17th May 2025

Today, there was no driving for us, Stephen (R’s brother) took us all on a tour of the sites around Hinton.  First up was the Solomon Lookout to view the Black Cat Mountain. There were good views of the mountains, and down below the valley. As luck would have it, there was a long goods train passing up the valley.

Why Black Cat Mountain? One mountain side had once been spectacular, but there had been the inevitable forest fire, and when the forest regenerated, the trees were a different colour to the surrounding ones. They created an image which looked like a high backed, scared black cat. Years later, like now, you need a particularly good imagination to see it.

Then on to Switzer Provincial Park, where there is a lake. Some trees showed evidence of claw damage. Here there were some birds flying around. I managed to get a photo of a dark-eyed Junco, an American Tree Sparrow, a Yellow Rumped Warbler and of course a Canada Goose.

Back at Hinton we stopped at a café for coffee, before going on to the Northern Rockies Museum of Culture and Heritage.

Back at Steve & Marilynn’s, we had a chicken BBQ supper. Bit too chilly to sit out on their deck, so we ended up eating indoors, after BIL Steve had braved the elements to be chef-of-the-day.