Milo Canopener (June 1, 1995)

An archive of the Milo Canopener.The University of Lethbridge Library received permission from the Archives at Milo Library to digitize and display this content.Jtd Rates Business llireelory...$5.0(1 (fuarter ...........$0.00 Hill) page...._______$11.00 Full page.......................$15.0n Classifieds.................$2.00 Kodees, Thankyou’s, Baby Wedding annouuceinenls, news items, arl;icles.....u/e Sutascmpllon ‘Rates Picked up or delivered ****** ...........$12.00 Alailed__________$20.00 B.S.A t»*HtHM*mt*m****t*t*M» $24.00 Oul; of country.......$30.00 1/ aimjiu Letters to the Can Opener are Welcome! PLEASE SIGN THEM, no letter will be printed without a signature. The Can Opener is Printed on the LAST FRIDAY of each month, unless otherwise stated in the calendar on the back page. PLEASE HAVE ALL ITEMS IN NO LATER THAN THE WEDNESDAY BEFORE PRINTING. You may mail them to: MILO CAN OPENER BOX 12 MILO, ALBERTA TOL 1LO or leave them at Jamies AG Foods store or Fax them to us at 599-38 3 5 or Give them to one of the following people: Sheila Winch, Levona Dixon, June Beckner, Marina Vannatta, Carol Henry, Zola Webber, Sue I vers, Ellen Watt or Betty LahdGoods & Services ^^Perfeciion W Sr CATERING/SERVICE Allan and Colleen Bartsch MILO. Alla, phone. (403) 599-2204 <zy? c/? ee Sc Jirtrmgfyt, dleatt Sc pimple INTERNATIONAL RECORDING ARTISTS PH. (403) 787-2346 FAX (403) 787-2346 LAR-MAR PROMO. PH. (403) 599-2410 Keepin’ the Country In music HDtr* (Go Mo Os$®imlb<& (403) 485-6005 P.O. Box 87, Vulcan, Alberta, Canada BUS. 599-3731 RES. 599-2153 PAT GAUTHIER Petroleum Agent UNITED FARMERS OF ALBERTA CO-OPERATIVE LIMITED BOX 58. MILO, ALBERTA TOL 1 LO 8. X Drump OPTOMETRIST BOX 972 VULCAN. ALBERTA TOL 2BO TELEPHONES 485-2177 485-2886 Phillips Agricultural Products and Services fettibccs Pesticides Herbicides Custom Applications Sol Sunpiong Prescription Blending Gain Uidoetiog Wet Sic Spaying Box 292 Lomond[ Alberti TOLIGO Robert Phillips Telephone: (403) 792-3757 Toll Free: 1-000-337-8486 CeUtAi r (403)652-9622 Fuc (403)599-3791 SCOTIA BANK THE BANK OF NOVA SCOTIA 599-3792 MANAGER: DON KINNEY BUSINESS HOURS: MON - THURS 10:00 - 12:00 1:00 - 3:00 FRIDAY 9:30 - 12:00 1:00 - 5:30WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK OUR ADVERTISERS FOR THEIR CONTINUED SUPPORT. WITHOUT THEM WE WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO PRINT THIS PAPER FOR THE ENJOYMENT OF OUR READERS._________________________ Helping Farmers Feed The World FOR ALL YOU GRAIN MARKETING AND AGRO PRODUCT NEEDS PLEASE CALL ANYTIME MILO 599-3866 QUEENSTOWN 599-2151 DENNIS CYR 599-3745 TRENT JENSEN 599-2172 GALVIN EGELAND 599-2199 Your Patronage is Appreciated Willy's Wheels 'N Deals Box 12 (403)641-2225 Bassano, AB Bill Schaffer ilBSIMPSONi liacille. &LLla 8973013 RJEMCO REMCO MEMORIALS LTD The Monument Professionals Since 1924 w ^dependent D'^ NIKKEN MAGNETIC PE£>DUCTS Alvin & Sheila Winch (403) 599-2223 RR#1 Milo, Alberta TOL 1L0 LOOKING GOOD HAIR DESIGN 599-3940 Open Tuesday - Saturday Walk In Wednesday 9-12 Call TERRY For Your Appointment MILO SEED CLEANING ASSOCIATION LTD 599-2150 Cleaner seed is sown Cleaner crops are grown ED POSEIN - manager MILO CAFE CHINESE & WESTERN TAKE OUT ORDERS 599-3832 MON SAT SUN 9-8 TUES - FRI 8 -8 beer & wine with meals Sssol VULCAN VILLAGE GAS BAR P.O- BOX 425 VULCAN. ALTA. TOL 2B0 PHONE: 485-6000 FOOD TO CO Garry & Bernardine Nelson 485-251977//? CAN OPENER will Qf printed tuly 5, ms -FAIRBANKS DENTURE CLINIC —i 125 Centre Street. Vulcan, Alberta TOL 2B0 4/ (403) 599-3922 BUS. /MM (403) 599-3941 RES. W Y —J (403) 599-3835 FAX f IT j FOODS 485-2368 JAMIE’S A. G. FOODS Scott D. Fairbanks - Denturist OFFICE HOURS: . -; v Wednesday 9:00 a m. - 5:00 p.m. Friday 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. JAMES £ CAROL ROBERTSON P.O. BOX 38 Proprietors MILO, ALBERTA TOL 1L0 -Flow els . n -Fancies TEA ROOM ;'" 7-... < FLORAL DESIGNS/4- GIFTS — JEWELLERY 320 Centre St,. Vulcan, Alberta T0L2B0 u Dorothy Healy Z~*- Telephone 485-2746 — GRANT, KRYSTALOWICH & BENNETT CERTIFIED GENERAL ACCOUNTANTS FULL ACCOUNTING SERVICES AND CONSULTING P.O. Box 239 Vulcan, Alberta Phone: 485-2996 TOL 2B0 485-2681 Remembfr FATHERS DAY *' Sunday June IB4- Do SotAE THING- m For DADVillage of Milo The regular meeting of the Village of Milo was held on April 12, 1995 at 6:30 n m * the Village office. • • in Present were Mayor Umscheid, Councillors Monner and Hingley, Municipal Administrator Lynda Cyr and Bill Brown from S & B Holdings. A letter was read from the County bus drivers in regards to the use of flashing lights when picking up students at the Milo School. Mayor Umscheid said he would try to get some more facts on this matter and bring them back to our May meeting. Tarragon Oil and Gas Company sent the Village a letter saying they are proposing to install a sweet gas compressor at the 06-05-19-21 W4M wellsite. The booster is required to compress gas produced from the wells in the area. The compressor will be driven by 430 HP natural gas driven engine. The facility will be constructed and operated according to the Existing Alberta Energy and Utilities Board and Alberta Envirnment Rules and Regulations regarding equipment spacing, safety standards, noise levels and emission standards. A signed letter is to be returned to them saying we have received this notice. A discussion was held and because some members of Council are concerned with the noise level, a letter is to be sent back saying this. Mr. Robert Langridge, the lawyer, who has been renting the village office on Thurs­day afternoons wrote to say he has not had much business. He would like to rent the office on a "pay as you come" basis. Council are in agreement with this and will charge $ 15.00 per hour., A letter is to be sent to him saying this, and asking him to let Lynda Cyr know when he will be using the office. There was a discussion in regards to the landfill site and the operation of it on Wednesday and Saturday mornings. A letter is to be sent to Dave McIntyre saying the Village has hired a Geophysical Company to do some test holes on the streets for the paving project. The approximate cost of this will be $ 1,500.00. Lynda Cyr said George Yanicki from Little Bow Park said Lake McGregor will be ready for the May holiday weekend. Several loads of sand have been hauled already. There will be 4,000 trees planted in the next few years. Councillor Monner said he has been talking to Dave McIntyre from Alberta Transporta­tion and Utilities in regards to the water improvement project. He said Dave did not like the idea of the total cost being higher than originally quoted. He said to go ahead and purchase the plant package to save any further increases. It will be about two weeks before we get written confirmation. As of now the Village is approved to get $ 280,000.00. Councillor Monner will be in touch with Tom Armstrong from McPherson & Thom to go ahead. Council decided to get a quote from Bexte Construction in regards to having the rest of the Village office building sided. They also want a quote on shingling the west half of the roof and putting tin on the whole roof. A discussion was held in regards to the construction of a new R/V park near the entrance to the Village.A letter is to be sent to Apegga in regards to Terry Mullinger and the way he con­ducted his business as an engineer for the water improvement project. He will not answer any letters, faxes or telephone calls. Councillor Monner said Mr. Harold Dewitt is coming to the Village to do some sur­veying for the bike path. He charges $ 50.00 per hour. Council decided it would be a good idea to have the Village office lots surveyed. The meeting adjourned at 8:45 p.m. NORTH PETERSEN LINT ANDREACHUK "Southern Alberta's Regional Law Firm" B-A-R-R-l-S-T-E-R-S- and --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------*• Dr. Robert J. (Bob) Langridge will be available to the Milo and area residents upon appointment which can be made at 485-2070 NORTH PETERSEN LINT ANDREACHUK Barristers & Senators Vulcan: 104 Center Street East 485-2070 JfoTlCE ’ NEXT RURAL INITIATIVES GROUP MEETING IS SET FOR JUNE 19, 1995 AT 8:30 P.M. AT THE MILO HALL. WE WILL BE DISCUSSING ALL ASPECTS OF THE BIKE PATH INCLUDING FUNDRAISING AND CONSTRUCTION. YOUR ATTENDANCE WOULD BE GREATLY APPRECIATED.MILO COMMUNITY CAMPOUT JULY 7-9, 1995 "HOGG PARK" WEST OF HIGH RIVER, 24 KM. ON COAL TRAIL ROAD OR WEST OF RODEO GROUNDS ON TONGUE CREEK ROAD TURN SOUTH AFTER 15 KM. & WATCH FOR HOGG PARK SIGN BREAKFAST SERVED BOTH MORNINGS BY LIONS GAMES FOR CHILDREN & ADULTS FUN FOR EVERYONE FOR MORE INFO., CONTACT KEN FETKENHER 599-2307 EVERYONE WELCOME! O/C o To /<_£ U <:Times have changed in the Yukon town of White­horse, and not for the bet­ter. The Klondike days are done and the wimps have taken charge. You cannot drive under age or over the limit — not any. more. Scat belts arc com­pulsory oa the highway, and you need a helmet to ride that snow­mobile. Restaurants may not serve moose steak to paying customers. Unlicensed campfires arc subject to a hefty fine, and there is even a 24- hour cash machine to help you pay it, outside the bank in Main Street Can this really be the wild frontier - of the far, frozen North, where the Bishop Ate His Boots, and the con­stables of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police set out to trail the Mad Trapper of Rat River? Was it for this that sourdough poet Robert Service wrote The Ballad Of Blas­phemous Bill? Not likely. . “Never mind,” says Blaine Wal­den, nodding at the sleds strapped to the roof of his van. “You can still go bareheaded and drunk with a’ dog team.” The vastness of the Yu­kon territory still harbours a few grizzled die-hards, and Blaine Wal­den is one of them. Blaine is the kind of fellow for whom the Great North Woods were invented. He knows how to build rafts, tan hides and jug hares. Every fall he goes out and bags himself a moose. Then he dredges the lake below his cabin to net half a ton of fish, which he stores in a treehouse beyond the reach of four-legged thieves. The unlucky moose (or most of it) is for the kitchen. The fish come in handy as trail-food for his dogs — served frozen, raw and hacked into neat chunks with an axe. Blaine’s cabin is 50 miles from anywhere, in wilderness so remote ' that the lakes are unmapped and the mountain peaks unnamed. There is no road, but in high season and hard winter he and his clients can get in by canoe or by dogsled. During the treacherous mud and melt seasons Between, the place is completely in­accessible. I was a February client In Whitehorse, it was so cold that 1 could have chopped off my own nose and not felt the difference. Blaine sported a long ponytail and flowing moustache — modest enough in a town that still prizes full-face bird's-ncst beards, and where clean-shaven men feel somc- ThlS CUt'Tlde. c^pci/ OH -f-he. Proper pcL^n. Qp tAe. Lotivot! PEHPLAf/D ) Times . Bi- A aASE WEUDEfi/ (pofJ tTtam (JtSO/T/D) Took Will,pm (}peEfJ /ro^ £ I/O LA A/D on CL do9 /> Me Ye, T'aai hi/aa£/%mess This sTrpy IP T/ie rescir Dp i~ oip - how underdressed. At -25°C you need all the hair you can get He pa­tiently inspected my inadequate boots and mittens, and announced that he had better lend me some of his own gear. Next morning, 50 miles from town and muffled to the eyebrows, 1 was ready for my first lesson in mushing. From Blaine's* “dog- mobile”. we loaded two sleds with food, fiicl and snowshocs, and laid out yards of gangline. Each sled was anchored with a grappling hook stamped hard into the snow. Then, one by one. we brought out 11 Alaska-cross Huskies — high- tailed, wet-nosed and whimpering with excitement. Blaine introduced them as we slipped each dog into its harness and hooked up to the traces. “This is old Ruby — she’s eight now, and our best lead dog. And Poncho, he’s got some saluki in him somewhere. Most of the younger dogs are grandsons to those two — like Frank, or Kobuk and Banjo on your team here. They can be hard to tell apart. But Spud’s easy — he’s die only one with a white coat.” My team of five dogs seemed amiable and informal as they waited for the off. but I was worried about the correct forms of address. Somebody had warned me that it is no longer the done thing to give a lusty shout of “mush!”, as men used -to in the old Jack London books. “Your dogs will follow my tracks,” said Blaine, “but if you like, you can go ‘haa!’ to wheel them left, and ‘gee!’ for right. Now, step on the trad, hold on to the sled bow and pull up your anchor. All you have to remember is — -never let go of the sled.” I was still wondering about what to say instead of “mush!” when Blaine’s team steamed off along the trail, and I pulled my anchor. An instant later we were round the first comer and shooting down a kind of laundry chute. Ahead and far be­low. I could hear Blaine shouting “And don’t forget the foot brake!” Lesson one. Sled dogs don’t have to be told to start pulling. They just go, and keep going. Sleds run faster than their dogs on steep downhills, but I managed to get to the bottom without running over Kobuk and Banjo. We were now all on the frozen surface of Squanga Lake, and our trail led offIn the snowy Canadian wastes of the Yukon WILLIAM GREEN hooks up his dog team and runs with the mushers of ‘Lake Blaine’, where he meets Kobuk, the husky that can’t howl across the ice, comfortingly hori­zontal. We clipped along for an hour or so. I haid nothing to do but ride my sled, braking occasionally to keep distance from the leader, and give myself up to the pleasure of the moment A light breeze stung the cheeks, with the glacial silence of winter broken only by the hiss of the runners and the panting of the dogs. We left one lake, and climbed over a rise to join the next I jumped off and “pumped” to help the team pull over the incline, remembering to hang on tight to the sled bow. If a driver lets go, the dogs will press on regardless. Drowsy mushers on the marathon Iditarod trail sometimes fall off their sleds and are found, cold and cursing, 20 miles behind their dog-teams. I stumbled in soft snow at the top of the hill, but jammed one knee on to the runner, and pulled back aboard. I was beginning to think of myself as quite a musher. The sled tipped, swerved and then bashed against a tree. We were accelerating downhill again. Suddenly, I was poking my head out of a large snowdrift, in which the rest of me appeared to be buried. At a standstill on the trail, five dogs looked back with reproachful ex­pressions. Blaine anchored his sled and ambled up to inspect the wreck. “Good,” he said, “you held on to the sled.” • We reached the cabins before nightfall, without, further calamity, but after some hard pumping over soft snow. Jt was warm work, with plenty more to keep us busy after the dogs were unhooked and dispersed around the camp, each to his own chain and doghouse (there are no “kennels” in Canada). There were II ravenous stomachs to feed, along with snow to clear, logs to chop, and stoves to be lit Minutes after our arrival, a whiskey jack, or camp-robber jay, flew into a tree overlooking the kitchen. It maintained its stakeout for the whole week of our stay. The camp had two cabins — a tumbledown shack built by Blaine with his brother when they first came in to the territory 15 years ago; and a spanking new skookum version, with luxuries such as gas lamps and double-glazed windows. Running water, however, remains beyond Blaine’s handyman ingenu­ity. We scrambled down to the fro­zen lake, and smashed a scoop-hole in the ice with an iron pick. The ice was about 2ft thick. We had to ferry all our water in pails up the snowcovered trail, Jack-and-Jill style — the hardest of die daily chores. On the trails that week we visited several nntenanted trappers’ cabins, austere sawn-wood shelters with rusty stoves, frozen logs of loo paper and cryptic messages chalk- marked on the walls. “Shot moose but missed. Hank Henry,” said one. It must be a cold, lonely life work­ing the trap lines in midwinter. But a short spell outside of civilisation, making pancakes and eating game in a cosy cabin, with a team of dogs for good company and exercise, is absolute bliss. Blaine knows of lux­ury backwoods cabins, accessible only by helicopter, that are rented out by the week to Hollywood stars and pressured executives, who know no other way of escaping the telephone. For getting out and about in the fresh air of deep winter, there is nothing to beat a good team of dogs. I tried two other local meth­ods — racquet snowshoes and “fishscale” cross-country skis — but both were slow, and tricky, too. Snowshoes trip you up in the same way as loose shoelaces, and then they make it almost impossible for the wearer to stand up again. They are more useful as snow shovels. A third, and noisy, option is the snow­mobile, preferred by busy trappers and antisocial teenagers. Blaine has a typically no- nonsense view of the matter “Dogs can do things that a skidoo can’t, like get you safe across a half- frozen lake. A skidoo may be fast and furious, but it can be un­reliable. You are much more likely to die if there’s a breakdown and you’re far from help. As all the old mushers say — you can’t eat a carburettor.” Midweek, we took ourselves as far from help aswe could on an overnight sled trip up-country from the cabin. By this time I was on speaking terms with all the dogs, and practised enough to harness them, or tie colourful ny­lon booties to those with cracked paws. I was particularly drawn to young Kobuk. a willing dog with one terrible failing. He can bark. A good husky is unable to bark, and is ticked off sharply if it growls. In­stead it is supposed to flaunt its wild ancestry by yapping and howling like a wolf. We set off with our full teams, al­though we were lightly loaded, and Frank was sick. A chained dog alone at the camp would fall easy prey to one of its wild cousins. Blaine wanted to recce a distant lake, the possible site for a new cabin he wants to build for his canoeing clients. We mushed all afternoon, in heavy snow. Some­times it got too soft and deep for the dogs. Then we would hook up the sleds, and one of us would snow- shoe ahead to break trail. At dusk we made camp in the trees. The dogs were picketed in a long line, and fed from tin bowls. We stretched a tarpaulin, stamped out a circle and built a huge fire. Then we cooked our own meal — along with our mittens, which we turned like toast slices against the flames to dry them. Later, we rolled up in volu­minous bags. Through the treetops, we could see the northern lights dance over our heads. Next morning, the temperature was -15°C. “You can tell that from the ice crystals in your nose,” said Blaine. “And if it was colder, we would hear the trees crack.” Emerging from my protective co­coon of down, I ran about stamping my boots to try to thaw them. I looked over at the dogs. Each one was curled up happily, on a bed of frozen snow. We showshoed through more woods to emerge on “Lake Blaine” — unvisited and gleaming in the early sun. Fresh caribou tracks crossed and recrossed the frozen surface. “It’s a safe bet that you are the first tourist ever to see this lake,” said Blaine. He picked out a good stand of black spruce, and sized up the trees. A cabin- builder likes to have his materials ready on site. The weather began to cloud in. so we slogged back to the dogs, hooked up and made for iomc. Arctic squalls blew in and. covered our old tracks. We made >cttcr running in the woods. On one lair-raising bend I crashed again, extravagantly. I may have done it on purpose — the snowdrift was as soft as feathers. Back in Whitehorse, I parted regretfully from the dogs, and from my borrowed Mukluk boots. The weather had changed again, to just below freezing. “That’s 10 degrees loo warm for me, and 20 too many for my dogs,” grumbled Blaine. He drove off in the dogmobile, back to some real work. It may take him the whole summer, but he is determined to teach Kobuk how to howL • Getting there: Whitehorse is not the most .accessible of cities, but travellers from London can fly via Vancouver on Canadian Airlines (081-577 7722). Apex fare from £537, plus £21.50 taxes. Blaine Walden runs half-a-dozen backwoods sled trips out of White­horse every winter between January and March. No experience is nec­essary, but participants should be “skier” fit and happy to shovel snow when required. Maximum four guests per trip. The cost of a week-long outing is C$1,700 (roughly £800), plus flights. Book­ings through Arctic Edge, Box 4850, Whitehorse, Yukon Terri­tory, Canada (010 1 403-633 5470; or ring Glyn Lovel on 0372-843032 in Britain for a brochure). Other operators featuring the Arc­tic Edge include Twickers World (081-892 8162) and World Ex­peditions (0628-74174). Health warning: William Green and Blaine used water from the fro­zen lakes, but care must be taken when extracting from such natural sources. The water may harbour a variety of microbes, including giardia, which cause giardiasis, a particularly severe form of diar­rhoea. Boil water for 5-10 minutes or treat with iodine and/or use a water filter that guarantees to ex­tract bacteria, protozoa and viruses. Further information: Visit Can­ada Centre, 62-65 Trafalgar Square, London WC2 (071-839 2299). • William Green travelled as a guest of Blaine Walden's Cadillac Kennels. Arctic Edge and Canadian Airlines HE IS JUST A LITTLE BOY by Chaplin Bob Fox He stands at the plate with his heart pounding fast. The bases are loaded, the die has been cast. Mom and Dad cannot help him, he stands all alone. A hit at this moment would send the team home. The ball meets the plate, he swings and he misses. There's a groan from the crowd, with some boos and some hisses. A thoughtless voice cries, "Strike out the bum." Tears fill his eyes, the gam