Last weekend George Smith invited me to hike to Chapman Lake, and it was a cool, beautiful day, the best temperature to go for a 6 hour hike. George is one of the founding members of the Tetrahedron Outdoors Club and has had a huge part in the creation of the Park and the building of the hut system there. It was an absolute treat to go through his backyard, getting a constant narration ranging from ecology, logging, old-growth forests, and the challenges with keeping this park going, among many other topics. A big thank you to George for showing me around. It also provided me with an opportunity to check out the Chapman Lake Dam first hand, including the siphon system that gets implemented when we hit stage 4 water restrictions. It looked like everything had been winterized when we got there, and there was enough water going over the dam to prevent us from getting across, and to keep the bypass closed. Apparently the gate that regulates the flow in the summer time can be remotely controlled by staff at the SCRD. Very neat. The water then flows down the creek bed and makes it to the SCRD intake 18 hours later. That is why we need to keep focussing our efforts on protecting the whole Chapman Creek watershed, as our drinking water currently flows through the middle of some substantial cutblocks. I thought I'd share a few pictures of my time there.