Friends and family of Taylor, B.C. resident Dieter Eggers, 24, are still seeking answers following his tragic death at Halfway hot springs on Nov. 8.

Nakusp RCMP have attributed Eggers' death to the consumption of so-called magic mushrooms, though they say that in lieu of a yet-to-be release toxicology report, they can't know exactly what caused him to stop breathing and die at the natural outdoor pool.

'Magic mushrooms' is a colloquial term for a variety of different mushrooms that contain the hallucinogenic compound psilocybin and sometimes other natural psychoactive chemical compounds. Investigators still don't know if his death was triggered by a reaction to the mushrooms, another variety of mushroom that was poisonous, something that was added to the mushrooms, or another cause, such as something he ate.

Eggers was travelling with his long-time friend Cameron McSorley, 26. They were en route from their hometown Fort St. John to Nelson when they decided to stop at Halfway for a couple of days to relax, and as McSorley says, get into the "Kootenay spirit."

They had been camping at the hot springs for two days.

In the early afternoon of Nov. 8, they brewed a batch of magic mushroom tea, and had both drank from the same batch. McSorley says he has had no apparent adverse reactions. In addition, McSorley said they had ingested mushrooms from the same batch over the past year with no apparent ill effects on their health.

Eggers' mother says a preliminary autopsy indicates that, regardless of what caused the reaction, the damage it caused to Eggers' internal organs was catastrophic.

Lorna Gardner said the autopsy showed Eggers had a swollen brain and lesions on his heart, lungs and intestines. Gardner believes her son had an adverse reaction to either the mushrooms or something else he'd ingested during the day.

She says being on 'magic mushrooms' could have adversely affected Eggers' perspective on pain. If he had been sober, perhaps he would have noticed something wrong and sought help. "The fact is, if Dieter's body was in the state it was [during the autopsy], he was suffering quite badly physically," she says.

Gardner says Dieter had never had serious allergic reactions in the past.

McSorley says the two had shared many thoughts and feelings during their hallucinogenic 'trip', and they had both felt the effects were waning late in the evening.

McSorley says he brewed the concoction at 3:30 p.m. Eggers died at about 9:30 p.m.

McSorley says they were best friends and had a spiritual connection with each other. They shared many of the same philosophies and often meditated with each other, sometimes for hours at a time.

A couple hours after the peak of their 'trip', McSorley says they began to meditate in the pool. A few minutes later Eggers turned to him and asked, 'Cam, do you mind if I go for a bit?'

McSorley thought he meant down to the river, so he said yes. Then Eggers closed his eyes and moments later began to kick out in the water, and express frustrations verbally.

"It was quite unsettling," says McSorley. "I didn't quite understand what he was doing but I thought he was just wrestling through his emotional state, his past and coming to terms with things."

McSorley said Eggers then indicated that he was hallucinating and seeing apparitions.

Eggers became agitated, and was "wrestling" physically with "demons" that he was hallucinating, and then later exited the pool.

After a while, they both got back in the pool and McSorley says Eggers once again began talking to things he was hallucinating and agreed to "go with them if he had to."

At the time, McSorley says Eggers seemed physically healthy.

McSorley says he was trained as an emergency first responder. He says Eggers had no discolouration and showed no symptoms of poisoning. His skin wasn't white and he had been drinking water.

Shortly afterwards, McSorley borrowed a lighter from two young women who had been bathing in an adjacent pool so he could start a fire.

While stoking the fire he looked over at Eggers and noticed his mouth was open and thought he'd fallen asleep. He'd gone over and slapped Eggers lightly to wake him up and noticed Eggers wasn't breathing and had blue lips.

McSorley said he pulled Eggers out of the pool and pushed on his chest and heard a wheeze. He checked for a pulse on his carotid artery, on his wrist and checked for pupil dilation and there was no response from any of the tests.

"Five minutes prior to that he was breathing fine and looking at those girls," says McSorley.

Eggers had only been submerged up to his navel at the time. "I had checked him, put my hands on his shoulder a couple times to see what his heat was like, and he was doing fine. I thought maybe he was having some kind of a reaction to the mushrooms. It seemed very odd because he'd done them a number of times before and he was fine."

Toxicology results for the case are still pending.