Читать книгу Highballer - Greg Nolan - Страница 9

It was the late summer of 1983. I was restless. Barrett’s phone call couldn’t have been better timed. The spring season that had such a positive and profound impact on my life was almost three months behind me. Barrett explained that he had just been awarded a treeplanting contract up Bute Inlet. I was invited.

We were to mobilize from Heriot Bay on Quadra Island in two weeks. After arriving at our destination, we’d establish a tent camp, though our meals would be provided by a nearby logging camp. It sounded good to me. I committed to the project without hesitation.

As soon as I hung up the phone, I searched for Bute Inlet on a map and was immediately struck by its geographic isolation. It stretched some eighty kilometres into the rugged coastal Interior from its mouth at Stuart Island to its head at the estuaries of the Homathko and Southgate rivers. There were no highways or roads leading in; access was by air or water only. The juices really began to flow when I learned from my sister that it was considered to be one of the most dramatic and picturesque waterways in the entire world. I was stoked.

Up until that time, my experiences in remote locales were limited to the Interior of central and northern BC. And as extraordinary as those regions were, veteran planters insisted that the coast, specifically the coastal inlets, was infinitely more wild and exciting. They regaled me with tales of glaciers, ice fields, giant cedars, boulders the size of condos and vast stretches of pristine wilderness. Bute Inlet, above all other coastal destinations, was given special standing for its exceptional beauty and mystique.

One day before I was to embark on the twenty-four-hour bus ride from Calgary to Campbell River, where I was to spend the night before crossing over to meet the crew on Quadra Island, I came down with a nasty flu virus, one that nearly knocked me out of the picture. My mom, being a registered nurse, didn’t hesitate in hooking me up with medication she thought might help take the edge off of my long journey. Before I hopped onto the bus, she handed me a small bottle of pain-relief pills, some with codeine, some without. We didn’t realize it at that time, but I had an allergy to codeine, one that produced hallucinations and extreme anxiety.

I was five hours into the first leg of my journey when the sun began to set over Rogers Pass. I found myself unable to settle my nerves, partly due to my feverish state, partly due to my excitement and anticipation over the prospect of a new adventure.

As night began to descend over the mountain pass, I thought about home. I thought about how much I was already missing my friends and family. I thought about my mom. I then remembered her care package and promptly put back two of the larger white pills, hoping a sense of calm and quiet would sweep over me.

From that point on, my memories are fragmented and vague. I remember an unfamiliar sensation sweeping over me. I remember becoming fixated on the jagged black shapes of the mountain ridges on the horizon. I traced their near vertical contours all the way down to where they transitioned into complete blackness below the edge of the highway. Everything had a somewhat surreal and interesting quality at first, but then things began to spiral out of control. Dark shapes and shadows began to emerge from the rock faces and conifer patches on the right side of the highway. Worse, the steep valley walls on the left began to crumble and collapse, threatening to crush and bury our bus under piles of rock and debris.

Until then I had never experienced what the hippies referred to as a “bad trip,” but this certainly had to qualify. I remember the panic, the desperation as I attempted to calm myself down. I remember hyperventilating, closing my eyes and burying my face in my jacket, trying not to scream. I’m not sure if I was successful in thwarting those impulses as my next real memory was dragging my gear across the bus station parking lot in Vancouver, some twelve hours later. But that was only a fleeting impression. I have no recollection of boarding my connecting bus, crossing the Strait of Georgia by ferry or making the journey up Vancouver Island. Apparently, I had so thoroughly programmed the entire itinerary into my head that I didn’t skip a beat. Waking up en route, hearing the bus driver call out, “Next stop Campbell River,” was a monumental relief. My dreams up until that point were toxic, plagued with flashes of alien landscapes and baleful faces.

Nearly defeated by the residual effects of a fever and a bad codeine trip, I dragged my heavy gear from the bus depot in Campbell River to a hotel I had booked in advance. Spotting the Quadra Island ferry dock from my hotel window was comforting—it was the vessel I would need to board early the next morning in order to hook up with my crew.

The first leg of my journey was behind me. To celebrate, I turned the TV on to the movie channel, collapsed on the bed and drifted off into a shallow coma. Later that night, I awoke with a start to the sound of roaring engines. For a few crazy moments I had no recollection of where I was, or how I got there. Running to the window and peering out onto the street below, I could see only the vague outline of unfamiliar buildings draped in a thick layer of fog. I was lost. I had no sense of time or space. On the desk next to the TV was an assortment of pamphlets and menus that finally revealed my location, allowing me to crawl back into the here and now.

The engine sounds that triggered the panic attack sprung from a movie that was playing on TV—George Miller’s The Road Warrior—an extremely disconcerting post-apocalyptic tale of a desolate world filled with fiendish, relentless antagonists. The intrusion from the television seemed fitting somehow, considering my current state of mind.

I shook off my dopey malaise early the next morning and managed to catch the first ferry over to Quadra Island. It was a short crossing. The warmhearted generosity of the local island folk made hitching a ride to the other side of the island an effortless task.

I arrived at Heriot Bay ahead of schedule. Barrett’s trucks, which were in the process of being loaded onto a barge, were a comforting sight. Though I felt as if I had been dragged behind the bus for the entire journey from Calgary to the West Coast, my strength was beginning to return. I felt myself coming back into the light.

It was good to see Barrett. He elevated my spirit. He was his usual animated self, grinning ear to ear, looking for any opportunity to laugh out loud. The crew he had assembled was small. There were only a dozen of us. I was surprised to see six new faces, including two younger bucks named Ricky and Zach.

Ricky was a tall, lean and ruggedly handsome fellow. He immediately came off as loud and unrefined. He was the kind of guy who didn’t give a shit about what others thought of him—an admirable quality, I thought. He too loved to laugh out loud and, despite his crass nature, I immediately spotted a friend in him.

Zach was the polar opposite of his buddy. He was a solemn man with piercing green eyes. He appeared restless, brooding. He had a simmering intensity that could be felt the moment you entered his space. Though I greeted him warmly, shaking his hand, I resolved to keep my distance for the time being.

Ricky had also brought along a friend, a gentle and attentive Doberman pinscher named Lady. She was smaller in stature than most Dobies I had met, but she was very well conditioned. She had strong lines. It was obvious that Ricky loved his dog and took exceptionally good care of her.

Also on the crew were three familiar faces from the spring: Kelly, my first foreman, Ron, the ex-high-school English teacher and Nick, a Stetson-wearing cowboy with a thick southern drawl. The one person I had hoped to greet more than any other was not in evidence. No one could tell me where she was or how she was doing. In a way, I was relieved Debbie wasn’t there.

There was one detail concerning the Bute project that I must’ve missed when Barrett briefed me over the phone. We were to sail along with the trucks for the entire ten-hour barge ride to the head of the inlet. I was stoked. The prospect of slowly skirting some of the more isolated islands within the Discovery Island group, before entering the inlet itself, promised to heighten the level of adventure.

Our barge captain navigated our vessel with great finesse through the narrow, turbulent channels between the islands of Read, Maurelle, Raza, Sonora and Stuart. There were also numerous smaller islands, completely uninhabited, that created an obstacle course of sorts, requiring delicate navigation. Once we rounded Stuart, about four hours into the journey, Bute Inlet opened up before us. Though shrouded in layers of fog, it offered a glorious moment. We were now heading into mainland BC through an eighty-kilometre-long estuary; a classic fjord some four kilometres wide with steep mountains rising up to three thousand metres on both sides.

Shortly after we entered the inlet, the clouds opened up and light rain began to fall. As we made our unhurried advance through the calm, dark blue water, each kilometre revealed something singular, something extraordinary: spectacular waterfalls cascading from great heights, their genesis cloaked in thick layers of cumulus; granite cliffs rising many hundreds of metres above us—their extent was also obscured by the low ceiling; voluminous creeks emptying into the estuary with great drama. Every once in a while we’d spot a small abandoned cabin poking out of the forest, only metres above the high-tide line, on the verge of surrendering to the elements. I imagined grizzled old prospectors once having lived in them as they scoured the area for gold decades earlier.

The slow barge ride up the inlet was a lot to drink in. I used up more than half of the film I had brought along to document the adventure, unable to set my camera down for more than a few moments at a time.

Curiously, feelings of loneliness and isolation began to take hold the farther in we went. I suppose if we had flown, or travelled in a much faster craft, those feelings wouldn’t have had the opportunity to develop. The barge, burdened with the weight of trucks, fuel, gear and personnel, plodded along slowly through the dark calm water. By hour eight or nine, not having seen any other vessel travelling in or out, those feelings of loneliness and isolation gave way to a general sense of unease. I know I wasn’t the only one who felt it.

We arrived at the head of the inlet late in the afternoon. The plan was to drive the twenty-five kilometres to the Scar Creek logging camp, unload the trucks, and hike to a nearby creek where we’d pitch our tents. Once set up, we could sit down to a hot meal back in the camp dining hall. I had endured nearly forty-eight hours without any real food.

The road leading inland from the head of the inlet was built specifically for the purpose of harvesting trees and putting wood in the water.¹ It did not link up with any other road or highway network. It terminated where the harvesting ended. Beyond that were hundreds of kilometres of pristine, untouched wilderness unbranded by human footprints.

It was a good half-hour drive from the beachhead to the Scar Creek camp. Stepping out of the truck, I immediately sensed something off about the place. It didn’t feel right. I quickly dismissed that first impression. I couldn’t trust it. I was still suffering from the residual effects of a fever and a codeine hangover.

The camp was well organized. Aside from a large machine shop and mess hall, there were a half-dozen mobile-home-like structures sprawled out across two acres, erected to shelter the crews that worked to put wood in the water.

No caulks beyond this point was the ubiquitous message in camp.² The sign was at every entrance to every building. It was especially prominent at the entrance to the kitchen and mess hall.

Across the compound was a recreation room where the loggers went to unwind after dinner. The door was ajar. I could spot several sets of eyes checking us out from within.

While we were unloading gear from our trucks, a group of loggers assembled on the mess hall porch. Judging by the sour expressions, this wasn’t a welcoming committee. They didn’t seem too thrilled about strangers rolling into their camp. I suppose they decided that we didn’t pose much of a threat, though. They soon lost interest and went back to their meals.

Our late arrival left us with limited daylight. We needed to hike our gear to the creek and set up our camp before nightfall. Wafting across the compound from the kitchen was the wonderful aroma of dinner. Hot food would be waiting for us the moment we got ourselves squared away.

The trail that led to our camping area cut through a thick patch of conifers for the first two hundred metres, then dropped down to a sandy flat where it wound through another two hundred metres of thick salmonberry, terminating at a sandy ledge at the edge of a creek.

The creek was at its seasonal low, exposing a five-metre-wide swath of dry creek bed, checkerboarded by round alluvial stones rendered smooth and slick from fast-running water. The creek just beyond ran shallow but steady. On one side, a large boulder field interrupted its flow, creating deep shimmering pools beyond, and on the other, a sublime sight: the exposed creek bed transitioned into a long, soft carpet of grey, talc-like sand—a narrow swath at first, swelling out into a vast expanse some five hundred metres long and up to fifty metres wide.

Tall timber flanked the beach on the upper fringe, accentuated by cedar, balsam and hemlock. The creek defined the lower boundary, its flow occasionally disrupted by large protruding boulders, inducing sloshes and churns that reverberated throughout the corridor.

Beyond the boulder field on the other side of the creek, the terrain then sloped upward, gradually increasing in grade, the heavy brush giving way to towering cedars with smaller maples interspersed between them. It was an ominous backdrop. This was real wilderness. One had to wonder what lurked along those higher reaches.

The beach offered numerous possibilities for individual campsites, everything from compacted waterfront benches to private alcoves tucked in along the forest edge. Preferring privacy, I claimed a spot at the very far end of the corridor. It was a long walk to the trailhead that led back to the logging camp, but the spot was wonderfully secluded.

After an hour of dragging gear, levelling sand, and pounding tent pegs, we raised an impressive little tent village. One dozen nylon structures of every shape, colour and size extended some five hundred metres from one end of the corridor to the other. My contribution to the neighbourhood: a two-man pup tent with an orange shell and a bright blue tarp fashioned as a rainfly.

By then, the sun was in full retreat. Barrett calling us to dinner was music to my ears. With our tents pitched, our gear organized for the next morning and flashlights in hand, we made our way back up the trail to the dining hall.

The mess hall was set up like a cafeteria. At supper, the entire meal was laid out buffet style—all you could eat and then some. In the morning, there was an assortment of breakfast entrees, also laid out buffet style, but you could have your eggs made to order. We were responsible for bagging our own lunches, and there was a separate room where lunch items were laid out each morning.

A very generous dinner spread was set out for us that first night, and as we filled our faces, Barrett gave us a quick rundown of the house rules, which facilities were open to us and which were strictly off limits. Aside from the dining hall, we were granted access to a vacant unit at the far end of the camp. It had a bathroom, several shower stalls and a good-sized dry room in the event the sky opened up on us. The recreation hall—where the loggers gathered to blow off steam after dinner—was a big question mark. Access would be decided by the loggers and would be by invitation only. I was intrigued by that little detail.

I slept extremely well in my tiny pup tent on the beach that first night. Soothed by the sound of running water and an occasional breeze caressing the canopy of conifer limbs above, I was instantly lulled and transported into dreamland. Nothing could have shaken me out of my slumber that first night.

It was pre-dawn when I emerged from my tent the next morning. Feeling better than I had in days, excited at the prospect of hitting the slopes, I headed off in the direction of the logging camp, eager to get a jump on my day. Along the trail, I heard a dog barking in the distance. It wasn’t a normal bark. It sounded anxious, strained. I remember wondering if it was Lady, and what it was that had her so agitated, so early in the morning.

I wasn’t prepared for the reception I received when I stepped into the mess hall that first morning. Three dozen loggers, all in the final stages of polishing off their breakfasts, stopped in mid-chew and stared me down. Bulletproof faces. Row upon row of them. Not a smile or friendly gesture among them. This hostility was par for the course in many ways. These men were working in one of the most geographically isolated areas on the planet. They weren’t used to outsiders coming in, violating their space, sitting at their tables, eating their food. Tread lightly, I thought. I made a beeline for the safety of the lunchroom around the corner.

The lunch spread that greeted me caused my jaw to slacken. It had every variety of cold cut you could imagine, along with supper leftovers, a dozen different types of cheeses, every conceivable type of condiment and sandwich topping, and of course, a respectable collection of bread and rolls. But what really floored me was the area devoted entirely to desserts. Those items occupied twice as much table space as all the other lunch items combined. There were apple, strawberry, rhubarb, cherry and blueberry pies. A variety of lavishly iced cakes occupied the shelf above. Cookies, tarts, turnovers, brownies, fruit squares, Nanaimo bars, eclairs, Danishes and doughnuts. It was total madness.

Back at the dining area I spotted Kelly, my foreman, setting a plate of bacon and eggs on one of the tables that were made available to us. Kelly was an intense fellow, but it was a palatable intensity. He had the biggest, roundest blue eyes I had ever seen. The rest of his facial features were obscured by a thick black beard that merged with his straight, bowl cut. Kelly always seemed to have a knowing grin on his face, as if he were able to read your deepest thoughts.

As I approached his table to bid him good morning, he looked up and asked, “You didn’t think to bring a rifle along, did ya?” Before I could respond, the mess hall door flew open and Ricky and Zach barged in, deeply engaged in conversation, oblivious to the disapproving glares from the locals. It then occurred to me why Lady had been barking so anxiously earlier on, and why Kelly would ask such an odd question. From that point on, our mess hall conversations were dominated by the talk of bears. Grizzly bears.

The drive to our first cutblock was a short hop from the logging camp. Along the way, Ricky and Zach described spotting a bear on the other side of the creek at roughly 4:30 a.m. It emerged within fifty or sixty metres of their campsite (their tents were close to the trailhead). It was fairly dark at that early hour, but from what little they could see, they estimated it was a large animal. Lady was the first to detect it, picking up its scent from inside Ricky’s tent. When Ricky turned her loose, she immediately bolted to edge of the creek to challenge it. When the bear was slow to retreat, Lady crossed over and gave chase. The confrontation lasted well over an hour. The barking I’d heard on my way to breakfast was apparently the tail end of that episode. This got me thinking about my preference for privacy at the far end of the corridor.

Our focus soon shifted to planting. Being the first out of the truck and the first to bag-up, I was the first carve off a piece of the mountain. This was my very first piece of coastal terrain. It was challenging. The slash was bigger and deeper than in the Interior. The stumps and root swells were often several metres in diameter, rather than just a foot or two. The brush was thicker and higher.

I couldn’t get the thought of a grizzly encounter out of my mind. I was on edge all day, reacting to every little sound and vibration around me. The day progressed without incident, though, and as usual, it ended almost as soon as it began. Time flies when you’re hard at work creating a new forest.