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Ancient Forest gets special delivery

There was a special delivery made Monday to the Ancient Forest when a helicopter dropped 17 tons of lumber at the site so volunteers can build the 250-metre plank pathway to the waterfall.
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The 1,600 foot universal boardwalk at the Ancient Forest Chun T’oh Wudujut provincial park is seen in this 2013 file photo.

There was a special delivery made Monday to the Ancient Forest when a helicopter dropped 17 tons of lumber at the site so volunteers can build the 250-metre plank pathway to the waterfall.

The lumber was delivered by truck to the quarry that is close to the Ancient Forest site and from the quarry a company that owns a helicopter, whose owner wishes to remain anonymous, brought the lumber to two higher locations. It took five hours.

"Pretty well eliminating about 2,000 hours of labour that was in front of us (volunteers) this summer," said Nowell Senior, president of the Caledonia Ramblers hiking club and the man who was inspired to create the Ancient Forest Universal Boardwalk so people with disabilities can enjoy the wonders of the rare inland temperate forest. The 1,600 foot universal boardwalk was completed in 2013.

The 4,500-foot plank pathway, which loops through the rest of the site, has been a work in progress for the last two years and the last leg of the trail tread protection project should be complete by this fall.

"We had about 12 people out volunteering Monday because we had to load the lumber onto the helicopter and that was the easy part," said Nowell. "At the far end where all this material was dropped the volunteers had to receive the load and move it away immediately because three minutes later another load was going to be dropped. It was exhausting but not nearly as exhausting if we had to carry it all summer."

Some of the lumber will be added to the existing pathway which needs to be broadened so a fourth board will be added bringing the pathway to three feet wide. The rest will be used to create the plank pathway to the falls.

Volunteers have a lot of other things to do in connection with protecting the trail.

"We have platforms to build, to protect the root system on some of the more popular trees that get a lot of visitors who go up to the tree to get photo opportunities and so in five or six of those particular areas we want to build little platforms that invites people to go to the tree for photos but without damaging the roots or damaging the lichens on the cedars," said Senior.

People are now coming to visit the Ancient Forest by the thousands and Senior said that's why the volunteers are doing the work to protect the delicate ecosystem that exists in the Ancient Forest.

"We're trying to protect the forest floor but also to make it safer for people to walk in there," said Senior.