2nd night at Castle Provincial Park, Beaver Mine Lake campground. I booked 2 nights into this camp because I figured I would need to release the tension after all that driving. I used the afternoon to watch clouds float by. Just what the soul needed. It was another sunny day but as I watched the clouds I could see darker ones on the horizon. Sure enough we had a thunder and lightening storm during the night. I packed up early and we all went into the tent just in time. I did a little video of what it was like. Music today was the wind in the pines, song birds, the patter of rain on the tent and thunder.
Early morning dog walk to the lake. Sunrise on the mountain. The lake was not far away. Down the road and around the bend. No one else was around.
Beautiful sunrise on the mountains. There were some geese that became curious about our presence.
Another Canadiana photo – mountain, pines, lake, Canada Geese and pugs.
Time for breakfast, Alberta’s Kicking Horse coffee company, Yoghurt, onion, dill bread from the Welsh bakery in Weyburn, chick pea and vegetable soup and Deet.
Finally saw someone walking down the road. He told me there was a trail up the road so we got ready. Because it is bear country I got the bear spray – and more Deet. The bear spray was another item from Mountain Equipment Coop that I bought. I had to fill out a registration form for its purchase. Thankfully I did not have to use it on this trip.
Eve is all set for the interpretive trail. I’m surprised this wasn’t on the park map.
I stuff Raisin into her Sportsac carry bag. And we are off.
Being pro – active in bear country means making noise to warn them of our presence. I didn’t have a bear bell so I sang “Bear, Bear and the Maiden Fair” from Game of Thrones. Eve kept an eye out.
There were 10 interpretive signs but I’m just showing 2 to give an idea.
Here is the stump the sign was referring to.
The trail was in a loop but we didn’t know where it would end. We came out and some people were hanging in a parking lot so walked over and asked. The pugs got a lot of attention. Turns out we were at the trail head of the Table Top Mountain trail. We had to walk about 1 Km back to our campsite.
Time for lunch with multi grain bagels, spinach & artichoke hummus. Shared some with Eve because of the long walk she did. Raisin got a piece of sweet potato.
They crashed out for a nap. There were black ants crawling around so took Eve awhile to find a comfy, non-ant, spot. Raisin didn’t care, she likes everyone.
We were at the top tier of the campground. Behind us was bush. Walked up the hill a bit to show our campsite.
Then I sat with a cup of wine and watched the clouds. After a couple of hours I noticed the dark clouds on the horizon. They were headed our way. I decided to pack everything up in case we had to have an early start.
We took our evening walk down to the lake.
Eve was getting frisky after her afternoon nap.
On the right is Castle mountain and Table Top on the left. Table top has a broad flat top which people hike to. It has a view of the whole valley and lake. Would have been nice but that is for more advanced hikers, not pugs.
I could feel the storm coming in. We snuggled into the tent. I read for a bit. The pugs fell asleep. When the thunder came they were both awake. They don’t get fearful but being in the tent made the thunder, lightening and rain just that more intense. Soon fell asleep to the patter on the fabric.