Medal for trail legend

Photo: Shuswap Trail Alliance.

Connie Harris Crowley (2nd from left) receiving the Shuswap Trails award in 2010. (Also shown are fellow trail stewards, Jim Beckner, Jim Hoskins, and Ed Hinman)

Known as a local legend, Connie Harris Crowley recently received national recognition and is to be awarded the Senate 150th Commemorative Medal.

Crowley will receive the medal on Dec. 11 at 2:30 p.m., just ahead of a Salmon Arm city council meeting. The public are invited to attend.

The medal has been awarded to outstanding community volunteers from the interior of British Columbia for their work in building and promoting community trails as a legacy for the future.

“Local trail volunteers had no hesitation in acknowledging Connie as a fitting representative of the thousands of hours invested by members of the Shuswap Outdoors (club), developing recreational opportunities for hiking, snowshoeing, skiing, biking, and paddling throughout the Shuswap,” said Phil McIntyre-Paul, executive director of The Shuswap Trail Alliance, in a press release.

Since the early 1970s, Crowley has been part of a dedicated group whose work led to the evolution of the Larch Hills backcountry trial system, the Larch Hills Nordic Society, most of the Shuswap's iconic alpine hiking trails, the creation of the Mara Meadows Ecological Reserve and helped to guide the creation of the Shuswap Trail Alliance, said McIntyre-Paul.

“All of us owe a deep dept of gratitude to the steady presence and leadership of Connie and Shuswap Outdoors,” he said.

"I truly appreciate the thousands and thousands of trail building volunteers all across our country who have  made it possible for all Canadians to have an opportunity to get out into nature and enjoy healthful physical recreation," said Sen. Nancy Greene Raine.