.
    We left with two wooden swords, licorice, and a bag of popcorn. As we cruised along the shoreline of Lake Okanagan we started to get hungry. When we arrived at our Summerland destination, we went out for dinner at Zia's. They had a backyard for kids to play in. What an amazing idea! Everyone ate too much and then we ordered dessert!    Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Boo the Bear

    July 29, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ☀️ 25 °C

    Last night Dan and Martina entertained friends from Calgary. For dinner we had lasagna made from ground mule deer that Dan and Martina had tracked for three days before killing it just outside Golden. Home made lasagna noodles (eggs from their chickens of course) and vegetables from the garden made for a true locally harvested meal. This morning we returned to Kicking Horse and rode the chair lift up to the bear refuge to meet Boo the Grizzly. He was happily grazing just inside the electric fence which surrounds his 21 acre habitat. After listening to the guided tour, Toby and I decided to walk down the mountain. Jess and Oliver rode the chair. We all agreed that splitting up was quality time spent one on one with the kids. We went back for left over deer lasagna and quiet time. We're getting excited about the next leg of our journey. Tomorrow we drive to Summerland in the Okanagan.Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    Kicking Horse

    July 28, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 11 °C

    We boarded the gondola up Kicking Horse around 11:00. There weren't many people around until later in the day when the downhillers started descending into the bowls along spaghetti-thin trails carving through the stubby brush. We chose the CPR trail along a ridge that ran parallel to the gondola. It was an iron and rust coloured rock pathway threading it's way through feathery spruce trees. Jessica lugged Toby who was audibly nervous about the steep slopes crumbling away on either side of our path. It took all of us awhile to get our Mountain legs but we persisted to the end of the trail and back up again, about a km in total. Being in the mountains really makes you feel yourself, Jessica said. The scale of the mountains from up there is like an ocean. It's terrifying and beautiful at the same time. Afterwards we ate left over salmon and burgers at a playground and then went to Cedars campground for a swim in the lake.Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler

    The Day of the Wolf

    July 27, 2017 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 8 °C

    After learning about wolves at Northern Lights wolf center, we drove to the Blaebury River valley, between Willowbank mountain and Mount McBeath. We were surrounded by dramatic peaks: Redburn, Moberly, and Langford. Ollie said the mountains made him feel calm. Jessica reported feeling small but powerful. We were all alone in the great wide open of the valley. A Giant's footprint is a humbling place to be. We splashed in the freezing water, collected rocks and basked in the hot sun. Nothing could touch us there. After a lunch of leftover hot dogs we drove north towards Sea Lion Mountain and Mount Lassedat in search of Thomson Falls. The emerald green waters of the Blaebury got brighter and richer the further we drove. By the time we reached the bridge where the falls were supposed to be our road had run out of room. We walked 100 meters or so up a carpet of daisies, buttercups and bell flowers. Ollie and I banged sticks together to give wild animals fair warning. The forest encroached on our path, eventually swallowing it up in a veil of green leaves. The only way through would have been to chop away the vegetation. Toby had fallen asleep in his carrier and we were getting nervous about bears...Read more

  • Andrew PearsonPearson’s Take the WestTraveler
    10:00 at night in Golden

    Golden

    July 25, 2017 in Canada ⋅ 🌧 9 °C

    The pirate, the ninja, the mommy and daddy continued on their quest through the wild West. On their 4th day, the sun bounced up over table top mountain and it was already hot before ten o'clock. After a play at the park and some lunch Dan took us up to mount 7. We drove the dusty switch backs above Reflection Lake all the way up to a paragliding take off platform. After watching a couple of paragliders take off we went on a hike up an old logging road.Read more

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