VANCOUVER — Hockey legend Ernie (Punch) McLean may be 77, but he says his age was no liability in coping with being lost without food for four days in the remote woods of northern British Columbia.
“I’m in excellent shape. I’m physical through hockey and things like that. I am a little bit of a health nut. I take care of myself very, very well that way,” he said Friday in an interview from the RCMP detachment in Dease Lake, a small B.C. community about 250 kilometres south of the Yukon border.
McLean has spent years in the region looking for gold after retiring from a successful career in B.C. amateur hockey.
On Sunday, while working his gold claim with some friends, he fell about 23 metres down a crevasse.
“I rolled like a little kid,” he said.
He wasn’t injured, but got lost trying to find his way back.
