Mysteries of the Rocky Mountains’ Dark Twin: The Columbia Mountains

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Beyond the iconic peaks of the Canadian Rockies lies an untamed and mysterious world—an older, shadowy twin known as the Columbia Mountains. While millions of visitors flock to the Rockies to marvel at Banff, Lake Louise, and Jasper, few venture west into this hauntingly beautiful region. Here, the crisp alpine air gives way to an eerie, dreamlike atmosphere that whispers of ancient secrets and untold stories. Join us as we delve into the forgotten tales of the Columbia Mountains.

WILDMAN LEGENDS
0:00:00 – The Rocky Mountains’ Dark Twin
0:02:32 – Mountain Giants
0:04:54 – John Bringsli’s Encounter

LAKE MONSTERS
0:08:06 – The Monster of Kootenay Lake
0:16:06 – Slogopogo

FUR TRADE MYSTERIES
0:21:16 – The Columbia Express
0:23:15 – The Rapids of the Dead
0:28:49 – The Vanishing of Elizabeth Harriott

GOLD RUSH AND RAILROAD MYSTERIES
0:33:14 – Ghosts of Wild Horse Creek
0:39:03 – The Wraith of Revelstoke

UNSOLVED DISAPPEARANCES
0:41:12 – Weird Energy
0:46:17 – The Murder of Carmella Lajeunesse
0:48:11 – The Disappearance of Deborah Schneider
0:49:42 – Myron Shutty’s Mysterious Rescue
0:53:34 – The Vanishing of Wally Finnigan
0:55:57 – The Disappearance of Brianne Wolgram

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39 thoughts on “Mysteries of the Rocky Mountains’ Dark Twin: The Columbia Mountains”

  2. Another excellent video. Your knowledge of the history of both the land and the 1st Nations, makes these really interesting.
    I totally agree that some places where tragedies have happened can have an odd atmosphere, an echo.
    Recently, I visited Culloden Battlefield. It was fairly quiet, not many there. It was a nice day, but as soon as we got to the actual battlefield, it just felt different. Just so lonely and cold.
    Almost 1500 men died in less than an hour during the short battle, mainly Scots. It was a complete massacre.
    There is definitely a feeling of sadness hanging there.
    Have a great week.

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  8. I think Okanagen lake is one of the last lakes fed by the Columbia river before it flows down across the US border, or is a major tributary to the Columbia at least. If there was going to be a lake monster it would likely prefer that water system which includes the huge Kokanee lakes and a handful of large lakes which the Columbia river system flows from one to another. Especially with the multiple dams built along the way as well to deepen the route. The center of British Columbia is nearly one long lake and makes sense that fur traders would use it for transportation. It is also worth looking at the origins of the Fraser River which also begins tucked into the Rockies, and rather than meandering south it makes a huge upside down horseshoe north west to Northern BC then bends south towards Vancouver where it exits into the ocean. I would wonder how the multiple dams on the Columbia river has affected fish and other water species, making a difficult trip to the ocean. The Columbia river sturgeon are probably low numbered compared to the massive free flowing Fraser which contains the largest bodied and largest population of white sturgeon in the world.

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  10. Wells Gray Park is an underrated area containing volcanic mountains and valleys, leading into an almost inaccessible region in its north which has multiple glaciers, Sarlac's pit (Canadas largest cave), high elevation mountain passes filled with Caribou and grizzly bears

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  17. I've been to Fisherville a number of times, and it feels strangely creepy every time. I thought it was just my own perception, but it's crazy to have it corroberated by Hammerson Peters

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  19. Thanks for the interesting stories.

    Can your books be purchased elsewhere than Amazon? I never use that website since it’s bad for brick and mortar small businesses.

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  20. I Live in Nelson BC and thank you 🙏 Hammerson for all your content is amazing , in the West Kootenays we have plenty of wildlife Grizzly bears are plentiful and Rivers still are full of fish , your Sasquatch series didn’t mention my part of the province much but that’s probably a good thing they don’t need more attention

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  22. Hammerson Peters is the History Teacher I always wanted. Only recently went to Radium BC for work. Seeing Banf and beyond makes me understand these stories even more. I live in the PNW. But Canada is no joke…

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  23. I hit LIKE & let these awesome stories play by hotspotting an old cell phone, volume down, so our gracious host still gets credit for the viewing on YT, then I download the vid w/TubeMate as an mp3 & listw w/out having to hear some c___ on a pharmaceutical ad blather on in her atrocious American female accent about plaque psoriasis or whatever food she is feeding her stupid cat. Win-win!!! 🤠

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  26. big oof. do not propagate knowingly false stuff, especially if you work with the person who filmed it, lol. they did not film a documentary, it was a mockumentary. first downvote on this channel.

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  27. I lived in Radium Hot Springs and went to school in Invermere as a kid. The mountains and wilderness in those areas were breathtaking as well as terrifying. It's very easy to get the feeling of supernatural things lurking in those vast forests and rocky cliffs considering how most of it is nearly untraversable for most people. And it was also scary because of the fact that if someone wanted to make you disappear, it could easily be done. As long as they had a truck and enough gas to drive off road for hours.

    On the lighter side we also had a eccentric 'wizard' named Rolf who lived in Radium. A nice hermit who liked to carved faces into logs and trees and had a small collection of goats on his property. There's a small memorial where his house used to be near the roundabout where the big ram horns are.

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  31. I once took a cool rock from atop old fire tower hill above hudson cemetery in Northern Michigan. I was plagued by horrible luck, lost my job and was approached by Animals of all kinds that would stare menacingly at me. I made the drive back to the exact spot and returned it with an apology. My luck leveled out and I got my job back

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  33. Appreciate the detailed breakdown! Just a quick off-topic question: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). What's the best way to send them to Binance?

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  35. Abomination? The Crowsnest? Highway 3, I love that highway, I've walked that highway, all alone, from Grand Forks all the way before I got off at Aldergrove and headed into Langley, multiple times. I've driven that road more times than I can count. It's not an abomination, it's a lovely drive. I don't necessarily recommend walking it, especially at night up in Manning Park, when you can't see your hand in front of your face like I did many times between 18 and 20 but what an experience. Standing at the foot of the Hope Princeton Slide, all alone as the light fades, changes your perspective. Walking the old road that disappears under the slide, all alone, I can't explain that feeling. There's two dead people from my town under that slide and although I was too young to know them personally, I did know the bereaved husband of one of them. I also have five friends that died one night just outside of hope in a car crash, walked past that monument too. I've been on the number 3 cross this whole province, Oh, and I'm 52 born and raised, walked many miles, know the road and we call the whole thing the Crowsnest, not just the pass. If you walk it, trust me, it feels high. You want catch me wiling walking the Coquihalla though, driven it plenty too. That damn road is a trap, I broke track on that road one night in my Camera coming back inland from the Island, hit a blizzard, that was one white knuckle night. The guy at the toll booth was both shocked to see me and thought I was crazy. Apparently they closed the road right behind me, no one knew I was out there. It's the only time in my entire life that snowflakes actually scared me. They where so damn big and the snow was just piling up so fast. I had stopped to catch some sleep for a bit, pulled over, got out to take a pee, literally scared at what I saw coming down. Said nuts to that and plowed on, literally plowed through and I don't think I have tell anyone, a camaro is not the car for that job. An RCMP actually caught up behind me a few miles out of Merit, never so happy to see a cop on my ass in my whole life. I can tell one thing for sure, BC is an adventure, always. I have a mountain of road stories.

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  36. Unsolved disappearances, well I can explain probably most of those, BC and BC mountains are raw wilderness and lot so it. You talk Nelson and Revelstoke sure, pretty obvious choices in size. From Grand Forks, it appears there's only two ways to go, West or East on the number 3, as I said, what we call the Crowsnest, the whole thing. But, well aside from South and that's different stories, you can go North too. Up the Granby or North Fork roads until 10 mile bridge and junction, then it's straight North Fork until you cross the river at 28 Mile Bridge. Nice little camp site immediately on your left, nothing but Granby Grizzly Wilderness looking North. Stay with me, this might get interesting to you. So, you cross the bridge at 28 mile, you could go straight but just don't do it, leave those hillbillys to themselves, trust me. Past the campsite and within the next five minutes you come to another choice, straight up to Blue Joint, which I recommend for camping but bring a truck, or to the right up the Burrell Creek Road. That's the one you want. It can get a little bumpy but it's actually pretty well maintained on account of logging and forestry access road, still bring a truck although I've seen all manner of cars up there. Just after spring runoff it can a little sporty and it's high country so spring runoff runs late. Don't try it in the winter unless you're me. At any rate, carrying on, after a while, you'll come to Gloucestershire Creek and road, the union mine is up that way to the left, it's worth a look just to the creek, nice little camp spot there too, you'll know it, there's a little bridge over the road. You have cross the bridge to find the road up to the mine but the first pull off, before the bridge is the nice little camp spot, good fishing and grouse hunting. Oh, and I don't have time of travel or distance for you anymore because we just went and knew where we where going, we never navigated by distance or time, just name of our spots, that's growing up in the wilderness for you. I can tell you this, the first town is about a 70 mile drive from Grand Forks on this road, so after 28 you have an idea and after 28 to 70, is all dirt. I suppose I better wrap this up quicker. You'll start climbing and I mean climbing. Eventually you come to another cross roads, up to the left, straight and then down or up and to the right, now I've been on all three, camping and hunting, and I can tell for sure, up and to the right, goes much higher and it's a beautiful sight and wonderful spot to camp. Bring a big rifle if you're going to walk around, don't be silly, I'm not joking about Grizzly country, Wolves, wolverines, badgers, mountain lions, yeah, you're in the wilderness. Giant moose, pine martins, beavers, deer, elk, every manner of water fowl, you name it, it's all there. I should have said, I worked for the Forestry Service for a time but I'll digress on that for now too. At any rate, you want the middle road, straight then down, and that road goes down in elevation hard. Watch out the passenger side window though, it'll start appearing in flicker, the big blue, way down below. What you're just starting to catch a glimpse of is the Arrow Lake, and it's something, it's also mostly man made, and it's cold. Great fishing because there's just almost no people. Our secret, although oddly enough it becomes the Columbia River in Castlegar, but then it was always the Columbia and lying at the other end is the North Eastern route 97N from Kelowna. The first thing you come too when coming down to the water is actually a pretty big highways yard, maintaining the logging road but most importantly it sits in this little town the entire world pretty much forgot and one of favourite places on earth. You've only seen towns like this in the movies from a long time ago. One general store, a couple of streets, cars you didn't thing you'd ever see again except on the televison, etc. It's called Edgewood. From Edgewood, which has a new relatively large dock, for what must be pretty big ships but i haven't seen them, it's paved all the way out North to Revelstoke or wherever you want to go from there. For most people it doesn't exist. And there's plenty of that right here in BC, like Slocan, New Denver, to Castlegar. Off the Beaten track, or take the ferry across Kootenay lake and see the back road to Creston, the ferry is Nelson side of Kaslo. There's a whole world out there, off the beaten track that to most the world, doesn't even exist. This is an amazing place, an amazing wilderness but best be prepared, no silly tourists allowed because that world can swallow you hole and call you an unsolved disappearance and a mystery. It's no mystery though, the land consumes what it kills and it kills indiscriminately because that's what nature does, at any moment. It's not personal, it's not a horror, it's just life in the real world and if you make a mistake, wonder beyond your ability, unprepared, it's actually really easy to never be seen again. Now I know people think they know the wilderness has been plundered and picked clean but that's all BS, there are forests up there, where light and sound don't escape. I won't step into them without a compass, not even on the hundredth time I step into them, so, yeah it's not really unsolved, you just remain unfound. And I have plenty of near death stories solely form friends, people who actually do know and almost didn't make it out. Of course plenty of those are in the winter up there. Oh and I know you can google earth it now, it's not what it looks like from space but you know what, you get up there, then you'll know and if you don't want a memory like the Revenant be prepared and don't do anything outside your knowledge. Next time the Santa Rosa, back road to Rossland and my family's giant Homestead from over a hundred years ago, still in the family. 370 acres on the top of the mountain and a river runs through it.

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  38. Alright, I have to pause again at 6:22. Yeah, I know six mile, right where your picture is towards the lake is a cabin that belonged to a good friends parents. Some good stories in that too but I'll attempt to stay relevant. Picking wild berries and they where seen again. Yeah that's not much of a mystery, again, bear country. We lose hunters up there fairly often actually. It's the field dressing, bears have come to understand what a gun shot means. Best have at least two, one standing guard, if you're both knuckle deep with no one watching you have a high chance of getting killed and ending up on the menu for, well, absolutely everything that lives up there. It's just dumb luck if they ever find anything. Same goes for wild berries, you know bears like those. Until one was standing in my yard about 2 years ago, so when I was 50, that area is the only other place I've actually come in contact with a grizzly, eye to eye. Trust me when I say, yard or wilderness, that's a moment you won't forget. You know the other thing is, although rare, most people don't understand, this particular area is a Wolverine and Badger migration route, I won't get into the details just know it. Wolverines especially, can take down large prey, even a damn Grizzly won't mess with those things, no joke. And they eat everything, bone included. I had a friend working up in the Yukon, I have actually several friends lived up there but this particular friend's rig broke down about ten miles out of town one night. So, being like we are, he just walked into town. The company boss was furious, he near got fired. Why? Wolverines, that's why. Everyone thinks Grizzly but the rule for breakdowns was radio and sit tight, not because of Grizzly but because of Wolverines. Even right here on the Washington State border in Grand Forks, a year ago, a person I know had one stuffed in the back seat of his truck, taken near hear but I won't say more then that except, sitting right behind me stuffed, still gave me fright. I had a deer kill in my back yard, oh about a month ago. There days, nothing left. All I saw left in three days was a few birds on a chunk about the size of a dinner plate, nothing else, not even bone. Now it was dragged up the mountain side but, seriously, I didn't even find a bone. So, slip and fall, get taken down, doesn't matter, a few days out in this wilderness and they likely won't ever find anything, maybe chunks of your clothes and seriously, I know a lot of dead people from the woods, ice fishing, snowmobiling, from bears, from logging, lot's of stories, all killed in this wilderness. I even have some good rattlesnake bite stories, no deaths from that in my stories but close enough. I can tell you exactly why juvenile rattlesnakes are more dangerous then large rattlesnakes and no, it has nothing to do with the old BS story that baby rattlesnakes can't control the venom delivery. That one makes me mad it's so stupid. Okay, I'll tell you, I guess for safety I can't let that story go. Juvenile Rattlesnakes, (baby rattlesnakes as people call them), are more dangerous because they don't have rattles yet. Idiots pick them up, more then, well, rattlesnakes with rattles. And thus more dangerous, because more people are bit by them. Crotalus Viridus and Crotalus Oreganus, Prairie Rattlesnake and Northern Pacific Rattlesnake, respectively, are pit vipers. The larger the snake, the larger the venom gland and fangs. The larger the venom gland and fangs, the more venom available to deliver and deeper into the bite site. The bigger the snake, the more danger, if it bites you, it's actually not complicated. Snakes don't want to bite you, to synthesize venom a snake needs protein, to get protein, a snake needs meals, to get meals a snake needs venom. You see their dilemma about biting things they can't eat? Rattlesnakes are actually capable, day one of life outside the egg, to dry bite. Especially when little with little venom to spare, wasting it could easily mean starvation. So, I hope I sorted that out. Now I've almost stepped on a few of those buggers and I don't like snakes, the obvious solution was to learn everything I could about them, it helped, still don't like them though. It's the startle factor, I can hear a bear coming and that'll pucker you up but that damn snake never goes off until he's at my ankle. Turns out I can actually fly with the right motivation,,,,who knew. If you a heart condition, I have no doubt anyone of them, big or small, can kill you without even biting you, if it has a rattle and chooses to use it.

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