We went to a hotel in squamish to meet the white water rafting gang and after signing in and wet-suiting up, we all piled onto two old school buses with the rafts on top to drive out to the river.
The guides were brilliant - kept us entertained on the drive and pointed out views of waterfalls, mountains and glaciers. Then we got to the put-in point and got our life jackets and helmets on whilst the guides prepped the rafts. One safety talk later and we were out on the water. Our guide was Jean from France and he was hyper as anything, bouncing all over the place and getting excited about the trip. In our boat with us were a father and son from Luxembourg, an active middleaged British couple and two girls from Australia. I had my reservations about the crazy Jean at first, but he was amazing, his enthusiasm for being out on the water in the natural world was catchy and we all enjoyed ourselves. He steered us into the biggest rapids and told us about the landscape and his crazy kayak adventures - he did a 20m waterfall in his kayak once!
The river we were on was called the Elaho then the Squamish, which flows straight from the icefields and glaciers - only 4 degrees and good to drink. I scooped handfuls on the way, it was delicious. The river wound its way through forested mountains and between granite rock faces, sometimes calm and sometimes a bubbling torrent of grade 5 rapids. One of the kayakers in front of us went out of view when he was in the trough of the wave and we were riding the crest. We got slammed with facefuls of water as Jean screamed "Bonsai!" and we all dived into the bottom of the boat. Woohoo!
On a calm section, we jumped out and held onto the raft, riding the little rapids on our backs. Then we were hauled ungracefully back in by our life jacket lapels like fish flopped into the bottom on the boat. "Positions!" Then "Paddle forward! Harder!" And back into the next set of rapids.
Between rapids, Jean pointed out the Weeping Wall, a mountain face covered with braided waterfalls, and we went along a calm section of braided river between huge piles of dead trees scattered on the pebbles. We were out on the water for two hours and had an amazing time. When we got out, we all helped get the raft back on the bus and sat in our soggy wetsuits on the ride back.
It was 3.30pm when we got back to the hotel to change and eat and look at the photos on the big screen together. But Dave and I couldn't stay long - we had a three hour hike to do to get to our campsite.
We took a turning off a street in Squamish and were immediately on a gravel road in the woods. Doesn't take long to get out of town here. The road was 16km long and took us ages in the little Yaris, me trying to avoid potholes and rocks and driving off the road! We got to the car park, put our camping fee in the honesty box and started our hike at 5pm.
It was shady in the trees and we headed up the rocky path without too much trouble. As we got a bit higher, the landscape opened out to reveal alpine meadows of pink heather interspersed with clumps of deep green trees. Off to the left, views of huge mountains with green slopes and white peaks. The evening light was beautiful and thankfully not too hot and we kept stopping to admire the landscape.
As it was approaching 8pm, we came over a gentle crest and saw a hut by Elfin Lakes. The air and water were still and the mountains and their personal clouds were relected in the clear lakes. One mountain light grey with an ice field on top had formed whispy white clouds atop its peak. Its neighbour was a jagged cluster of black rock peaks that had formed a dark, sinister cloud for itself. We went past the hut to the campsite - newly built tent pads on an alpine meadow overlooking the best of the views. The sun had gone behind a mountain but it was still light and we pitched our tent with an incredible view of the valley and mountains. The trees really are something else, I've never seen such a rich deep green.
There were two or three other tents around and when we went into the little cabin to make dinner, we chatted to Brandon and his 12 year old sister Gill. It was her first camping trip and they were having a great time.
By the time we'd cooked, eaten, washed up and changed, we were hanging our food in the bear-proof hanger in the light of the moon. It was such a gorgeous, still evening and we'd heard there was a meteor shower so we put the mats and sleeping bags on the tent pad outside the tent and looked at the sky. There were plenty of stars to see in spite of the bright moon and we saw a few shooting stars before I fell asleep and Dave had to wake me to get me inside as the dew was starting to form all over us in the cold night.
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