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March in the East Kootenay
By Ian Cobb
March torments me.
It teases with the odd glorious day and then reverts to being Old Man Winter’s muse for nastiness. In like a lion, out like a lamb and all that.
It is a month in which my adventurer’s soul is stirred. Gazing up to the Rockies and Purcells, still heavily blanketed in brilliant white snow, I wish to roam upward and say hello to favourite places.
Alas, it is a month that offers quick and crushing death to the too adventurous or at least inconvenience in the form of getting hideously stuck. It is a month where we glare at our winter tires and wonder: ‘do I dare take them off now?’ For as sure as Betty White is awesome, if you take your winter tires off too early, you’ll find yourself white-knuckled and cursing.
Ticks start to come out in March and birds return and with the growing light of day comes more noises of nature.
March is the month where I want to get started but usually find I must stop and wait. The deck gets cleaned and determined efforts are made to enjoy the outdoors but retreats are beaten when the sun slips behind the rocks.
Yes, March brings promises of lovelier months ahead and for that I am eternally grateful.
But damn I’m glad March is past because that was one SOB of a winter! Many residents in the region experienced overland flooding last month; a bugger of an ending to winter and beginning of spring.
This past month’s wanderings in the region resulted in images from: Aq’am, Gold Creek, Bull River drainage, Cranbrook and area, Kimberley and area, Koocanusa area and Yahk.
Images by Ian Cobb and Carrie Schafer/Through My Eyes Photography
