The Stoke

A true harbinger of spring in Revelstoke is the weekly Revelstoke Farmers’ Market which takes place in Grizzy Plaza each Saturday. Meet up with old and new friends (both human and canine), and meander down the street perusing displays of hand-crafted, organically-grown and home-baked goodies. There’s everything from fresh veggies, plants for your garden, fresh baked bread, locally-roasted coffee, homemade sausages, the ever-popular Indian food, and any number of crafty items from soaps, textiles, garden decorations, jewelry and more.
Join us from 8:30 - 1:00 every Saturday!

This Saturday, there’s a special event taking place at the Farmers’ Market - Revy local Krista Carnegie has organized a Shoes for Swaziland shoe drive on the 2nd block of Mackenzie Ave. Millions of families in the developing world lack adequate footwear, so please donate used shoes (whether it’s boots, sandals, shoes, slip-ons, or anything but high heels).

Call Krista at (250) 837-8569 for more information, or check out the Facebook page.

Revelstoke Bear Aware Coordinator Penny Page-Brittin has a great message to pass on to Revelstoke residents and visitors alike.

New to Revelstoke, New to Bears?
Are you hoping to see a bear? Do you think they are cute and cuddly? Are you new to town? Maybe new to Canada?

Bears are beautiful creatures, but they are wild animals that can be very dangerous. They deserve our respect. If you see a bear, DON’T feed it, DON’T approach the bear and DON’T take the time to find your camera to take a picture. Bears are fast, and can move up to 50 km/h. An Olympic sprinter at top speed will hit 43 km/h. A bear can go from being far away to way too close in an instant. The bear you are looking at may not be alone. You may be standing between a mother bear and her cubs. You may be threatening a food source, or have startled the bear. What will the bear do? Don’t stick around to find out! Stop what you are doing. Without making eye contact, back away slowly, talking to the bear in a calm, quiet voice. For more information on “What to do if you see a bear”, view “Staying Safe in Bear Country” a free over night rental available at Video Express.

Yes, you are now living in or visiting Bear Country. Revelstoke is surrounded by prime black and grizzly bear habitat with wildlife corridors passing though town. Chances are you will see a bear at some point. We expect to see bears around, but it is of utmost importance to the safety of our community and well being of the bears, that when bears visit our neighbourhoods and properties they do not find food. They will then continue on their way and remain healthy bears.

Please take the time to survey your neighborhood and property for bear and other wildlife attractants.

1. Ensure your garbage is securely stored inside a locked, secure building until garbage day. Know when garbage day is in your part of town; schedules are available at public works and at www.cityofrevelstoke.com.

2. Bring in bird feeders. There is plenty of natural food available for birds at this time.

3. Ensure that you are managing your compost, by layering, and turning on a regular basis. If your compost starts to smell, use lime to stop the odor.

4. Clean your barbeque thoroughly after each use by burning off any excess food or grease.

5. Ensure bears do not have access to livestock feed or pet food on your property.

6. In the fall ensure your fruit trees are picked and any windfall is cleaned up.

When bears learn there is a tasty treat in a garbage can, dumpster, at a fruit tree or birdfeeder, they will return and continue to feed there. We have chosen to live in bear country, with this choice comes a responsibility to ensure peaceful coexistence. By managing bear attractants we help to keep our community clean and safe and avoid the unnecessary destruction of bears.

If you are aware of new residence or neighbours that are not familiar with their responsibility living in bear country please refer them to Revelstoke Bear Aware or ask them to visit our website shown at the bottom.

If you see a bear in your neighbourhood call the provincial wildlife occurrence phone line
1-877-952-7277 or the Revelstoke Bear Aware phone line 837-8624. By failing to report a bear sighting or problem, you are contributing to the likelihood of that bear being destroyed. When reported, education can occur, attractants can be removed and the bear given a chance to move on.

If you have any questions or concerns contact Revelstoke Bear Aware at 837-8624, beaware@telus.net or visit our website at www.revelstokebearaware.org.

Penny Page-Brittin
Revelstoke Bear Aware Coordinator

Revelstoke Bear Aware has provided some excellent resources on bears in the Revelstoke area. When traveling in bear habitat, consider whether a bear could perceive your presence soon enough to avoid an encounter. A surprised bear can be aggressive especially if it is feeding or protecting cubs. In the vast majority of instances, a bear that picks up on the approach of a person melts away into the bush. We can never know how often we have passed such a bear with out realizing it.

The most useful and easiest tactic a person can employ to avoid bears is to simply make noise. The human voice is a distinctly foreign sound in the bush. It does not matter what is said, just say it loudly! Bells are frequently used for this purpose, but their high pitch carries poorly and they can be tiresome to listen to all day. It is more effective to use your voice. Hiking in groups is a good idea as people in groups talk more.

Consider the environment in which you are traveling. Dense, wet vegetation absorbs sound. Rushing streams or wind also cover human sound and scent. Make louder and more frequent sounds in these situations. Streams also cause air to flow down valley. Hikers walking up a trail along a rushing stream need to pay extra attention to making their presence known. Also important is remembering to always look around. When walking on rough ground, hikers spend most of their time looking down. Make an effort to keep looking around, especially if you are first in line. Binoculars help in scoping out large open areas such as meadows before you enter them.

Should you encounter a bear, stay calm. Most likely nothing will happen. Do not approach the bear. Speak in a calm voice to let the bear figure out what you are. Back away slowly. Don’t make eye contact. Approaching a bear may make it feel threatened and behave aggressively, especially if the bear is a female with cubs hidden nearby. Approaching a bear near a road can cause it to run out onto the road and create a safety hazard.

Avoid wearing perfumes or carrying especially smelly foods. Bears are curious and to them, a new smell may mean a new food source worth investigating. Never feed a bear or leave food or garbage where a bear can reach it. Once a bear learns to associate food with people it never forgets and continues to expect food from the next person it meets. Food attractants create spoiled bears - the single biggest reason why conservation officers in British Columbia destroy 800 black bears and 50 grizzly bears annually.

When camping in bear habitat, consider the following:

• Choose a campsite that is off a natural travel corridor. Bears will use a path of least resistance.
• Plan to cook well away from your tent so if a bear does come by later to check out the inevitable cooking spills, you won’t be there. Choose to bring along simple to prepare foods that have little scent, i.e. oatmeal instead of bacon for breakfast.
• Keep food out of the tent. Carry 15 metres of rope for hanging food. Remember black bears climb trees well, so hang it off a branch, out of reach. Where there are only very small trees such as in subalpine areas, stash your food away from camp.
• Avoid campsites where litter is present. This could be a sign of a bear that has learned to associate people with food

The best place to see a bear is from the inside of your vehicle. Bears are frequently sighted in avalanche paths adjacent to the highway or while feeding along the roadsides in the early morning. Be sure to pull over and park with consideration to other traffic.

Hi folks,
we thought it would be a good idea to do a big season-ender bike ride, in style. Come one, come all to the Bicycles & Beverages tour! We’ll be travelling on two wheels to every establishment in Revelstoke who will have us and imbibing in beverages of the alcoholic variety.

In between locations, we’ll be busting out games, songs, and human pyramids.

MEET AT 2:00 pm at the old BIG EDDY PUB. Bring a can of beer, and we will have a celebratory shotgun to honour the Big Eddy.

WHAT TO BRING: a costume, a bicycle, at least one beer to shotgun, an entertaining diversion (cards, frisbee, golf club, tennis raquet, crokinole, baseball glove, or anything else your little heart desires), and all your friends. This is a critical mass party!

Sorry for the lack of posting lately, folks! I work full-time at Revelstoke Mountain Resort, and my free time is taken up skiing, sleeping, and generally having a great time.

I want to let you know about a great event coming up this weekend at RMR! It’s closing weekend, which is always both a bummer and a blast. Saturday, April 10 is Mexican day, so bust out your sombrero and shorts and get out on the hill. We should have sunny, mild weather that day, and there is a great band playing on the Mid Mountain Lodge patio that afternoon.

Sunday, April 11 is the Third Annual Stoke to Spoke race. Celebrate the transition from winter to spring with this awesome triathlon. The Stoke to Spoke involves skiing or snowboarding, biking, and navigating an obstacle course to the finish line and then chugging a beverage of the adult variety (if you’re legal to do so!). Compete as an individual or in teams of three. Prizes will be awarded to the top three finishers in the solo and team categories, along with best costume and best wipeout, and the oldest and youngest competitors. There are great prizes to be won including Oakley A-Frame goggles for the 1st place team and a Mammut Respect pack for the 1st place individual! Prize value is estimated at $800.

Entry Fees: $20 Individual, $45 for a Team of Three - Includes a Souvenir Event T-Shirt
Registration: Teams and Individuals can start to register beginning on Thursday, April 8, 2010 at the Downtown Presentation Centre (Mackenzie and First St) or at the Revelstoke Outdoors Centre at the base of Revelation Gondola. Although you can enter the race right up until April 11, competitors are encouraged to register before Sunday morning.
We want you to de-throne the current two-time champions: Patrick Tourchot and Chris Ford! The obstacle course will be set by Saturday afternoon for those wishing to check out what excitement this year will bring. Competitors, you can even strategize to come out a winner!

The annual Revy Rail Jam is back again in Grizzly Plaza! This afternoon, Saturday, March 13, come cheer on competitors right downtown!

Organizers will be bringing over 50 dump trucks of snow right downtown to Grizzly Plaza in Revelstoke to shape a rail and jib course for snowboarders and skiers.

This open competition is limited to 100 competitors who will compete for over $6000 in prizes such as snowboards from Burton and Never Summer, skis from Salomon and Dynastar, cat skiing, and more!

Registration is $10 for groms aged 13 and under, and $25 for those aged 14 and up. This includes a membership to the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association, registration kit and event T-Shirt.

Don’t miss this awesome Revy event! The street will be packed with spectators, and live music will be pumping from local band Blindspot. Check out http://revyrailjam.com for more information. See you on the street!

Commemorating Canada’s largest avalanche accident - the 1910 Avalanche in Rogers Pass, Glacier National Park, BC

March 4, 1910: In a late-evening blizzard, CPR Road Master John Anderson toiled alongside 60 men to clear an avalanche that had covered hundreds of metres of track near the summit of Rogers Pass, BC. As the workers and their machinery punched a trench through the deep snow on the tracks, Anderson walked to the watchman’s shack to advise the Revelstoke dispatcher of their progress. On his return, he was met with an eerie silence. A second avalanche had come down from the other side of the valley, entombing the workers and taking 58 lives.

Since that fateful night, little has changed in the mountain environment; yet everything has changed in the way we interact with the many elements that create avalanches and avalanche hazard. Today, Rogers Pass in Glacier National Park is not only a vital transportation corridor but also home to some of the world’s most advanced avalanche risk management programs and research in avalanche science. During the centennial year of this tragedy, the organizing committee invites you to join in telling the story of this accident and how it helped set the stage for the myriad of changes that allow Canadians and our visitors to travel safely through the stunning beauty of our mountains in winter.

On Thursday, March 4, 2010, please join Revelstoke residents, visitors and special guests for the 1910 Avalanche Memorial Service at 7:00 pm in Grizzly Plaza.

Join us as we remember the men who died, and the impact that this event had on the community and on the railway. The memorial service will include telling the 1910 Avalanche story, prayers (both Christian and Buddhist), community choir singing, roll call of names of the deceased, candlelight vigil, display of over 8,000 Senbazuru cranes, a howitzer gun salute by the Canadian Forces (the first time the Howitzer has been shot off in Revelstoke!), and comments from the community, historians, and descendants of those involved in the avalanche. Revelstoke Mountain Resort Pro Patroller Tomo Fujimura has played an integral role in piecing together the stories behind individuals who died in the avalanche, and his wife Yuko organized the Senbazuru crane effort. On March 4, relatives of victim Mannosuke Yamaji will be on hand for the 1910 Avalanche Memorial Service at Grizzly Plaza in Revelstoke.

The organizing committee is made up of Parks Canada, the Friends of Mt. Revelstoke & Glacier National Parks, Revelstoke Museum & Archives, the Revelstoke Railway Museum, Canadian Pacific, and the Canadian Avalanche Association and Canadian Avalanche Centre - many thanks to everyone involved in this commemoration.

The Crane Project and Japanese Connection

Discovered only recently, 32 of the 58 men were of Japanese origin. It is believed that if you fold 1,000 origami paper cranes and link them together (called a Senbazuru), your wish will come true. Countless school children, community groups, businesses and individuals in Revelstoke, Golden, Kelowna, Vancouver, Calgary, Ontario,Arizona and beyond, have been folding cranes to make a wish “to never see such a tragedy again”. Over 8,000 cranes have already been returned to Revelstoke for an outdoor presentation during the March 4 Memorial Service! Watch the animated video to learn more about the 1910 Avalanche and its connection to the crane project:

Well, I’ll admit it. The weather has been unseasonably warm here at Revelstoke Mountain Resort, and the lower mountain is taking a bit of a beating. People have been enjoying beers out on the patio at Mid Mountain Lodge (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!) and hanging out on the deck for apres-ski at the new Rockford wok|bar|grill at the base of RMR. But despite the warm temps down low (damn you, el Nino!), the upper mountain skiing has still been quite good! The snow in Greely Bowl yesterday was fantastic - deep, lightly tracked, and tons of fun. Elsewhere on the mountain is a bit … sportier, to say the least. The moguls are huge, but I skied with a group of Easterners yesterday who were absolutely loving it. There are still some steep, deep and tight lines through Vertigo, along Gracias Ridge, and through Greely that are good to go.
Check out the newest vid posted up by Revelstoke Mountain Resort. Do you have any great ski footage this year?

I got a new pair of skis a few weeks ago and I’m still waiting for that first huge dump of snow to really test ‘em out. Last year it went off in March, so I’m hoping for the same sort of weather pattern this year. How is your winter going? How have you been enjoying the snow, wherever you are?

The Backcountry Lodges of British Columbia Association recently launched the the BLBCA’s Big Ol’ BC Backcountry Brag Off! You could win you great prizes, including a Tracker transceiver, G3 el hombre skis, I/O Bio baselayers, a camera, a Deuter backpack, a probe and shovel, a subscription to explore mag, a private AST course for four, touring gear, and more!

There are three categories: skiing/snowboarding, hiking and wildlife. What do you have to do? Tell ‘em about your adventures in the BC backcountry! BLBCA encourages you to “bring on the brag!” Put a caption of 100 words or less on your fantastic photo, and tell them your photo’s story in under 250 words. Winning submissions will exemplify one of those ‘best day ever!’ moments in the BC backcountry, be visually engaging, and align with BC’s outdoorsy, adventurous spirit.

“This photo contest is for those who have a reputation for babbling on about the deep powder days, meandering summer hikes and chance wildlife encounters they’ve experienced in British Columbia’s world-renowned backcountry,” said Brad Harrison, BLBCA’s Executive Director.

Your photo and story can be from any season, anywhere in BC’s amazing backcountry - waist-deep pow, winter camping, grizzly sightings, summer hikes, wildlife snapshots, or anything else that makes a great story.

Submit up to five entries, and remember to back each photo up with a story. Contest closes on March 1, 2010.

A fantastic event is happening this evening, but it needs support from community and visitors to be truly effective! A Carousel of Nations takes place from 4:00 until 7:00 - the evening celebrates multiculturalism and diversity in the city of Revelstoke. As more and more immigrants move to Revelstoke to work and play, it’s important to respect and recognize their unique backgrounds!

There will be ethic food booths (featuring fare from Canada, Poland, India, England, Italy and China, with sampler tickets for just $3), crafts (including Japanese fans, dream catchers, henna, handprint poems, and memorial origami cranes to commemorate the Rogers Pass 1910 avalanche), and a kimono demonstration.

There will also be interactive displays celebrating diversity, including displays on First Nations, Metis, Indian and Korean culture, the Railway Museum, the 1910 Rogers Pass avalanche, the Revelstoke museum, and the English Victorian era.

Listen to stories and books from around the world and check out live entertainment (including a highland pipe band welcome, a Zumba demonstration, Metis dancing, Canadian folk songs and Scottish dancing). Travel slide shows will happen every half hour in the Senior’s Centre and include the history of Revelstoke’s multi-cultural heritage, Turkey, Hungary, the Antarctic, Africa, and France.

Cap off the evening with a free swim at the Aquatic Centre with your Carousel of Nations passport. Come out for a great [free] evening celebrating Revelstoke’s history, present and future!