Paper Trails: From Trees to Trash - the True Cost of Paper by Mandy Haggith

Author:Mandy Haggith [Haggith, Mandy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: nature, Environmental Conservation & Protection, Technology & Engineering, Manufacturing, Travel, Essays & Travelogues
ISBN: 9780753513293
Google: 3O5NDBHgihgC
Publisher: Virgin
Published: 2008-11-15T00:14:17.597529+00:00

Catface

Although non-binding environmental protection and improved forestry recommendations by Clayoquot Sound Scientific Panel had been adopted in 1996, in 1999, International Forests (known as Inter-for) bulldozers were still ploughing yet another logging road into the pristine forest. My partner Bill and I had just returned from Mears, one of many islands in the Sound, blissed out with images of amber foliage under fern-decked cedars and hemlocks. We were looking for more adventure.

A harassed-looking young man in combats welcomed us into the Friends of Clayoquot Sounds office and indulged us as we raved about the 1,500-year-old giant cedars between whose toes we had been camped for the last few nights. ‘You weren’t put off by the rain, then?’ he smiled. It rains all the time on the west coast of Vancouver Island: they measure rainfall in metres.

Bill shook his head. ‘We’re from Scotland. We were actually wondering if you could recommend anywhere else we should go. We only came back because we ran out of food.’

Our host looked us up and down, and then grinned. ‘Fancy a bit of direct action?’

Bill and I confirmed with a glance. ‘If it’s in the forest, we’re up for anything.’

‘You won’t be risking arrest. It’s just that we’re blocking some bulldozers in on Catface Mountain, but two of our activists had to leave this morning. Now there’s only Maryjka left on the blockade. It’s pretty quiet at the moment, but we don’t like only having one person out there, just in case anything goes off.’

‘We’re all yours.’

We were duly signed up and dashed off to get some provisions. Half an hour later we were in a speedboat hurtling across the sound to the foot of Catface Mountain. Boat is the only way in and out of this spectacular forest. After a long slog up a steep logging track from the jetty we found the blockade: boulders and logs across the track and a huge tarpaulin slung between several trees. Under it, beside a puffing camp stove, sat an elf-like woman. This was Maryjka. Once she realised we were there to support her, she leaped to her feet and launched into a series of stories about Canadian people and organisations we had never heard of. We pointed out that evening was drawing in and we should sling our tent up before it got dark. She showed us to a clearing behind the roadblock and Bill set about pitching the tent, while Maryjka gave me the full tour of the site.

A few minutes later, an engine growled towards us, and Bill came scampering with his camera. ‘Er, what’s the protocol here on the vehicles? He nearly knocked the tent down with that bucket.’ Emerging out of the woods behind Bill was a yellow excavator the size of a house, a bucket swinging on the digger arm big enough to scoop up a car.

‘He’s just being macho as usual,’ said Maryjka. ‘They’re outrageous, those drivers, they really are. They’re always trying to frighten us.’

The digger ground towards us with a check-shirted man glowering inside.

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