Water Neighbours For?

It is forecast to rain in the greater Blind Channel area all week. Of course, I say “the greater Blind Channel area” with my lower lip secured between my upper and lower teeth (to prevent me from uncontrolably chortling) because, while there is a massive “area” surrounding Blind Channel, the “greater” part might seem to indicate there is something here in the fashion of human settlement.

There are numerous indications by way of hidden ruins and shell beaches left behind by a thousand years of clam eaters that there were once far more Native people dotting this expanse then there are residents of today. For a variety of reasons I’ll write about over time, these crafty, industrious and hearty people were oblierated by the arrival of Europeans, or they have been greatly absorbed into a broader society at what I would say has been a tremendous disadvantange to their magnificent cultures.

I musn’t digress, as I am on limited writing time today. Hereabouts, there are no roads, no stores, in fact, not much of anything except a few fishing lodges located here and there and which are served by float plane and boats. Of course, we have loads of woods, mountains, water and more water.

On top of that water already here, we have the winter rains down low and the heavy snows up high that are now resident and likely to remain so until May. The associated dampness is off-putting to many, as is the darkness that comes with the sun dropping into the sea around 4 p.m. each day.

The weather here is very localized, in that it may be pouring a torrent a few kilometres away and right here, you might be able to see blue sky up above through a tunnel in the swirling clouds, if only for a few minutes. This seemingly would make it hard to guess the daily conditions before they actually happen, but that’s not true any longer. Due to my new webbing capability, I have found the exact Environment Canada web spot that seems to set me up with what the weather pattern will be during the day. For anyone interested, it is the forecast for Sandspit, B.C.

http://www.weatheroffice.gc.ca/city/pages/bc-88_metric_e.html

I suspect that this location offers up the most reliable expecatations because the weather happens there after it arrives largely unimpeded from the west/northwest and it departs from there largely unimpeded until it cracks or slops, I ought to say, into my area.

The reason I bring this up is that I often am asked, when I am off kicking about in some other place, what it is like up here?

It’s wild, beautiful and, for quite a few months, wet, as I have stated. It is the complete opposite of city dwelling, so much so, that the extreme might be described as being excessive. Wet, wild, lonely, yes, disturbingly lonely and, today, wet, shockingly wet.

However, I view this wetness as a gift from the heavens and I, for one, would never set about complaining, lest our spigott get shut off and we wind up in a situation similar to what I am reading about taking place in certain parts of the U.S.A. at the moment – that being drought of large enough proportion that certain well endowed capitalists are laying plans to make millions by constructing drinking water pipelines along the same thinking as those who have constructed oil and gas pipelines in the past.

Can you imagine the oil industrialist T. Boone Pickens is spending a fortune to pipe water into Texan cities from the north of the state as a way to sustain the populations there? He expects, I read on the Internet, to make large sums off of this. I also read where the City of Atlanta is about to have all of its water shut off entirely due to the fact their huge local lake is empty. I thought it rained excessively in the southeastern United States?

Very scary, when you think about it. Millions of people plucked down in their lives with scarcely any opportunity to simply pull up stakes and go off wandering in search of water the way nomadic tribes of pre-colonization humans did those many eons past. These people are trapped, are they not, with their tract homes and all the rest, including their famously disgraced dog-hanging quarterback and a hockey team that plays as if it belongs to a minor association? Perhaps a harsh God is punishing them for the dog thing, although I read that took place in another state? Regardless, as I sit here next to my two beloved doggies, I can’t help but throw in my two-cents about that subhuman conduct.

Back to the moment. I have been having tea and an egg sandwich while taking a few minutes away from the boat shop and I am admiring the view as the rains come and go and the clouds swirl and every so often, a “sucker hole” opens up and affords a prolonged vista of some distance. Sucker holes are so termed because some ill- informed boaters (and even aircraft pilots, if you can believe it) sometimes trick themselves into thinking these areas of temporary clearing represent some type of break in the weather and, unfortunately, some have set off to try to get someplace, only to have the heavens resume their activity and kill them, or cause them to be rescued. We have many such instances take place up here every year.

Just now, off to my east, I glimpse the towering mountains that catch all this weather. Said weather runs in here off the North Pacific. The runoff from these lusty storms comes cascading down the slopes as rain unable to be absorbed in the saturated ground, or as snowmelt in the warmer months. There are amazing waterfalls at the end of very long, winding fiords that extend in from the sea to the foot of the mountain canyons and cliffs that run up thousands of feet into the snowfields, which are visible from outer space. These areas are simply spectacular, if you are able to come during a dry time when you can see them. The rest of the time, they are mist shrouded, unless the odd sucker hole forms.

These waterfalls and other watercourses feed hydro plants up and down the Coast Range. Thus, even some extremely remote areas, like mine, are able, through much toil and cost, to have electricity. That’s thanks to the bounty of falling water and the industry of those who think even the most out of the way spot deserves some current.

What an effort it has been to distribute the electricity that is afforded by God’s storms! Many brave souls are to be thanked for this difficult and magnificent work.

I have heard many stories about the various hydro and power commission workers over the years. Many years ago, in fact, Boris Karloff, an aspiring actor who went on to become famous for his role as the monster Frankenstien, was actually a trencher for B.C. Hydro. I read his stint with the outfit was short, but he famously went on to make a living off of being repeatedly electrocuted in numerous sequels, didn’t he?

It has also been verbally circulated that some hydro workers operating in excessively remote places along the endless coast and proximate mountain interior have spotted the elusive Sasquatch on numerous occasions. B.C. has a magnificant spot that is officially named Sasquatch Park, although I do not know if it is named in honour of the furtive, hairly giant. I am inclined to believe, that if this creature does exist, it must live up here, because so few others do that staying out of sight would not be much of a hard day’s work.

Well, back to my central idea.

I am afraid this area will eventually become overrun by thrist-crazed water refugees from places that are going to dry up and blow away in the wind. Like Atlanta, Dallas and the entire southwestern United States. I suppose we’ll be expected to share this water with these displaced environmental victims, like the good northern neighbours we are reputed to be.

But, then there is also the problem of the rising oceans from the thawing of Greenland Ice Cap and Antarctica flooding out the lower lying areas of the east and west coasts, forcing all of those people who survive that to get on the move, too.

Eventually, some of them will come up by whatever watercraft they have been able to beg, borrow, build, buy or steal and then, we’ll be having housing developments along the channel. God, what an awful thought. I do not know how far my hospitality can be stretched.

Which reminds me about this time I was on a ship headed into the harbour at Nuuk, Greenland, and we were lining the rail up near the starboard bow and one of the crew says to those of us who hadn’t been to Greenland previously, “You’ll love it here, boys. There is a woman behind every tree!”

Well, of course, once we were at the pier and we disembarked and walked up into the “town” that was largely comprised of what appeared to be many, many prefabricated buildings, one of the boys stopped and said out loud, “Look! There isn’t a single feckin’ tree to be seen!”

That’s when we got the joke.

Well, enough of this for today. Lunch is over. Back to finishing this boat right here before the drought and flood refugees arrive. It’s two weeks past due and the customer is getting edgy.