Engine Block Fire

This morning we went to a canoe steaming. Felix Solomon, a renowned Lummi carver, invited us to come to the steaming of the new river canoe he is creating. We had been to his studio a couple of months ago when the canoe was just starting to appear in the log Felix was carving. Today he had a ceremony and began the steaming process. In the old days his ancestors used fire heated rocks to boil the water in the canoe. This would soften the wood and begin the process of bending the sides of the canoe outward. Today Felix and the men working with him used old engine blocks. You can see one in the upper left of this photo. They actually hold heat better than rocks and serve the same purpose.