Anahim Lake - Renewal at the Eagle’s Nest

Joe Meche is president of the North Cascades Audubon Society and also serves the chapter as newsletter editor and birding programs coordinator. He has been watching birds for over 50 years and photographing birds and landscapes for more than 30 years.

Imagine if you will, falling asleep at night and stirring in the morning to the music of common loons, right outside your bedroom. The calling of loons — along with the howling of wolves — is arguably one of the true sounds of the great northern wilderness. As civilization and uncontrolled development continue to encroach on wild lands, these calls of the wild have all but disappeared from most of the area south of the Canadian border. We enjoyed the evocative and moving calls of loons at the end of a 10-hour drive from Bellingham, in a place we knew nothing about until last year.

In mid-September, on our return from a wonderful trip to the Bella Coola Valley (Beaks and Bills, October/November and December, 2007), we ascended the Hill and regained the higher ground of the Interior Plateau of British Columbia. Inspired by a recommendation from a river guide just before we left the valley, we stopped for breakfast at the Eagle’s Nest Resort, four miles west of the small community of Anahim Lake, population 1,500. It was during this stop that we discovered the destination for our annual spring getaway.

We had left early that morning to give ourselves one more opportunity to observe salmon-seeking grizzlies before we left the valley, so our own appetites were ready for nourishment. In a perfect setting just above the lake, we enjoyed a splendid meal, complete with fresh eggs and freshly-baked bread with homemade jam. On an impromptu après breakfast tour of the grounds, the hotelier, Tim, showed us the accommodations, while Petrus spoke of the good birds that we would see in spring. He is the resident “bird guy” at the Eagle’s Nest.

Petrus has been at the resort for a number of years and, as I understand, the library is apparently his pride and joy. This warm and welcoming room is filled with numerous volumes including many about local history and a wealth of books focusing on the wildlife of the area. I lost count of the number of bird books on the shelves. It’s the sort of place where you could spend many hours on cold, rainy days.

We drove away that morning with the idea to return, so I made reservations for the Memorial Day weekend. In the interim, I pored over Web sites, printed matter and maps to plan our spring visit. The primary focus was on the birds we might see, and these turned out to be quite similar to the species we expect on our traditional spring trips across the Cascades.

The first day on the road, a 10-hour drive turned into almost 12, further complicated by a huge and extremely healthy black bear, obviously waiting for us just a few miles from our destination. We had to spend time with this beauty and watched in awe as he easily hurdled a split-rail fence. Tim was waiting with the keys and showed us to the old ice house, now known as The Cottage. This is the most popular cabin at the resort, since it sits right on the lake and offers the most privacy.

Needless to say, we were pretty worn out by the drive from Bellingham, so we chose to stay close to the cabin on our first day there. After breakfast, we explored the grounds around the resort and immediately found ourselves in a virtual birding hotspot. Four species of swallows filled the air while yellow and yellow-rumped warblers searched for food in the trees. Red-naped sapsuckers and northern flickers were active along with good numbers of chipping sparrows.

Pacific-slope flycatchers and white-breasted nuthatches shared our backyard with Cassin’s finches and white-winged crossbills. Ospreys soared above the lake while Barrow’s and common goldeneyes floated past in likely breeding pairs. Gray jays scrutinized our every move outside the cabin, competent as they are to look for handouts.

On day trips, we found ourselves on back roads where we found interesting birds in numerous wetlands and open fields. Killdeer shared shorelines with greater and lesser yellowlegs and upland sandpipers. Tim sent us on a journey to an area known locally as The Precipice. The rough map sent us six kilometers down one road, eight up another and finally to a dead end and a startling hole in the landscape! The Precipice was complete with a plunging waterfall of the Hotnarko River and a large hoodoo across the abyss. The morning was cool and sunny, as well as inviting.

As you might expect with us being this close to Bella Coola, we just had to journey down and back up the infamous hill. It turned out to be a good idea since we found more hotspots for birds in the numerous ponds, some of which were still shedding their mantles of winter snow. Near Heckman Pass, we saw tree-nesting Bonaparte’s gulls and Wilson’s phalaropes sharing the open water with ring-necked ducks and buffleheads. We also had occasion to observe five more bears and a lone wolf.

No matter how we chose to spend our days, the surroundings were tranquil and serene. The grounds and the lake were alive with birds and there was also the rejuvenation that comes from staying out of your vehicle, if for only short periods of time. Every day was special and relaxation was the key.

One morning in particular stands out and will be lodged in my memory for some time. It was just after four a.m. on our last full day when I first heard the loons calling. By 4:20, I was sitting at a picnic table with a mug of steaming caffeine as the sky slowly began to change colors with the increasing approach of dawn. The lake was calm when the pair of loons came around the point, barely 50 feet away. They were calling to each other and obviously discussing family matters.

The loons alone made the morning special, but added to the mix were the deep hoots of a great gray owl, the intriguing oong-ka’ choonk (R.T. Peterson) of an American bittern, and the calls of numerous red-necked grebes farther out on the lake. The bird sounds and the quiet of the early-morning lake fueled my lifelong passion for rising early in the day.

Of all the sights and sounds of the five days we spent on the lake, it seems that we found the single best place for birds on the way home. We made another early start to get that proverbial jump on the drive home, but we were quick to get off the road at one particular wetland. The combination of morning light and active birds derailed our plan to focus on getting home earlier than later.

West of the small community of Red Stone, we came upon a wetland that was a frenzy of bird activity. The road intersected the wetland so we had birds on both sides. Black terns were nesting just a few feet from the road along with Wilson’s phalaropes, yellow-headed and red-winged blackbirds, and pied-billed grebes. Canvasbacks, ring-necked ducks, and buffleheads were too numerous and busy to get an accurate count!

On our return drive to Bellingham, we discussed the reality of this special place and how it really wasn’t that far from home, after all. The similarities to eastern Washington are obvious in the landscape and in the birds. The main difference is the noted lack of … people! The drive north from Hope, British Columbia, and up the Fraser Canyon rivals the spectacular drive over the North Cascades Highway.

The part of central British Columbia that lies between Vancouver and Prince Rupert is vast. Our short time there at the end of May barely scratched the surface of the potential of this area. West of Williams Lake and all the way to Bella Coola, side roads are few and far between and most are better served by four-wheel-drive vehicles.

West of Anahim Lake is the southern portion of the massive Tweedsmuir Provincial Park, one of Canada’s largest, and more than three times the size of our own North Cascades National Park. Highway 20 is the only highway that traverses the park, so Anahim Lake is the last stop before going into the park. The park offers a true wilderness experience and unless you have access to a float plane, hiking is the only way to go. Keep in mind that this is also the realm of large numbers of grizzly bears.

If you’re interested in utilizing the same base that we did, visit the Eagle’s Nest Web site at http://www.eaglesnest-resort.com. If you choose to dine in the main lodge, you’ll experience wonderful food with a sense of style that is at once cordial and unpretentious. You may also choose to cook your own meals as we did. Either way, the importance of a good base camp in any situation cannot be underestimated and the Eagle’s Nest fits that bill splendidly.

The landscapes that we saw last fall were in varying shades of brown and we were overwhelmed by the disastrous effects of the mountain pine beetle. This spring, however, the abundance of new green served to soften the shock to the senses brought on by all the dead and dying trees.

Additional notes: We searched high and low, as well as early and late for moose, to no avail. However, you’ll notice that at no point in this article did I mention mosquitoes. §