Advise from Mr. Bradbury

 

Beach Days

Sometimes when I feel sad that I live in a farming town in rural Alberta, I remind myself that I live 25 minutes from one of Alberta's best kept secrets.

Long Island Lake is a spring-feed lake, has yet to have a season of Swimmer's Itch, and has a charming little island to explore. Eat your heart out Tom Sawyer.

Growing up in Southern Alberta I had my choice between either ice cold glacier lakes in Waterton National Park or man-made lakes that were surrounded by farm land which meant pesticide and cow manure run-offs. Yummy! Don't swim with your mouth open.

I made a goal in 2018 to go to the public beach at Long Island Lake, which is open for day-use for the steal of $5 per vehicle, 20 times. They open May Long weekend and typically close right after Labour Day. This rounded to approximately once a week. We ended up camping there a couple of times which put my chances higher as we were there for 3 days at a time, making up for some rainy weeks in late Spring. We did it! We actually ended up going 21 times in total. Not too shabby!

This year, however, the Municipal Campground, (which is ultimately Westlock County), would not open up it's gates to day-use, only letting in campers who have trailers that have a bathroom (full self-containment, as they put it). I further inquired, it seems that they have put picnic tables on the beach and each campsite is assigned a number that corresponds with a picnic table. This way, they ensure that social distancing practices are being maintained. When the campground is full, so is the beach, making it unreasonable to open the gates to day-users. Sad, but practical under the circumstances.

Due to the denied use of Long Island Lake, my family has to travel a bit further to access a "swim-able" lake with a decent beach. This year, our new lake is going to be Slave Lake.

It's a bit more of a drive as it is about 90 minutes North of Westlock. Devonshire Beach is a Provincial Park and has, thankfully, opened it's doors to public day-use, asking for the public to please bring their own toilet paper and hand sanitizer (although, they did have both at the outhouse last week).

We are gearing up for our second trip out there, although the water does have to warm up a bit before I venture through it. Here's to summer! Being adaptable! And finding joy in nature!