Coastal connection

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This article was published 28/05/2022 (1609 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Not everyone is able to travel to the islands and waterways of B.C.’s Salish Sea, an area that’s been home to the Tla’amin, Klahoose and Homalco First Nations for centuries. But Grant Lawrence’s memoir Return to Solitude provides an entertaining and insightful view of the unique characters and multitude of wild creatures — from ticks to cougars to humpback whales — that populate the Desolation Sound area.

Lawrence, who lives in Vancouver with his wife, musician Jill Barber, and children Josh and Grace, is an award-winning author and broadcaster as well as an indie rocker. Return to Solitude is a sequel to his Adventures in Solitude, published in 2010.

Desolation Sound was named by Captain George Vancouver in 1792. Vancouver and his crew were baffled by the complicated mixture of islands, peninsulas, channels and bays located at the northern tip of the Sunshine Coast. Maps inside Lawrence’s book show this intricate geographic network.

As a child, Lawrence didn’t share his parents’ enthusiasm for the rugged beauty of this remote location that his family travelled to each month after his father bought 180 acres of coastal wilderness for $155,000 in 1976. His father subdivided the property into 38 oceanfront lots and built a family cabin in the early 1980s.

As an adult, Lawrence gradually grew to love this saltwater paradise and now revels in introducing his children to the wonders it contains and sharing stories of the colourful residents who once lived there.

One of these former residents is “Cougar” Nancy Crowther. Crowther got her nickname in 1939 after she killed the first of 23 cougars. She had moved to Desolation Sound with her parents and brother when she was nine.

Immigrants from the U.K., William and Doris Crowther were unsuited to the hardships of living in a location that was accessible only by boat. However, the family managed to build a house, plant trees for an orchard, till a garden and raise chickens, geese, goats and bees, supplemented by seafood, to meet their dietary needs. William was also among the first to raise Japanese oysters starting in the 1950s. Nancy married, then divorced, but kept living on her parents’ property until her death at age 71 in 1990.

Lawrence says he was personally impacted the most by another iconic local character, the Hermit, Russell Letawsky. Letawsky grew up on a farm in northern Alberta, but left for the big city — first Vancouver and then Toronto — where he became a proper businessman until he was introduced to marijuana and the hippie lifestyle.

Eventually heading west to B.C., he met a woman in Kamloops whose sister and her boyfriend owned land on Desolation Sound. Letawsky thought having the chance to live off the land and sea was appealing, and he convinced his girlfriend to join him in hiking across the Coast Mountain Range to the West Coast. Avoiding landslides and roaming grizzlies, the couple managed to make it to the coast just before they collapsed from hunger.

Letawsky used his natural charm and ability as a salesman to win friends, including Lawrence’s parents, who grew fond of this “leftover hippie.” Lawrence found that the Hermit’s sisters and daughter weren’t as enamoured with his antics. His daughter told Lawrence that her father was “running from responsibility, accountability, his own integrity and his guilt.”

Despite learning about his hero’s shortcomings, Lawrence feels he learned valuable lessons from the Hermit. “So much of who I am now can be traced back to Russell’s positive influence and teachings. None of that excuses his behavioural patterns, and I only wish that he had imparted some of the gifts he had given to me to members of his own family and loved ones.”

The last section of Lawrence’s book is devoted to detailing the saga of the Spaghetti Bandit, a vagrant who camped in and disturbed First Nations’ sacred cultural sites and holed up in various empty cottages in the area. Local property owners were spooked as the Bandit seemed capable of vanishing straight into the bush to evade capture.

Throughout Return to Solitude, Lawrence’s love for the natural beauty of Desolation Sound comes through clearly. His writing gives a glimpse into this area that’s still a bit off the beaten track thanks to the barriers of mountains and waterways.

Andrea Geary is a freelance writer in Winnipeg.