Indigenous people have lived in the Bella Coola valley for a long time.  Nobody knows exactly how long, but estimates put it between 8-10,000 years.  With such abundant natural resources and food swimming past your doorstep, it’s easy to imagine why humans have called The Great Bear Rainforest home since the end of the last ice age.

We dropped in on a local family to learn their traditional method of smoking salmon.  “Not very many people do it this way anymore,” says Lorriane Tallio.

Mind you, this is a smallish spring salmon

Slow dried and alder smoked. It takes a lot of patience to do it the old fashioned way.

We also happened to run into this guy on our way to the local stone carvings.  He unearthed them after clearing six inches of moss and says they were carved around 8,000 years ago (although there’s no way to date them).

As the unofficial caretaker, Brian Apps has also adopted the role of art curator. He combines traditional stories from the region along with his own interpretation – much the same way the patron of a modern art exhibit might add their own spin to a work that isn’t totally clear.  There are tales of birth and regeneration, emotion, outer space relatives and our arrival on earth while riding the eyelashes of the sun.

The eulachon is an oily fish that was widely eaten in the valley until the runs dropped precipitously.  The reason for this crash isn’t clear, but the tribe built this statue to beckon their return.