What an (almost) great visit to my home town, Slave Lake!

To the Editor:

I returned today from a brief three-day visit to our old hometown …Slave Lake.

I apologise to all the friends I didn’t connect with but….There’s always a next time (at my age, I sure hope so).

It was great to share memories and catch up with the lives of the friends we left behind. The smell of spring in the air was intoxicating and I hope all Slave Lakers appreciate the air quality (wildfire smoke notwithstanding) the area has.

I connected again in a special way with the land when I strolled along the short loop at the bird sanctuary and listened to a Spruce Grouse rustling for lunch in the dry leaves. The beach at Marten Beach Subdivision was nice to stroll along and enjoy the beauty of the water along the ice edge of the lake. Marten River, I was surprised to see, was a trickle of its usual spring runoff. The lake is a lot lower too.

I had a pretty busy agenda and a couple of must-do’s that sadly, didn’t get done. I went out to Gilwood Golf Course, to my friend Roger’s second home, to visit with him and to fulfil one must-do on my list: Walk the trails, (bear spray in hand) at the North Shore. Alas! There was a big sign telling me that it was closed to the public! BUMMER!

Never mind, I thought, I’ll go a bit farther to Marten Mountain (another must-do) and drive up to the magnificent vista there! NOT!!! It, too, was closed!!

I had to get to the bottom of this so I visited with the parks departments (Did you know there are two?) that was responsible for the opening of these sites, and spoke to someone of authority there who informed me that: They always open on the May long weekend because the roads to the sites may be in poor shape from flooding and could cause problems for some vehicles if they open the roads any sooner. (Remember the grouse in the dry leaves and the low water in the river?)

I suspect that explanation has about as much strength as a fart in a hurricane!

To the Parks people: It takes just a little bit of extra pride in what you do to inspire others to be better too.

C’mon Slave Lake, you can do better! I’ve seen it happen!

Les Close
Redwater, Alberta