Backroads that beckon (more pics added)

[Okanagan]

Some pics from last Saturday, on my last predator foray of this season.

The snow level is about 200 vertical feet above this small weeping wall photo. Melting snow has water cascading everywhere in big and small  streams, but this little lacy one on the moss caught my fancy.  




Just a bit higher and we're into fresh fallen spring snow, already melting at this elevation.



There is nothing great about the photo below but it shows a big canyon where I did some calling.   The sound could reach a lot of real estate.  I hate calling real estate!    But you reach for any straw at the end of the season!



The view when I got back to pavement and houses in the first little town on my way home.

[pitw]

Man I'm glad you pack your brownie with  .  Them are just wonderful and the only way I get to see it, so thanks for them.

[KySongDog]

Those are some great pics.  Beautiful scenery.  What state are you in?

[HaMeR]

Beautiful pics!! I like waterfalls too so those 1st pics are right on cool!! Thanks for sharing your day out!! 

[Okanagan]

Those are some great pics.  Beautiful scenery.  What state are you in?

Those photos are in southwest British Columbia, Canada, near the border with Washington State.

[KySongDog]

I'll be in Vancouver later this summer but won't have much time to explore the area.   Sure is great scenery. 

[Okanagan]

I'll be in Vancouver later this summer but won't have much time to explore the area.   Sure is great scenery.  

I'm a little over an hour out of Hongcouver.  If it works out I'll buy you a coffee or lunch.  I might even go into the city to do that!   If you have a hole in your schedule, lemme know.  My time is pretty flexible when I'm home and not on the road.

[KySongDog]

OK.  PM sent.  Thanks!

[iahntr]

Love the pics !
Thanks a bunch for puttin em up for us.

[FinsnFur]

Thats postcard material right there, with a dabble from what would appear to be all four seasons

Whats that road made up of? ....and how's it withstand the water running off those hills all day?

[CCP]

Okanagan those pic's are so beautiful it is mind boggling to me. Keep them uh comin PLEASE

[GunDog]

These pictures are simply breath taking - please keep'um coming sir! 

[shaddragger]

  Wow! And again I say, WOW!

[Okanagan]

Thats postcard material right there, with a dabble from what would appear to be all four seasons

Whats that road made up of? ....and how's it withstand the water running off those hills all day?

We can drive to winter (snow) within an hour 365 days of the year, yet I seldom get snow at my house.  We can follow spring up the hillside for most of the summer, starting in the bottom of valleys near sea level and tagging along below the level of melting snow just far enough to be into spring flowers,.  Same with ripening berries.  It is common to say something like, "On every ridge we got into deer at the elevation where lupines were blooming."

As to how the road stands the running water, maybe a logger will chime in as to how they build roads.  First, they use a LOT of culverts, on every stream.  They do all they can to minimize water running on the road:  by crowning, deep ditches, water bars (more on those a bit later) etc.   The roads are almost always cut into a side hill, and cut into rock a fair amount of the time.  It looks to me like the road along that little waterfall runs on a bench cut in bedrock.    They use a big Cat, often a D-9, very little blasting as it is expensive, and cut a road bed.  They haul coarse rock a short distance from whatever is available and lay that down next.  Then they lay down a good layer of "fines" which is golf/tennis ball and smaller.  The fine stuff is not washed and usually has some dirt in it and the water washes on more dirt, which you see in the photo.  We have very little clay nor gumbo in this country, mostly sandy soil.

Once a road is not in current use, like the one in the photo, they walk a big Cat down the road putting in water bars.  The Cat cuts a ditch across the road at an angle (6-18 inches deep) to run water off the road to the downhill side.  The material from the ditch is humped across the road on the downhill side, adding a small dam to the ditch.  The deeper ones are annoying to drive over, a ditch and speed bump combo.  How close together they are depends on the slope of the road.  There are none on the level sections of road shown in the photos above.  

The idea is to never let water build much volume or speed on the road surface, but drain it off while it is still a trickling sheet, before it starts eroding much material.

Still, roads do wash out, sometimes leaving huge deep gaps and ravines.

[Tikaani]

Some great pictures of some very beautiful country Okanagan.  Thanks for sharing.

John

[FinsnFur]

Interesting, and as much water as that road has standing on it, it still looks to be in good shape. Ya cant tell how soft it is but it appears good.

[msmith]

Okanagan those pic's are so beautiful it is mind boggling to me. Keep them uh comin PLEASE

What he said! 

[Okanagan]

Interesting, and as much water as that road has standing on it, it still looks to be in good shape. Ya cant tell how soft it is but it appears good.

An old timer out here told me that if a puddle has water standing in it, around here that means it has a hard bottom and is OK to drive through.  That road has a skiff of muddy sand on hard packed gravel, and is so firm it doesn't leave a boot track hardly anywhere.  I know because I checked, since I was driving and looking for tracks.

A half dozen places up in the snow, a big stream was running across the road, usually on a wider place less steep.  When I got up to where I was dragging bottom in heavy snow, I came to a creek 40-50 feet wide running across the road on coarse gravel, crystal clear.  I assume it had filled up its culvert and then overflowed the road.  When I drove across it I couldn't get up the bank on the other side, too steep and slick in the barely freezing snow, even in 4 wheel drive.  I could have forced my way a little farther but since the stream was big and wide, the only place wide enough to turn around for quite a ways, I see-sawed around in the middle of the 8 inch deep fast and wide stream, then drove back down the road.  No pics of that.  I'll see what else I have and try to post a few more.


 

[Okanagan]

The pics above are near Harrison Lake, near the south west coastal corner of BC.   That last waterfall, just above, was starting to build volume from the melting snow when this photo was taken last week.  It will really be roaring as the weather warms and snow melts faster.

Below are some pics from northern BC the first week in September. The first one is driving south on the Stewart Cassiar Highway, 30-50(?) miles south of the Yukon border into BC.



Several taken while backpack hunting near Summit Lake on the Alaska Highway between Ft. Nelson and Toad River, closer to Toad River.

[coyote101]

Beautiful pictures. Thanks for sharing.

Pat