© Environment News Service (ENS) 2000
August 28, 2000
By Neville Judd

ELAHO VALLEY, British Columbia, Canada, August 28, 2000 (ENS) - As wilderness tours go, a guided trip to the Elaho is more exciting than most. Where else in British Columbia's forests are you likely to be apprehended on a trail by security guards filming your movements on video camera? Where else can you mingle with protesters, chat with police and get a bird's eye view of clearcut logging?

But then there is nowhere else left so close to Vancouver with so many ancient trees - a grove of about 50 Douglas Firs and Western Red Cedar that are more than 1,000 years old. That is why the Vancouver based Western Canada Wilderness Committee spent two years researching and mapping the Elaho, and building the Douglas Fir Loop trail.

The trail falls within International Forest Products' (Interfor) logging cutblocks in Tree Farm Licence 38, about 170 kilometers north of Vancouver. Visitors wanting to hike the loop now face a tricky dilemma because Interfor has obtained a court injunction barring public access to the area north of Lava Creek between 5 am and 4 pm, Monday through Saturday, until November 30.

The injunction is the latest in a long line of court orders obtained by the company, which is determined not to let protesters stop its work or the public endanger themselves while logging is taking place.

But with a little resourcefulness, it is still possible to hike the loop without being arrested or crushed under a tree.

EcoMountain Tours, for instance, runs guided tours along the loop on weekends and Wednesdays. On its midweek and Saturday hikes, the group simply walks the trail in reverse so hikers arrive at the active logging area at 4 pm when the injunction ends.

Compared to events earlier this month when a police SWAT team descended to remove four protesters from their treetop platform at Lava Creek, the Elaho was quiet last Wednesday. After a two hour drive from Vancouver, our group of six arrived at the Elaho's protest camp, a colorful collection of tarps and tents with banners that read "Injustice on Stolen Land," "Mummy, What Were Trees Like?" and "Kick Interfor Off the Planet."

Fewer than 10 protesters remain, including Sasha, who says she's been here all summer. "I'm here to protest Interfor's destruction of the forest," she tells us. "They took out 10 trucks full yesterday and it's been like that for two weeks."

Timed to perfection, a full logging truck rolls past, the driver waving from the window with an exaggerated smile.

"We have some truly f****d up neighbors," says Sasha.

Dressed in a shirt, sweater and padded vest, Sasha seems oblivious to the fact that it is 80 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade (27 Celsius), but later says she is sick. She and the others, who invite us to contribute to their donations tin, say they will remain encamped until the first snows.

We say our goodbyes and sidle off through a narrow clearing in the forest to pick up the Douglas Fir loop. The donation tin remains empty.

After a steep descent through bush and abandoned tents we reach the Elaho River and stop for lunch. The forest on the valley bottom is mostly old growth, more than 250 years old. In addition to the more common western hemlock, Douglas fir, balsam and western red cedar, visitors can expect to see yellow cedar, amabilis fir, mountain hemlock, western yew and lodgepole pine.

Blueberry and huckleberry bushes support a thriving population of black bears and the Coast Mountains' southern most Grizzly bears. The only animal wildlife we see is a toad of unspecified origin - but then city dwellers on steep trails are prone to look down, not around. With a look up and a lot of luck we might have seen a spotted owl or northern goshawk.

The spotted owl is designated by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) as "endangered". Fewer than 100 breeding pairs remain at only 39 sites in southwestern British Columbia, restricted to scattered, unlogged watersheds such as the Upper Elaho Valley.

The northern goshawk is thought to be related to the Queen Charlotte goshawk, which is listed as vulnerable by COSEWIC. Both birds were found living in Interfor's cut blocks, prior to logging.

Soon after negotiating a bridge made from ladders strung together by ropes, we meet two uniformed security guards. While one draws our attention to Interfor's court injunction and our proximity to the affected area, the other films us with a video camera. Marsha, our guide, says such meetings are not uncommon and that the guards, employed by Interfor, are making sure no one wanders into an active logging area by mistake.

Presumably the video cameras are in case we are up to something.

We see the first of about a dozen ancient Douglas firs near the camp WCWC used to use to plan its research and mapping strategy. It takes six of us linking arms to encircle the tree, which began life about 900 AD. It is difficult to estimate its height but the girth of such a tree is what appears most striking.

So thick, so tall and so straight with no branches in its lower half - the money half - this is the kind of tree valued by shipbuilders of old and by Interfor's international customers today. As we walk past half a dozen more, stopping each time for photos, the noise of forestry equipment and falling trees becomes louder. We backtrack a little and rest a while, to kill time till 4 pm, when the silence returns.

The injunction lifted, we carefully climb our way over the surreal landscape of this afternoon's clearcut. The forest canopy has become forest carpet, a mess of fallen trees and branches overlooked by two mighty grapple yarders whose engines are cooling after a day's work.

By the time we reach Interfor's logging road we are drenched in sweat, but find enough energy to make one more climb to the top of Bear Bluffs, a lookout point over the Elaho Valley and the glaciers of the Tantalus Range.

The British Columbia Ministry of Environment estimates that about eight grizzly bears, 55 moose, 240 mountain goats, eight wolves and 15 cougars may live in the Elaho, Sims and Clendenning watersheds. Interfor has logging rights in the Elaho and Sims.

As we cross Lava Creek Bridge, scene of blockades, treetop protests, arrests and violent confrontation, a lone RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) officer greets us. "It is hard for us to be impartial in all this," she says. "We say hi and bye to the protesters but they don't speak to us. They're mad because of the logging."

The portable office she and one other officer are stationed in is a vast improvement on their original station in the woods, she says. "We had to sleep in the car," she says with a grimace.

The protesters have deserted camp by the time we reach the van. Laundry hangs limp on a makeshift line and we wonder where everyone has gone. Someone puts a buck in the donation jar before we head for home.

For more information about EcoMountain Tours' trips to the Elaho, visit www.ecomountaintours.com and www.elahotrail.com. For information about Interfor's logging operations in the Elaho and elsewhere, visit www.interfor.com. For more on the Douglas Fir Loop Trail and WCWC's calls for the creation of a national park, visit www.wildernesscommittee.org/ Error: Unable to read footer file.