Out Of The Rut – Kat Dancer – May 2025

Chapter 177

May the days be bright, beautiful and laced with grace in all you do. This is the season to shrug off the last vestiges of winter, to get excited about growing things, watching flowers burst to life and the landscape change before our very eyes. Calves are already dotting the fields as I write and young creatures will be springing out all over the place. This is also the season of camping in snow storms and similar surprises.

On one memorable Victoria Day weekend we travelled down to Belly River Campground by Waterton. It’s a lovely place, peaceful, wild, sites to camp nestle between trees and hedges around the edges of the Belly River. It was glorious, warm enough to plunge into the mountain stream and emerge spluttering and refreshed, bouncing in and out with the dogs, having fun.

I remember pitching our small mountain tent, not bothering with the extra guys designed for intrepid adventurers to keep this ergonomic shelter adhered to the side of a mountain in a gale. That was not something we ever intended attempting. Our friends pitched their tent close by and we all snuggled into sleeping bags with various assortments of dogs to keep us warm and cosy overnight.

Early in the morning I was rudely awakened by my then partner shoving me and crying somewhat hysterically:

“I can’t breath! The tent’s collapsing!”

“Ugh…. no it’s not, there’s nothing wrong where I am”.

As I roll over and get my ridiculously early morning bearings, I can see that the tent is somewhat droopy, but certainly not collapsed. However, above my partner’s head the tent does make a bit of a swan-dive towards his face. He was sleeping towards the more sloping back aspect so it was making contact with his rather prominent proboscis.

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll have a look and see what’s happening” I say.

I squirm around and manage to get my head out the zip door to see… not very much. There is a veritable blizzard blowing. Flakes the size of soup spoons are whirling before my eyes. When I crank my head around I can see that the snow has built up on the tent and where I eschewed the additional guys, the weight of the snow has caused some drooping to occur. Not a biggie.

I retreat to warmth and reassure my less than robust other half while bumping the interior roof of the tent to dislodge the accumulated snow.

Not long after, my body, having been awakened from a cosy snoozy sleeping bag night, decides since it’s morning it must be time to get up and go through the morning ablutions and associated rituals. Drat.

I need to navigate my way to the toilets in the middle of the campground in a whiteout. It was a fun way to start the day. Snow piled up several feet deep in drifts here and there, I have to rely on my snow-addled sense of direction and memory and am fortunate to make the journey relatively directly and in good time.

On my return, others have stirred, dogs are ready for adventure and we all relocate to the nearby group shelter where a steel barrel stove is soon stoked and burning to thaw out our frozen extremities.

We make breakfast and laugh at ourselves. From glorious sunshine to deep snow. Such is Alberta. A few hours later we hear the snowploughs making their way up the mountain and around the campground allowing us access to the rest of the world. We are free! Liberated once again, it’s a swift trip down into Waterton village before heading to Red Rock Canyon for a walk with technicolour geology for entertainment.

On our way home, we encounter a Grizzly lolloping across the road in front of us, there is a dirt track off to the right so we make a sudden ninety degree turn to parallel the jogging ursus who casually demonstrates that 40kmph is a gentle amble for the great beast.