Over the Salmon River valley

What is a road trip, someone wrote a couple of days ago, without a side trip down a dirt road? I agree, although this time it was UP a dirt road. Beside the Salmon River (60 km north of home), I followed a road, paved for the first hundred metres or so, up into the hills, past a few small homesteads, up to the logged-off sidehill.

There I stopped, because there were warning signs beside the road: "This Road is No Longer Maintained", and a creek crossed the road, making a deep ditch. I pulled off as far as I dared, in case of other traffic (not likely, but you never know), and went for a walk.

Peaceful valley. Looking west, towards the late-afternoon sun.

Waiting for spring.

Up on the hill, my patient Toyota waits beside slash piles ready for burning.

One of the slash piles.

After a site is logged off, forestry companies pile all the slash in these large mounds, like enormous anthills. Sometime in the fall or winter, they may be burned, to reduce the risk of them fueling a forest fire. I watched them doing this a few years back when the forests were already burning; crews were busily reducing the heaps of dry logs to ash. No sense leaving dry fuel in the path of an oncoming forest fire.

Above all the destruction and waste of the logged area, Mount H'kusam floats serene.

What I found up there, I'll tell you tomorrow.