Road Trip (3): Chase - Golden

We were both up bright and early this morning, which gave us enough time to have a little bit of a drive before heading back to Salmon Arm for coffee with cousin Sandi. I was hoping to find a nice spot in Chase where we could view Lake Shuswap, but we were stopped by road works. In the end, we found a nice road running parallel to the lake, which gave a nice alternate route to the highway, and a chance to take a couple photos of the lake.

We spent about an hour at Sandi's and then headed off back to the Highway for the trip up to Golden. As we rose higher into the mountains, the clouds were looking ominous and we hit a number of patches of light rain and snow. The signs saying "wear winter tires or carry chains until end-April" didn't make me feel too confident, so I kept my finger crossed on the steering wheel that the snow wouldn't get heavier.

Fortunately, the weather stayed fairly mild, and we approached Golden around 4pm Mountain Time (clocks forward 1 hour as we'd left Pacific Time). Since we had plenty of time, I decided to stop and investigate the Wolf Discovery Centre, where I will be going for a walk with a couple of the wolves tomorrow. We took a look around the centre, and were given an interesting, and rather depressing, talk about the wolves and their future. The comparison with Yellowstone National Park, and studies into the role of wolves in the ecosystem was particularly interesting. Looking in from the outside as a European, the large wildlife are one of the most alluring aspects of Canada, and yet these animals aren't as well protected as we might hope. Far from being a thing of the past, wolves are still hunted outside of the National Park boundaries (the only place they are protected), and of course road accidents also kill a large number of wildlife each year. In the wild, only 5% of wolves die from natural causes.