I had been spending time on Kootenay Lake, the area I am most familiar with in BC having been going there since I was a kid. I decided I had to explore at least one new area before heading back to Alberta. Across the Purcell Mountains to the east of me is an area I had been wondering about for some time with a fairly large lake. Join me as I head over there to check it out.
Boat launch and harbour at Kuskanook aka Kootenay Landing
I was driving south along Kootenay Lake, making a long U – shaped route to get around the Purcell Mountains to my next boondocking area. It was a nice day in what turned out to be the end of a long stretch of warm dry weather in southern BC. I stopped at Kootenay Landing, now called Kuskonook, to drop off my garbage mostly, but in part to see what the harbour facilities look like these days. The original ‘Landing’ name refers to this being the original terminus of the Crowsnest Railway heading to the coast. From here, rail ferries took the cars all the way to Nelson. The ferry docks were obsolete once the railway connected to Nelson via the west side of the lake, but retained use for boat moorage all the way up to modern times. The original railway ferry was a long ride – laying tracks down the west side of the lake was a huge improvement in rail service. All the towns and villages along the lake were served first by ferry too before roads arrived. Now, the ferry between Kootenay Bay and Balfour is the only remaining service of what was once many boats plying the waters of the lake.
The view from St Mary Lake Regional Park
Cranbrook was a stop for resupply on the way. I thought about going into Kimberley, but it would have been a detour, not to mention the gas being more expensive there. I had thought I might take the motorcycle back into town from wherever I ended up boondocking, but that never worked out between the weather and longer distance I ended up from town. My destination was around St Mary Lake. If I wanted to stay close to town, there were some logging roads I might have found something before the lake, but I was hoping to camp near water again. My first stop at St Mary Lake Regional Park was a bust. The site looked nice, but was only for day use. I decided to continue past the lake as the aerial didn’t look promising for boondocking along the south lake shore and the north shore was all private property.
I was trying to not be too crazy getting off the the main roads as I knew there was rain coming, for several days at least. The drive along the lake confirmed that there was no boondocking – signs were everywhere telling you about the private property you were passing. But I knew past the lake you enter crown land, with a nice mountain goat welcoming me to the area.
Kootenay Lake past Evans mountain
You still have to pay attention past the lake – there is one farm along the river called Meachen that is all private property. Once you pass that, everything is crown land. The first two spots I checked out both had the problem of being flooded from the spring high waters. I knew it wasn’t going to get better in the next few days, so onward I went to an iOverlander spot that had some potential. This is where the road that goes to Gray Creek branches off. This is a shortcut to Kootenay Lake, cutting the whole ‘U’ that I did off. But the road is still closed at this time of year, and even if it was open, it’s not worth it being quite rough I hear.
Right beside the St Mary River
The junction area has two camping spots, just past the left turn heading to Gray Creek. The first one to the right I looked at went down a cart path that was flooded. It looked promising for some solitude, but I found out later that there was actually a trailer hiding back there that became occupied on the weekend. The other spot to the left was open to the road and the river. It was bigger, really two spots with the big spot close to the road easily holding two RVs. I took the spot farther from the road right beside the river. I was slightly concerned about potential flooding, or even having the river wash away the bank I was beside, so I paid careful attention to the rain forecast. It wasn’t too bad with mostly scattered showers. In fact, the river level dropped while I was there as the colder weather meant the snow wasn’t melting as fast in the mountains to the west.
Looks nice, but the weather is starting to roll in
It was now a lot cooler and variable weather. One hour could be sunny with a few puffy clouds hanging around, the next hour a rain squall could move in and soak you. In fact, I got wet exploring around on the motorcycle, even having only gone a short ways as I was thinking it might rain. By the time I got back to the RV, things were already clearing off and becoming sunny again, having only been gone for an hour. But I did get to explore the area on foot and by motorcycle – I just had to try and judge if the weather was going to stay dry for a while.
Creekside with a picnic table
In my explorations I did find some more boondocking in the area. One road not too far away that I walked to lead to Redding Creek, where it dead ended as the bridge had been taken out. There was a nice flat spot there, with a picnic table! It definitely got added to the list of potential boondocking spots for the summer. Even if that spot was taken, there were lesser spots further up the road you could take on say, a long weekend when everyone is out and about.
New shelter
One find that was more unexpected was a brand new shelter that had been dragged down a dead end logging road. It doesn’t look to have even been used so may have been dragged in on the snow early this year. I expect some hunters have left it here for use in the fall. The inside had no supplies yet, confirming my suspicion that this shelter has yet to be used. Every shelter I’ve seen has at least some old cooking gear and leftover camping bits left behind for later use.
A local supplied outhouse right at my camp
While I was camped, a few people came in to use the big area closer to the road during the day, with one staying overnight. I chatted with a group of day users who had come out with an extended cab high clearance 4×4 van. This was a 90’s era plain old van, with beefed up tires and suspension to take on the ruts and dips of the more challenging roads. It would be the best budget vehicle you could buy to get down rough narrow roads, but you would sacrifice some comfort as you have no extra height or fancy amenities as built. The group using the van did go up towards Hall Lake, saying the road was snow free almost all the way up. There is supposed to be some camping up there too. With the weather not cooperating, I never was able to verify any of this.
Visitors at the entrance site
After a week of on and off rain, it was time to head back to Alberta to visit friends and take care of business. I consider my return to Alberta to be the end of my travel season, at least as far as going south. I had vague plans to travel to NW BC if I did not need to stay in Calgary too long. I had firm plans to rip apart my furnace and fix it once and for all. See you next time for a little travel interlude story, and the beginnings of my summer travels.
