By James MacDougall
A few weeks ago Ray and I visited the Corran at Spirit Rock Conservation Area. We returned yesterday and went on the trail to the lookout. Along the trail there is an area that opens up into a grassy “orchard”. It is a wild and abandoned but you can make out what might be cherry or apple trees as well as some of the lost children of the rose garden that once grew there.
There was a grove of birch trees that we passed. When I was very young my mother collected birch bark from the road side. later she would cut patterns out of it and sew together tiny birch bark canoes and tee-pees. Spirit Rock is associated with a tragic “Indian Princess” legend. The story is that a young native woman fell in love with a member of a rival tribe and the following tribulations ended in her leaping off the cliff to her demise at Spirit Rock. On stormy nights when the lightning flashes ‘they’ say that her face can be seen profiled in the cliffs. Most of these Indian Princess stories seem to have been the creations of white settlers rather than actual native lore.
The lookout is fairly overgrown with cedar trees but a view of Colpoy’s Bay with it’s clear, almost tropical blue, water can be seen.
