festivals Archives | Carol Patterson

Winter has its own beauty but after five months of dark evenings (and mornings), scraping car windshields, and dressing like the Michelin man before heading outside, I am ready for spring! It is a time of renewal for Mother Nature and her enthusiasm for new life invigorates mine. (I’m also enjoying the extra sleep since I put the shovel away.)
If you’re looking for a way to celebrate spring why not head out to these Northwestern nature festivals and enjoy spectacular wildlife, yummy food, and entertaining speakers?

The Brant Festival in Parksville-Qualicum Beach, British Columbia runs until April 17. Thousands of Brant geese take a break from their northward migration to feast and rest. You can follow their lead and enjoy spring-themed dinners, art displays, and relaxation ocean-side while you watch the avian action. Dolphins and whales sometimes join the party. http://www.brantfestival.bc.ca

Drop into Hoquiam, Washington for Grays Harbor Shorebird and Nature Festival May 6 – 8. You won’t be the only one from out of town. Shorebirds from as far away as Argentina stop before heading north to the Arctic – a 15,000 mile round trip if you’re counting – and you can see tens of thousands of birds in the Grays Harbor estuary. To get your tickets for bird tours or a special presentation on butterflies head to http://www.shorebirdfestival.com

Wings Over the Rockies in Invermere and B.C.’s Columbia Valley May 9 – 15 is one of North America’s longest running and largest nature festivals. There are seven days of hikes, paddles, horseback riding, and evening presentations. I’ll be speaking Friday, May 13 at 7pm with my stories and pictures in “A travel writer with a birding habit”. Tickets for all events go on sale April 11 at http://www.wingsovertherockies.org

Utah’s Great Salt Lake Bird Festival May 12 -16 has a great lake and great birding. The birds come for the lake, the people come for the birds and for the celebrities who love birding. James Currie from Nikon’s Birding Adventures TV appears this year and will get everyone excited about our feathered friends. One year at this festival I had the pleasure of meeting Brad Harris – the record-setting birdwatcher played by Jack Black in the movie The Big Year – and realized I’d become an official bird-nerd! Get your binoculars on at http://www.GreatSaltLakeBirdFest.com

British Columbia’s Meadowlark Nature Festival May 19 – 23 highlights overlooked attractions in the Okanagan and Similkameen valleys. You can canoe, hike, participate in indigenous cultural events, stargaze, paint watercolors, or be a rock gummy (geologist for a day). Tickets go on sale April 9th at http://www.meadowlarkfestival.ca

These are some of my favorite festivals but there are more. What’s the best festival you’ve attended?

Carol

Feel depressed when summer holidays end? Staying home until its time for a winter escape to someplace sunny has me wanting to give a bottle of wine mouth-to-mouth resuscitation! So it’s great to see destinations using festivals to reinvent shoulder-season travel.
One of the best fall celebrations is the Waterton Wildlife Festival in southwest Alberta. Waterton is one of those places you want to see, but the drive and the horizontal wind -it is one of Alberta’s windiest places – make it easy to delay visiting. If you can rationalize the big winds as an excuse not to waste time on hairstyles, you can focus on the natural beauty. Waterton is jam-packed with wildlife including 250 species of birds, 60 species of mammals, 24 species of fish, ten species of reptiles and amphibians, and a major bat migration route!

With only 100 winter residents you more likely to encounter wildlife than locals but seeking out the latter will give you something to talk about. At the Waterton Wildlife Festival local experts share their animal expertise and turn a stroll through gale-force winds from a chance to weigh down your hiking boots with rocks into some of the best nature experiences of your life.

Local expert, John Russell, son of famed author, photographer and conservationist, Andy Russell, shared his love of bears in a hike that felt like being a bear for a day. Giving us a taste of bear life, John led us off the road into the bush, eschewing the trails in favor of stumbling – me, not John- through skunk cabbage and berry bushes.

We checked out a bear bulletin board – a tree with numerous scratches and bites where bears leave their marks and scents to let others know they are in the area. We poked at bear scat and listened to John tell how he replaced his birdbath with a bear bath when the bears started hogging the water.

John said, “When you live with the bears you get used to being around them. I’ve been in a chair reading a book while a bear eats grass under me.” I did not see reading with bears on the festival program, but I enjoyed walking with someone who had.

As I headed for home, the wind seemed less obnoxious. I realized the abrupt meeting of mountains and prairie that caused it, also creates one of the few North American places where all species of major carnivores are still found.

Shoulder-season travel just got a lot less boring! To learn more go to www.watertonwildlife.com

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