Another Day in Paradise

The campground at Halcyon Springs was very quiet at 6:30 this morning, so I was quiet too.  I didn't make my coffee until 8:00, and started riding towards Nakusp around 8:30.  It was cloudy and probably in the 70's...seemed like nearly perfect riding weather.  There was a slight headwind out of the south...I don't think we've really had a tailwind this trip other than a stretch from Bragg's Creek to Cochrane.

I passed a logging operation near Halfway River (halfway to what, you might be wondering...?). Logging seems to be one of the mainstays in the economy here.

There are several hot springs resorts along Highway 23, and one of them is Nakusp, but it's about 7 miles off the road.  Not gonna do it.  I need to take Highway 6 towards New Denver at Nakusp, but first I went to the visitor center to get a couple of questions answered.  Elaine Lindsay works at the visitor center and seems like the perfect person to be an ambassador for the area.  I wanted to know what the name Nakusp meant and she told me it was the Indian word for "Bay of Quiet Waters".  In fact, in 2006, Elaine wrote a poem...a limerick...as a tribute for International Women's Day and she's allowing me to reprint it here:

There once was a bay of quiet waters,
In which there were artists and potters,
The Spring rains pelted,
The mountain snows melted.
And the sun warmed the Dogwood daughters.

Pretty cool, huh?

I saw two heavily loaded touring cyclists coming towards me and yelled, "Good morning, where are you headed?" But didn't catch what they said.  There were riding uphill and had bags on both the front and back, so I turned around and caught up with them and we chatted for a bit.  They are Sigrid and Karl Heinzelman from Stuttgart, Germany.  They are headed over to Lake Louise and Banff so we talked about riding on Highway 1 over Rogers Pass and the robust climb they will have getting up to Moraine Lake and Lake Louise.  Karl is a bookseller, a cyclist, a "weltenbummler" and "obenbleiber".  Helen Koeppen, help me out with those last two...You can check out their blog at
Www.usa2013.twoday.net

There are waterfalls like the one at Ione rest stop along Highway 6 and I had to do a fair amount of climbing to get to a lake appropriately named Summit Lake.  I was amazed at how warm the water felt...I know Liz would have gone in...

I got to Daniel and Helen's around 3 and they got home from running errands around 4.  He had given me directions and they were excellent...I had no trouble finding it.  What wonderful people they are!  Daniel is a landscaper and photographer and Helen has traveled all over the world as a musician.  Their garden is phenomenal and I really enjoyed swapping touring stories with them.  One thing that Daniel told me about their place that I found fascinating was that nearby New Denver had been an internment camp during WWII.  When they took the buildings down, the lumber was moved and reconstructed into buildings on Daniel and Helen's property.  I loved that the wood had stories to tell and was rich with history.