Thursday 12th July 2012 ­ Vancouver: Grouse Mountain, Lumberjacks and Brown Bears!

After the thrills of the Capilano Suspension Bridge and Cliff Walk what could possibly beat that – well a cable car up Grouse Mountain, a Lumberjack show and Grizzily Bears!  I declined the invitation to take – or even run as many seemed to be doing – the tough 2-mile trail that climbs to the top of this 3973ft mountain.  A 6-minute thrill in a gondola with 100 other people seemed more appealing even with some sobbing teenage girls!  The views from the summit revealed the true grandeur of the British Columbia’s landscape although a mist shrouded the view of Vancouver.

As well as being a popular ski resort in the winter Grouse Mountain is a refuge for endangered wildlife and is home to two orphaned Grizzily Bears – Echo & Grinder who posed perfectly for the photos – and three grey wolves.  The latter had been tamed and used in films and used to occupy part of the reserve with the bears but the Alpha Male got too close to one of the bears who with a single backswing of tis paw broke the wolf’s neck so the wolves now have their own large reserve on the lower slopes of the mountain.  It was quite something to be only a few feet from these magnificent animals even if there was an electric fence in between.

The Lumberjack show was equally entertaining with traditional sports such as springboard logging – to get above the huge roots of the big cedars and spruce lumberjacks cut notches into the lower trunk intowhich they place ‘springboards’ on which they then jumped to cut another notch.  Today the competition was to place 6 boards and then cut through the tree trunk above.  Other sports included axe throwing, tree saw logging, scampering up 60ft cedar poles at frightening speed and coming down even faster having hit thebell at the top and log rolling.  This last sport takes place in water representing the loggers who lived on rafts of logs as they were floated down the rivers to the sawmills.  A highly dangerous job ensuring that the logs didn’t jam against obstructions.  I’ll put a series of photos up as blogs just to show the various elements of this very entertaining show.

A quite evening back the Steamworks Brewery this time for parmesan encrusted halibut and of course India Pale Ale before a saunter back to the hotel taking in the lights of Vancouver harbour and thecity and a night’s rest before embarking on the Rocky Mountaineer train tomorrow morning.