Rattlesnake Island (Okanagan Lake)
Rattlesnake Island is a small island on Okanagan Lake, directly east from Peachland. The land and shore surrounding the island form part of Okanagan Mountain Park. Legend has it that Rattlesnake Island is the home of Ogopogo, the lake's legendary monster.
In the 1970s, the island was developed as a tourist attraction, including a mini-golf course with a replica of the Great Pyramid at Giza and a Giant Camel (confectionary was going to be built on it, but that plan was later abandoned after only one day of business after opposition from the provincial government and others). In 2003, a lightning strike near the island started the Okanagan Mountain Park Fire that burned a large portion of the surrounding park but not the island.
Read more about Rattlesnake Island (Okanagan Lake): History, Folklore
Famous quotes containing the words rattlesnake and/or island:
“When you see a rattlesnake poised to strike, you do not wait until he has struck to crush him.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“We crossed a deep and wide bay which makes eastward north of Kineo, leaving an island on our left, and keeping to the eastern side of the lake. This way or that led to some Tomhegan or Socatarian stream, up which the Indian had hunted, and whither I longed to go. The last name, however, had a bogus sound, too much like sectarian for me, as if a missionary had tampered with it; but I knew that the Indians were very liberal. I think I should have inclined to the Tomhegan first.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)