Camping in Nelson

May 27th, 2007

We had planned to leave for Canada on Saturday morning, but Friday night Kayla and I held a quick conference: I mentioned that the weather was perfect, and she concurred by stating that she didn't want to make dinner anyway. So by 6:30 p.m. we were heading north with our van stuffed with gear and kids ready for camping. We took the western route, following Crowsnest Highway up over the pass and down the other side of the Selkirk Mountains. Two hours later we rolled into Nelson and set up at the municipal campground. We had planned to camp at Kokanee Creek Provincial Park, but the lateness of our arrival forced a change of plans. The city campground backs up to a forested hillside but is otherwise unremarkable. It does sport a very noisy population of crows (as we found out early the next morning). It is also extremely handy for exploring Nelson, being only about three blocks from the historic center of town.

Saturday was spent exploring and walking around Nelson. The lakefront park was filled with hundreds of kids playing soccer, along with their parents and families. We picked our way across fields full of seven year-olds kicking indiscriminately, then spent some time at the playground. In the afternoon, we took the car and explored southwest into Castlegar, then played at a little regional park on Pass Creek. That evening I took a drive and explored more of Nelson. The interesting thing about the town is its hilly, vertical nature. In fact, nearly every residential street has a grade of at least 15 degrees, some much more. Being from a similar climate I am astounded that people can even access their houses in the wintertime on such steep slopes. There were some streets that extended like playground slides for a mile or more up the hillsides.

This morning we awoke to a slow drizzle. It seems like camping trips always end this way for us... beautiful sunny skies at the outset, slowly devolving to overcast skies and ending in rain. Maybe it helps us want to go home more. We packed up and, on Kayla's request, attending the Nelson branch of the LDS church. We had been there once before, two years ago. I have to hand it to the stalwart members in Nelson, because their congregation is as near extinction as any I've seen. It must take an unusually high level of dedication to persevere in the face of such small numbers. I pondered why, in a town of 10,000, the Mormon church has so few adherents. Our home town has a meagerly population of 2,500, yet has two large Mormon "wards" (congregations). I suppose history and happenstance have more influence than population.