Category Archives: Museums

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A Detour to Tombstone, Arizona

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We were excited to cross the Arizona border at 11:00 am on Friday. We still had five hours of driving to go before we’d reach Mesa, but we expected we’d at least get to Tucson before calling it a day. However, the billboards along the highway were calling us to Tombstone, so we had to heed the call.

We took the exit off Hwy. 10 into Benson, and then took Hwy. 80, south to Tombstone, where we spent a few hours living in a time-warp, walking the plank sidewalks amongst cowboys, gunslingers and stage coaches.

Allan St. Tombstone

Looking down Allan St., downtown Tombstone, AZ

Bird Cage Theatre

Bird Cage Theatre

Stage Coach

Stage Coach on Allan St.

We took in the re-enactment of the famous shootout at OK Corral involving Wyatt Earp, Doc Holiday and the Clanton and McLaury gangs.

OK Corral Monument

The story

Gunfight re-enactment

Gunfight re-enactment

We sat through a film and histogram to learn about the development of Tombstone in 1880 during the silver mining rush, and its struggles to survive in one form or another over the next two centuries. The sun began to set and the temperatures began to drop when we climbed back into the motor home after everything closed up at 5:00 pm. Even though Benson was further north, the elevation was much lower, so we decided that a campsite back there might be more comfortable. At 6:00 pm we found a Wendy’s for a quick dinner, but went to the hardware store in the same mall first to pick up a couple of items. We were too late. What stores close up at 6:00 pm on a Friday night? Apparently in Benson it’s common practice. We looked up the RV Resorts in the area and drove to the closest and highest recommended one in the Good Sam Directory, but the office was already closed. On we went to another. The office there was closed too, but the owner saw us come in and told us where to park before he left us to return to the karaoke. With some difficulty and a little tension, because of the darkness and the need to back up to get into a spot, we got settled in for the night. We were exhausted and hit the sheet early. The furnace, although we thought we had the problem solved earlier, wasn’t working properly again. This meant having to get up during the night to manually turn it on and off by connecting the wires. But we were glad that we’d made the trip to Tombstone, and if it hadn’t been for the cold weather we might have stayed another day. There was so much more that we hadn’t seen.

By 12:30 pm on Saturday we were in Mesa. Before going to the RV Resort we hoped to get the motor home and the bike washed. We had seen many signs along the highway advertising RV washes, but in Mesa we could find none. Instead, Jim backed the bike into a car wash so we could get the grease and grime off of it at least to make it ride-able. We managed to get most of the dirt off the back of the RV too. At 5:15 we pulled into Mesa Regal RV Resort and got our spot. Set up and dinner was all that we managed before bedtime.

Sunday was devoted to “nesting”: finding our way around town to purchase some necessities like a phone SIM card and a new thermostat for the furnace; catching up on a week’s worth of laundry. On the way to the Laundromat, just a couple hundred feet from “home”, we noticed the parking lot of the main building was rapidly filling up with cars.  We asked what was going on and were told that there was a choir performing in the Regal Ballroom. We deposited our laundry into the washers and then went to see just what all the fuss was about. On the stage was a ninety member choir, accompanied by a twenty-five piece orchestra. We were thoroughly entertained with beautiful Christmas music, mostly unique arrangements of the traditional Christmas Carols. The hall was packed. It looks like it’s going to be a beautiful Christmas here, despite not being white.

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A Little About Kaslo, BC

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The next few days were devoted to helping family and friends with projects. Sarah’s mother-in-law had just recently received word that she had, after being on a waiting list for three years, been granted an apartment in the seniors’ complex, so I pitched in to help her start downsizing, while Jim built her a planter/privacy wall for her patio. We found some time to enjoy lunch at The Blue Bell with the family on Sunday, and Jim and I strolled along the main street, checking out the shops and taking pictures.

Kaslo sign

Kaslo is a great little town nestled below the mountain peaks and overlooking Kootenay Lake. Life there always seems simple and relaxed. There are farms in the area, many of which provide organic produce. Eating local and organic is a much easier choice than it is in Ontario, but anything that has to be imported, even from other parts of BC, is more expensive since transporting it is challenging. Although most people walk around Kaslo, a vehicle is a necessity to get anywhere outside the town. There are no trains, planes or buses. The closest bus terminal is an hour away, in Nelson; the closest airport is in Castlegar, an hour in the opposite direction and an expensive trip.  That’s why we flew into Kelowna and rented a car. But it’s worth the effort. The small town atmosphere is so inviting that you feel like you are part of a big family within minutes of arriving. There is a big, new hotel, and a motel, and several B & Bs so finding accommodations is relatively easy. However, Kaslo holds many weekend events that bring people in, so you should definitely check ahead if you plan to visit.

On the outside wall of the hotel, there is a little history of Kaslo portrayed in old pictures. Some things we were amazed to learn from this mural:

  • Survey crews laid out the Kaslo Town Site in 1889
  • A miner, J. Will Cockle, discovered the 125 pound Galena boulder, which became famous, in 1892 when he accidentally sheared a piece of rock while cutting a tent pole. Cockle was also a steam tug owner, a boat builder, an orchardist and an entomologist.
  • The Kaslo Hotel opened in 1896 and was expanded twice to accommodate the booming mining community. The stories of the original owners, J. Will Cockle and W.V. Papworth, reveal a large part of local history. Papworth owned the silver-rich Texas Mine, and later served for over twenty years as Town Clerk and Kaslo’s Mayor.
  • Cockle and Papworth sold the Kaslo Hotel in 1913. Daddy “Big Kid” Desmond managed the hotel, bar and billiards through much of the depression. After twenty years of depression the hotel and the town became run down.
  • In May of 1942, when Japanese Canadians were being moved from the West Coast and interned in Kootenay ghost towns after Pearl Harbor, internees began to arrive in Kaslo to face an uncertain future.  Some 1200 Japanese Canadians made up two-thirds of the town’s population.  Many were housed in The Kaslo Hotel. Most of the hotel residents were women and children and the conditions were cramped. The bus station (there was one then) was always busy as internees were constantly moved from camp to camp or to Eastern Canada. In 1945 the Kaslo Internment Camp was closed and Front Street became once again much less lively. The original hotel was replaced in 1958 with a masonry building.  Directly behind the Kaslo Hotel is the rail-to-water link, where rail barges were loaded from steamship to railroad up until 1957.
  • Kaslo experienced another boom in the 1960s with the building of Duncan Dam just up from the lake. The hotel was owned and operated by the Campbell family by then. Between 1957 and 2006, the hotel was known as The Mariner Inn. In 2007 the Eckland family bought The Kaslo Hotel and began a complete rebuild to an exacting heritage design by Robert Inwood. It is operated by Geoff Beer and Tom Eckland.
Kaslo Hotel

Kaslo Hotel Today

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The Kaslo Hotel wasn’t the only hotel in town during the heyday of mining. The Langham Hotel had been built in 1896. It was so busy during this economic high that beds were rented in three shifts a day. During the Depression, it too fell into disrepair. During the Second World War the Langham was used as an internment centre for approximately 80 Canadians of Japanese descent.

The Langham

The Langham today

In 1974 a small group of Kaslo residents decided to take this derelict heritage building, about to be demolished, restore it and turn it into a cultural centre. In June of 1975 the Langham Cultural Society was registered as a society. Today this award-winning building offers a theatre, an art gallery and The Japanese Canadian Museum. To learn more about this interesting history, visit the website.

The S.S. Moyie moored at Heritage Park is another bit of history that you’ll want to visit.

S.S. Moyie

This picture was taken in 2008 when we visited Kaslo by bike

Kaslo is definitely a three-season tourist destination. During the winter months the snow is heavy and the roads are often blocked by avalanches.

 

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Discovering some Canadian History

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At Wasaga Beach we found a spot to park at Gateway Campground, just a few blocks from the beach and at a discounted rate since it was the beginning of the week, before the first long weekend of the season. We were told that the busy season would start in a few days and the rates would jump. However, after taking a stroll along the boardwalk at the usually popular party beach, we had some doubts. The large section of retail stores and restaurants that had been wiped out by fire in 2007 has yet to be rebuilt and a store clerk told us that the former manager of two of the remaining bars had walked away, leaving employees and patrons “high and dry”. Attempts by someone else to get them up and running again in time for the upcoming long weekend were being thwarted by red tape, so the prospects looked slim. Still there was a throng of sun-lovers lounging on the beach.

Wasaga Beach

Wasaga Beach

We hadn’t even packed swim suits, and the biking gear we were wearing was clinging to us like a shy child to its mother. Jim insisted we buy suits, which we donned to take a dip in the campground pool after we cleaned some of the carbon out of the bike on a ride out to the country, and we picked up BBQ chicken and potato salad for dinner. It was just too hot to walk back to the beach!

The next morning Jim searched the GPS for the historical site of Sainte-Marie Among the Hurons, which he was certain was at Penetanguishene, but to no avail. He settled for the All Saints Shrine in Midland as the GPS point to follow, thinking once we got there it would find us what we were looking for. But once in Midland and heading toward Penetanguishene with Sainte-Marie Among the Hurons entered into the GPS, our guide tried to return us to Midland, once even trying to direct us down a narrow dirt path to turn us around. Now occasionally the GPS does steer us in the wrong direction, but it usually eventually figures out where we want to go. But sometimes Jim just doesn’t trust it, or me or anyone else he may ask for directions.  This was one of those days. While he continued on to Penetanguishene, I dug out a travel brochure that told me Sainte-Marie Among the Hurons was indeed in Midland, but that must have been an editorial error, because when we got to Penetanguishene Jim found internet access at a Tim Horton’s and Google Maps told him where to find it there. A few minutes later we arrived at a spot called Discovery Harbour, a military historical park. This time Jim had no choice but to believe the girl at the desk when she told him that Sainte-Marie Among the Hurons was in Midland. I prided myself on my patience, and Jim decided to give up the quest and enjoy what Discovery Harbour had to offer. Discovery Harbour (1817-1856) tells the story of the original 19th century naval and military outpost built to safeguard Upper Canada after the War of 1812.  With our animated guide, Ryan, dressed in historical garb, we toured the reconstructed dockyard, sailors’ barracks, workshops, Captain’s residence and the original Officers’ Quarters, and heard the fascinating stories of life at that time. We also boarded the historic Tall Ships, H.M.S. Bee and H.S.M. Tecumseth moored at the dock. In the end we were both happy to have been diverted.

Captains Quarters

Captains Quarters (courtesy of Jim)

Our Guide, Ryan

Our Guide, Ryan (courtesy of Jim)

Tall Ship

Tall Ship (courtesy of Jim)

We left there asking the GPS to head us toward New Liskeard, and it did, right back through Midland and past both the All Saints Shrine and Sainte-Marie Among the Hurons, which are directly across from each other on the highway heading north. It was too late to stop. We’ll make that a day trip on the bike another time. We were still a couple of days’ drive away from New Liskeard.