Pope Mountain and Fort St. James

It was a wet Sunday mornings, and despite my hesitations I decided to go hiking with the Ramblers.  It surprised me to see 30 other people wanting to hike too!  I guess bad weather is no excuse!

 

 This is the second uphill hike of the season, and it's harder then the Fraser Mountain hike.  In some ways the rain made it an easier hike then if it was 30 C.

After a good couple of hours we reached the Summit.  We had a very quick lunch as it was cold and wet up there and I was wearing capris.

Cold up top wearing capris, I overheat easily with pants in Summer

Kevin, a Parks Canada employee talks about the history of the area

 Just below the peak we listened to Kevin, a Parks Canada employee as he talked about the history of the area.  We also had an author who has written books about the area, give a little talk.

A hiker from Iran joined us on a hike

 As we hiked down, the clouds lifted!  It was nice to see the scenery again.

Anne and Uta

After the hike, most of us went to tthe Fort St. James National Historical site for a tour hosted by Kevin.

Stuart Lake is a wild but beautiful lake

 In all the years that I've lived in the area, I've never visited this Fort.  It is a very important part of history, it was the original capital of the area that stretched from all of BC down to Oregon.  To get her, HBC employees took a boat from Montreal and went down South America, around Cape Horn, and back up again!  It took them 11 months of travel time.

Since the fort was so isolated, they only stayed here for a maximum of 5 years.  I doubt that I could live so long in isolation.  Especially since the main food for the Winter was dried Salmon!  Winter lasted over 6 months and at times it could get as cold as -80 Celcius!  The reason that there was a Fort here was because there was such a huge demand for furs in England.

Storage building - Fort St. James

Hudson's Bay Co Trading Post

Currency of time was beaver pelts

I am glad that I finally got to check it out and I am glad that it is being preserved.  This is the last hike that I will joining for a while as Tour De Jasper is only a month away.