HAIL TO THE HUCKLEBERRY
Festival celebrates the tiny morsels
Note to self: Google the berry before heading out picking.
That might have saved us looking like complete newbies with two, large, shiny red buckets better suited for the beach than the steep mountainside.
Who knew huckleberries were so, well, tiny?
Apparently lots of people enjoying the Castle Mountain Ski Resort’s Huckleberry Festival did. Moms toting babies in backpacks with wee tupperware, and seniors with small plastic jugs clipped to their belts were signs of seasoned pickers at the 23rd annual festival.
“I like to see people with margarine containers. I think that’s the perfect size,” says Cole Fawcett, sales and marketing co-ordinator at the resort, who graciously avoided making any comments when five minutes later he saw the giant red beacons in our hands.
The festival has been running for more than two decades now after being started by the local community association. It grew in size and gradually the ski resort took over although the association is still involved and their volunteers were everywhere to be seen last weekend in helping visitors.
The resort makes a donation to the association for its help, and also donates to other user groups.
“We see it as a give back opportunity,” said Fawcett, who notes the festival isn’t a big money-maker but it’s an important anchor in the resort’s plan to draw patrons year round. They hosted their first WildR Rough Runner in June and are looking to add a fall festival in years to come.
The Huckleberry fest used to run over a Friday night and Saturday in late August but last year it was expanded to the entire weekend.
“Last year we took the leap and opened the chair on Saturday and created the all-access pass. I wouldn’t say we saw a dramatic rise in attendance overall but we had an extra 25 to 30 per cent on Sunday,” said Fawcett.
And while people ostensibly go to the Huckleberry Festival to search out the elusive berries, there are many reasons to head there on the last weekend of August. It’s a family-friendly atmosphere with local bands like Eaves and Bruns and Four to the Floor playing on an outdoor stage all weekend, barbecues and a pig roast, mountain biking and e-bike demos, and a swatch of area vendors selling everything from pies and jams from a local Hutterite colony, to chainsaw sculptures and homemade soaps.
In addition, there was a Full Moon Hike and Fine Dining Experience on the Friday which had hikers riding the Huckleberry Chairlift to the top, then following the trail to Haig Lake. There, chef John Warlow and sous chef Liam Braithwaite surprised them with a table laden with peach brandy vodka spritzers and their first course, baby greens paired with prosciutto-wrapped cantaloupe.
They had to hike back down for the rest of the multi-course gourmet meal, all paired with wine — a summer version of the resort’s winter snowshoe and fine dining experience.
Despite the B.C. wildfire smoke drifting across the mountains, it didn’t stop anyone from enjoying all the outdoor activities, from live music to children’s face painting and bouncy castle.
The biggest hits were beanbag tossing during the patio party and the impromptu children’s mosh pit that broke out in the hay bales piled in front of the stage for casual seating.
This is a very small community, about a half-hour drive from Pincher Creek, and while everybody seems to knows everyone, it’s a very welcoming place.
It’s casual and comfortable. And if you don’t know where to look for those berries, just ask.
Volunteers are eager to explain what to look for and where to go.
It turns out that the berries like to grow in the subalpine and at Castle, that means a bit of a stiff climb up the snowcat track from the Huckleberry Chair. (Yes, those are calf muscles back there).
The small bush is easy to spot as it turns a burnt red colour in late summer. The berries, smaller than blueberries, are hit and miss. Some bushes are flush with them while others are barren. But when you find them, they’re so remarkably sweet that you feel rewarded for the hunt. You need to find dozens and dozens to have enough to make anything more than a single tart but it seems most people were happy to just have eaten their findings along the way.
It’s the experience, not the result, that matters.