Monday, March 18, 2024

 Day Tripping to Hope BC


All of the fabulous pictures from the day can be found here on my Flickr web site. Go ahead and click on the link to see the full day's sights, you know you want to! 

Winter was almost over and Spring was just around the corner, a warm weekend was the perfect time to go out and explore some local history.

We picked the city of Hope, which is inland from Vancouver and the Pacific Ocean by 100 miles. Hope is a transportation hub, sitting at the crossroads of three routes. West takes you back to the city of Vancouver, north takes you along Hwy #5 to the Interior of BC via the infamous Coquihalla Canyon. The lakeside playgrounds of Kelowna and Penticton in the Southern Interior are favourite destinations for Vancouverites. Heading  east will take you to the Southern Interior towns of Osoyoos and Grand Forks on historic Hwy #3 also known as the Crows Nest Highway.

Hope is also the location of Fort Hope, one of the original Hudson Bay Trading Company's trading post established in 1849. The Sto:lo First Nations people have been here for more than 8,000 years, far preceding European traders and settlers. The 1,375 km Fraser River was a natural route for First Nations and later for French voyagers and British trappers hunting furs for the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) to send back to England  

Today our crew consisted of myself, wife Annette, grand daughter Adalyn, brother Ken and his wife Linda. First order of the day - BRUNCH !

From home to Hope is a 1.5 hour drive, we agreed to rendezvous at a Hope restaurant and see where the day's plans took us. As it turns out, both parties were a bit early into town and we met up at a local bookstore where Adalyn picked out four books for herself and Grampa picked up three local interest books. Ken picked up a bunch of magazines which the owner had been holding for him as Ken is a semi-regular there.

Our first stop of interest was the Hope Slide, located 15 minutes east of Hope. The Hope Slide occurred in 1965 after an earthquake shook the area. Several people were killed when the slide occurred, and the original road is buried under more than 200 feet of rock.

It was a fair bit cooler at the slide area, as we had gained 2400 feet in elevation and snow was still on the sides of the road and parking area. We all got out to have a look at the slide area, which is marvel to look at as half the side of the mountain had come down and we were now standing on it.  

Adalyn had fun playing on the rocks while the adults conversed about adult stuff and grumbled about how cold we were. 😀

Back in the cars we headed for the main street of Hope to look at the chain saw carvings which make Hope the self proclaimed "Chainsaw Carving Capital of Canada." 

What started out as a way to save a beloved, dying city tree turned into a tourist attraction for the town and a new industry for the local people. More than 80 carvings can now be found around the town; Maps can be found at the local tourism bureau to use for your self guided walking tour.

After looking at some of the carvings and Adalyn playing on the playground, we headed a few blocks to the north side of town to look for a geocache on the banks of the Coquihalla River where it meets the Fraser River. We did not find the geocache, but the Fraser River is very wide here and the once flooded shoreline forests are a stark reminder of the furies of a river during the Spring freshet as well as when the winter storms come calling.   

After our playtime at the river and our disappointing defeat of failing to find the geocache, ice cream was in order ! The local Dairy Queen as just what a 10 year girl (and the adults) needed to recuperate and feel better about ourselves. And so it came to be, continuing the tradition of visiting the DQ in Hope BC, a tradition which has been carried on through four generations of family !

Ice cream in our tummies and our pride restored, we headed west along Hwy #7 for our next point of interest. We stopped a couple of times along the way to find geocaches as Adalyn loves "treasure hunting" and Ken and myself kinda like it too. No day's outing is complete if we don't look for a few geocaches.  :)

Saturday was the first day the Kilby Museum was open for the season, at least that is what their website said. Apparently things did not work out for them as the museum was still closed for the season when we arrived in the afternoon. (No pictures to tease you with, will save that visit for a future day)

With the museum closed, we visited nearby Kilby Park located on the Harrison River. The parking lot was full but we managed to stop and grab a cache in the bush near the parking lot. Adalyn had the sharp eyes here and found the cache for the team. Which made us feel good as Ken's ego (well, maybe mine as well) is easily shattered if we can't find an easy-to-find geocache right under our feet.

We headed west a bit further and stopped off at a local slough which is a haven for the endangered Western Painted Turtle and found two more caches in the area. Ken spotted the cache and Adalyn made the grab. The cache  was hidden on the back of a sign advising the area is a nature reserve for the turtles, and attached to the cache container was a plastic turtle - how fitting.

With the latest two caches found and the day winding down, we said our goodbyes to Ken and Linda, and headed west still on Hwy #7 which would bring us to Adalyn's house. We stopped in for a short visit with our daughter Samantha and the other grandkids Rowan and Camden before continuing on another 30 minutes to home. 

Once home Annette's first order of business was to entertain the cat, while I downloaded the pictures from the camera and logged the geocache finds for the day. Now, where can we go next week ?

Thanks for sharing the trip with us, please leave a comment down below if you enjoyed the story.

                

 

Wednesday, December 27, 2023

 Five Corners, the Heart of Old Chilliwack BC


After the usual Christmas Day rain, Boxing Day was sunny and a balmy 10 Celsius. Annette and I took advantage of the good weather and drove to Chilliwack BC to visit the old section of the town. Five Corners is so named as three roads intersect here. One of the roads was originally known as Landing Road, which was the road leading to the original settlement named Chilliwack Landing located on the banks of the Fraser River. At some point Landing Road is renamed Wellington and appears as such at the junction. The second is Old Yale Road, which was is the original road created to join New Westminster BC to Yale BC, which is located in the Fraser River Canyon. The remaining street name is Young Road, all of these are major thorough fares in the north part of the city.


For many years this important crossroads area has been neglected and was showing its age as evidenced by the rundown state of the buildings and the closed businesses. Visiting the area today it is obvious the city has spent time and money on revitalization and as part of that process has allowed a new residential-shopping area named District 1881 to be built. The project re-creates narrow pedestrian only streets, with numerous shops on the bottom and one and two story condos above.



The buildings are lovely, and they are doing a great job of re-creating an old style shopping environment with what will be popular stores, restaurants, and pubs on the mall, right in the centre of the small downtown area. Within a two block radius in any direction are all the larger stores, services, and grocery stores you need.



We also spent some time and walked around the blocks adjacent to the 5 Corner intersection and were pleased to see the progress in re-vamping the older buildings on the streets. Some of the stores had historic newspaper articles detailing the history of the street itself which made for interesting reading.

After spending a couple of hours wandering the neighbourhood, we headed with the setting sun and were rewarded with a full moon rising over the local mountains.

Pictures of that wonderful moon and the rest of the day's pictures can be found here on my Flickr web site.

. .

Wednesday, August 02, 2023

 Maple Ridge Nightly Bear Visits


Since the warmer weather has come we have had several bears using our front yard as a walkway.

 Same pattern every time, the bears come out of the ravine across the street, check out the neighbour's on the left, walk across our yard or porch, then check out the other neighbour's yard. With this being summer, the bears seem to think a diversion to our side yard is in order to check out our blueberry bushes. Pity for the bears, between our grandkids and the racoons, the bushes are now barren. 

Three short videos for you to see, all from the same visit, just different camera angles. In the second video the window on the house is open and I watched the bear walk past the open window only six feet away from where I was sitting. 








   

Saturday, January 16, 2021

A Nomad in North Vancouver

 


CLICK ON ME TO SEE ME IN REAL LIFE SIZE 

This Saturday dawned slightly overcast with a promise of clearing skies for later in the day. That was enough of a tease for me to prompt me to check the charge on one of my camcorders and one of my cameras and ponder where we should go for a drive today. The "we" changed into a "me" as Annette was not up to a day of wandering aimlessly in the car. Funny, that sounds exactly like something I would like to do!

With the crew dwindling to a singular person I decide to return to one of my favourite haunts as a young man - North Vancouver.

NOTE - ONLY A FEW PICTURES ARE POSTED HERE. SEE THE LINK AT THE BOTTOM OF THE TRAVELOG FOR ALL THE PICTURES ON THE DAY

North Vancouver is located on the north shore of Burrard Inlet, across the water from Vancouver, hence the name of North Vancouver. My love of exploring the forest on a rainy day was enforced by many a rainy fall day wandering around the older original communities like Dundarave, Dollarton and Edgemont Village. Linear parks encompass major rivers which run down off the flanks of the Coastal Mountains and empty into Burrard Inlet. These parks provide the public access to what is, for many of them, an awe inspiring experience. No other experience fills the senses like the sounds of a heavy rain falling on the ancient trees comprising the temperate rainforest of South Coastal BC. All the water falling from the skies continues its trip by flowing from the forest floor into creeks, streams and eventually raging rivers carving deep canyons through the local mountains. And we get to experience all that on those rainy days if you have the will to get Out and About

Strolling along a riverside forest trail surrounded by enormous trees it is hard to believe most of North Vancouver was practically cleared of trees in the 1800s and early 1900s to supply wood for the fast growing Vancouver city and fledgling suburbs At the turn of the century most of these outlying suburbs required a tram ride or even a train ride on the Inter Urban BC Electric Railway to be reached.

Red Cedars, Douglas Firs, Western Hemlock and Pacific Yews all grow to incredible heights in the mild and rainy environment. Sadly, you have to look hard to find a few remnants of these 500-800 year old legends.

I started my day visiting the sleepy village of Edgemont located in the upper realms of North Vancouver near the Capilano River. As with any area you have not visited for a long time, things change. The sleepy village was no longer so sleepy - new grocery stores had been built, along with a few medium size condo blocks. There was now even two stop lights in the three block long village!

Even with the new buildings and obvious growth you could see the municipality was taking pains to maintain the integrity of the small communal village which was rewarding to see. I snapped a few pics off  main street but the original small town charm I remembered could not be captured on camera as the lens always tells the truth.

I left the village and headed a mile or two away to enter Capilano River Regional Park, which is the location of the Capilano Fish Hatchery. The hatchery complex has excellent sheltered self guiding information boards complete with a viewing section where you can watch the salmon jump up as they travel along a man made fish ladder back into the hatchery complex. The fish ladder is chest high enclosed behind thick glass which allows the public to experience the actual size of the salmon just inches from their face. Needless to say it is a huge hit with the kids.

Unfortunately, like many locations the facility was closed due to Covid concerns - the good news is the wild river was right there to enjoy. I snapped off a few pictures of the small dam built to moderate the water flow for the benefit of the salmon as they approach the fish ladder. In the distance of the above picture notice the tell tale mist along the river surface and the canyon-like terrain. We'll talk about that in a minute 

I wandered around the immediate area but not wanting to be diverted by the beckoning forest trails I pondered my next moves. I formulated a haphazard itinerary for the next couple of hours and decided my next obvious tour stop was half a mile upstream.


The Capilano Watershed area provides 1/3rd of Metro Vancouver's drinking water and the 91 metre (300 feet) high dam built in the natural river gorge is an excellent place to visit on any day. Apparently 100 other people thought so as well as it took me 10 minutes to score a parking spot in the small parking area.

Staring directly down a spillway's 300 foot drop is mesmerizing and has the effect of a magnet just holding you in place watching the water cascade down to the bottom lip of the spillway and exploding into a mist in the canyon below.

During this tour stop a few drops of rain had started to land on me, forecasting an end to any future photo ops I had planned. I made my way to the lower slopes of North Vancouver closer to the water of Burrard Inlet. The lower slopes around the Lonsdale Avenue corridor is where the rich moved from the common neighborhoods near the water. As North Vancouver prospered, there was a demand for prestigious neighbourhoods where the newly rich could showcase their wealth.   

Grand Boulevard running north-south to the east of Lonsdale Avenue, is a garden subdivision built in 1906 as the premier neighbourhood for those newly rich folks. The one mile long Garden Avenue is highlighted by a 345 feet wide grass area between the east and west legs of the street. This provided the wealthy residents the best sight lines down to the water front and to Vancouver City across the water. The wide boulevard also acted as a fire break, which was a major consideration as the same year as Grand Boulevard was coming into existence, there was a disastrous fire in San Francisco as a result of an earthquake.

Keith Road acts as the southern terminus of Grand Boulevard, and just a few blocks west on Keith Road we can see this wide boulevard idea repeated in what must have been a neighbouring garden subdivion for the wealthy.

My last tour stop was to be high up the mountain in West Vancouver - there is a lookout on Cypress Road which leads up into the Cypress Mountain ski area. Sadly, while I was wandering around the old timey rich neighbourhoods, the clouds had descended down the mountains blocking out any views to be had of Vancouver City from on high. And minutes later the rain started in earnest, putting a definite end to my day tripping. As much as I enjoy playing in the rain, my ambitions for my photo taking required clear vistas, and my open window to enjoy the break in the rains was now over.

I stated the journey home, happy that I had another chance to go out and explore and only slightly disappointed the day was not longer. There is always a next time and plenty of beautiful parts of our local to visit, so I'm not concerned with an abbreviated day - you roll with the flow !

ALL PICTURES ON THE DAY CAN BE SEE ON MY FLICKR PAGE HERE      

If you enjoyed this travelog drop me a comment either on this page or by email. Thanks for coming along on my day Out and About. 

Sunday, January 10, 2021

Aimless in Abbotsford



Been a while since I have been Out and About, as the saying goes. Between Covid restrictions and the onset of the poor weather, I have been doing a lot of staring at my collection of video and photography equipment hoping I get a chance to use it again.

This Sunday was an unexpected day where we had nothing on the agenda, and pretty well all the chores were up to date. An break in the non-stop chain of rain storms meant a few hours of dry time for me to be out wandering around.

I kept it simple, I picked my trusty point and shoot camera, and headed to the Fraser Valley town of Abbotsford. I knew of a few eye worthy places to snap some pics, and thought I would explore some of the little sides streets I had not been down before.

To see these pictures in a larger format, click on any photo.

Go ahead, you know you want to !



My first side excursion of the day was to poke around Matsqui, a farming community on the north side of the Fraser River. Straight roadways lined with trees planted as windbreaks is a hallmark of farming areas and there were plenty examples to be seen here.

The flat farming terrain also provided views of the low clouds enveloping the low mountains forming the ridge of the Fraser Valley. 


  The clouds clung to the higher mountains on the northside of the valley even more so, blocking out any scenic shots to be had in that direction.


After dawdling in Matsqui I headed over to main main objective for the day, the Township of Abbotsford. And now you are wondering, what's so special about these two buildings in the picture above? Well, if you have ever watched those Hallmark TV movies you would have seen these two buildings in many of those movies. At least, that is what my wife tells me ..  yeah ....

Vancouver is called Hollywood North and it is not uncommon to have two dozen TV/movies shoots ongoing at any given time. One of the most common movie channels to shoot in the area is Hallmark. For some reason they seem to love this two buildings - they are either using the older white building or the larger brick building as a main movie location. Seeing as I was already here exploring Abbotsford,  I naturally had to see for myself where these were actually located.


The Hallmark buildings are located in the old section of Abbotsford, which is roughly five blocks squared. I parked the car and meandered around the side streets and alleys looking for worthy subjects and came across the murals seen here. They encompass the back of the Hemmingway's book store, a very large and popular used bookstore in town. A lot of time was spent by the artists painting these vibrant murals and they look great and add life to a forgotten back alley.


A few years ago the Downtown association commissioned several sculptures to add to the visuals of the area. These three guys are very lifelike and have been in many a tourist photo. I also have snapped them a few times over the years.


The Goose in the Truck adds a touch of whimsy to the scenery, I have to admit, this Goose looks like he has real attitude! I can just imagine him leaning on the horn yelling for people to get out of his way! Must have received his license in downtown Vancouver  :)


The "art" scene is represented as well with a bench in the form of a large easel complete with dripping brush, all supported by a squeezed out tube of paint. Sadly the surface of this bench is in need of some TLC. Would look so much more vibrant if it was cleaned up and resurfaced.


 After exploring more of the downtown side streets, I decided to head towards another historic section of the general Abbotsford area, in the village of Clayburn. As I drifted in that general direction I kept my eye out for anything that caught my eye. And this sure did - Snoopy flying a Sopwith Camel airplane! I spotted this in someone's backyard mounted high for all to see from the street. That was definitely worth a stop to snap a picture - great job by the resident ! 


I took the long way around as I headed into Clayburn as I wanted to reach higher ground to obtain an aerial view of the surrounding area. I had circled back towards the Fraser River and was getting close to the Matsui farmlands again. Clayburn is nestled against those low mountains seen in the first scenic picture of this post. These low mountains have something needed for building construction at the turn of the century - clay. Perfect for molding into bricks and when heated and fired, perfect for building brick buildings.



I have been to the village of Clayburn several times over the years but only to look at the old General Store and the ruins of the brick ovens in the nearby bush. 



Today very little remains of the original town buildings. A few brick bungalows that were workmen cottages, and the General store. The land where the original factory buildings stood seems to have been cleared and is now a soccer field. It is quite possible they have bulldozed away the old kiln ovens. In the past, when I have walked through the bush, you would stumble upon a pile of brick rejects that broke during the firing process, so they were just dumped outside in a pile. I have retrieved a few bricks from those piles, all bearing the Clayburn name. So popular were the bricks, it was not uncommon for me to discover historic buildings in other cities in Southern BC built by bricks bearing the Clayburn name.


Today I spent an hour or so walking the side streets and discovered the original Clayburn School, and the Clayburn Church, which were new to me. These two building were only a block off the main street,  but I had yet to see them in all my travels in the area. Thus proving one of my favourite adages - "take the road less travelled, for there is more to see" 



 

These two buildings leant an air of charm to the small village and you could imagine the town folk of the day actively using the buildings as part of their daily lives. While the visible remaining structures from the original Clayburn townsite are small, they still allow you envision a time when the brick factory and the local community compromised the entire world for the work force. Vancouver probably seemed a long ways away. In the day, a trip to Vancouver was an all day event using the B.C. Electric train that ran from Chilliwack to Vancouver, with stops at various Fraser Valley communities along the way.


My last stop of the day was back across to the north side of the Fraser River into the town of Mission. Originally a major First Nations community, the first Europeans were Oblate priests whom established a mission high on the hill above the river.


With the coming of the CPR railroad, the city itself was created through a land auction by the stake holders of the railroad. Farming was the original economy of the area, however the salmon industry soon became a driving force as well. Five species of salmon inhabit the Fraser River, providing a large industry to exploit. White Sturgeon are found from the Mission Bridge, upstream to the town of Yale in the Fraser Canyon. The White Sturgeon live for over 100 years and grow up to 20 feet long. The sturgeon are true dinosaurs, as they have not changed much in millions of years.  
Supplementing the fishery industry was the boat and net repair companies. While many of these businesses have died off, the small industrial riverfront area shows its heritage by the businesses along the side streets    



The shore front has been cleaned up allowing for pedestrian access. A large viewing platform has been created for the locals to rest and sit on the benches while they enjoy their coffee watching the comings and goings of the local ship traffic. The local mountains complement the view by providing a scenic backdrop for daily life on the river. Like Abbotsford, Mission City has begun to install pieces of art around the city. With its large First Nations presence, some of the pieces have been created by local native artists. The Bald Eagle sculpture shown here represents the importance of the eagle in First Nations history. The statue also serves as a reminder of when the Bald Eagle congregate in the area each Winter. Just to the east of Mission is the Harrison River.  Each winter thousands of Bald Eagles migrate south from their summer grounds in Alaska and spend the winter feasting on the salmon runs in the Pacific Northwest. The primary winter feeding grounds are; just north of Squamish in the town of Brackendale; in the Harrison River area of the Fraser Valley; and in the U.S. south of the border in the upper Skagit River Valley. I've been to all three locations during the winter feeding times, and by far the Harrison River offers the most accessible viewing of the eagles. 


   By now the day was coming to an end, as daylight was beginning to wane, and the small bits of open skies were being replaced by darker clouds. Another round of rain storms are on the way, but at least I enjoyed a long overdue day of being Out & About in my extended "backyard" compromised of the 100 mile long Fraser Valley. Time to head home, download my pictures and see what I captured of the day.

If you liked the write up please leave a comment below.
A more complete set of the day's pictures can be viewed on my Flickr site here     
   

Friday, September 06, 2019

Story Of A Trip About "Vs' And "Ks" and One "M"


Click on any of the pictures to make them full size for your viewing enjoyment!

Once again I had the dubious pleasure of going on a geocaching road trip with two of my brothers where we spend an extended weekend touring cities and geocaching and acting like teenagers rather than grown men. It was a blast !

Brother Al and Brother Ken and myself headed to the Interior of BC looking to visit Al's son in Kelowna and another of our brothers and his wife in Vernon.

The trip took us from Vancouver through the cities of Mission, Kelowna and Vernon. Hence the name of this episode called V's and Ks and one M

We cruised out through Mission BC where we spent some time looking for a few caches in the city. The big "M"  you see in the picture above is an art piece celebrating the town of Mission and its industrial heritage. We did a few easy city caches, just enough to start the weekend on a positive note with successful hunts.


After Mission we crossed over the mighty Fraser River and headed to the Upper Fraser Valley city of Chilliwack. Once in Chilliwack we crossed over to the north side of the river and took some scenic farm roads as we followed a geocache series that wound it's way east with the landscape alternating between fields of summer time corn almost ready for harvesting, and quiet enclaves where livestock grazed the fields.
The nice thing about taking the back roads is you see more scenery than if travelling the highways and you come across unexpected treasures.

In this case the small village of Rosedale provided a stellar surprise in the form of an antiques shop housed in an old garage. Outside scattered around the garage property were old trucks. I have to admit my brothers are more into old cars than I am, but even I was impressed with a couple of vintage trucks that are rare to find. And to have two of them on the same lot was even rarer.


A red Diamond T flatbed was prettied up and parked waiting for admirers to come along. Diamond T trucks were built as luxury trucks of the times, if you had one of these you had serious money.


The other pretty boy on display was a Federal truck. I have seen a lot of old Fords and Chevies and Dodges but not often you see a Federal parked nonchalantly among the other old trucks.

After finishing our caching around Chilliwack we stopped for a quick bite to eat in Hope, then hotfooted it to Merritt and beyond to make up for time spent.
The three brothers arrange a geocaching road trip 2 - 3 times a year. The downside to frequent caching and road tripping is you tend to have to go through the same towns to get outside of your normal range. As a result of this, we have done many of the caches on the main roads that run to and through those towns.

Just east of Merritt we pulled into a natural grasslands reserve and found two Gold Country caches. The Gold Country series were created by multiple towns in the Thompson area of BC getting together drum up tourist business for their dying towns. And they scored big.
Over 200 hundred geocaches stretching from Merritt to Lytton and Lilloeet and all the way north to Clinton ensure there is a steady stream of folks running around the towns and areas looking for hidden treasure. Those same people overnight in the small towns, buying meals, gas, groceries and filling motel rooms and campsites which is a tremendous boost to the local economy.


As we had crossed over the Coast Mountains we were now on the leeward dry side of the mountains and the coastal rain forests of the coast had been replaced with dry grasslands and rolling hills.This is prime cattle and horse land, and many ranchers enjoy a good life living the cowboy way.


After finding the Gold Country caches we were back in the truck and on our way to Kelowna. Al's son Chris was expecting us and as Chris was out caching himself we sent him a hail to let him know we were in town and where to meet us.
Chris met up with us a city cache at a local farmer's market where we collectively found a geocache hidden on an old tractor.
It was good to see Chris as Ken and I had not seen him for months, and dad Al was happy to see his son as well. Family grows and move apart from each other, so you treasure those moments when you can get back together, even for a little while.

We managed to sneak in a few caches before the sun went down, and at that point we decided dinner and a beer were high on our list of things to find next..


ABOVE = Al and Ken AKA Bowser98 and MrTJ

Saturday we were out caching in the sunshine again with Chris along as a local tour guide. We did some downtown caches, some neighbourhood caches, and few caches on the outskirts of the city that brought us up into the hills for a good view of Kelowna.

 
The houses in the picture have lovely views but are sitting atop a rock, so chances of having a backyard to play is is limited. But you have what you want and what you can pay for. I guess if you don't have kids you don't have to worry about them falling off the cliff in your back yard.

We spent the day puttering around Kelowna and as the afternoon wore on we started working our way north towards Vernon. We had a dinner engagement lined up with another brother and his wife, so we had to keep on the move and be conscious of the time, all the while trying to get "one more cache" squeezed into the drive.


The Okanagan area of BC is lined up in a north-south orientation which follows the path of a glacier more than 10,000 years ago.
From Osoyoos in the south, which is located right on the Canada - U.S. border, to Vernon in the north, the Okanagan Valley is one long valley blessed with perfect weather for harvesting wines and fruit.
The wide valley also presented generous views along our route as we traveled to Vernon.

We made it into Vernon just a few minutes late, but then we found out there were two hotels of the same name just blocks from each other. One has the proper name, the other one doesn't advertise that name and the signs on the hotel use some other name. After wasting some time going back and forth we finally guessed at the right hotel and found our brother Wayne and his wife Inga waiting for us. Wayne has been having a medically tough time the past few years, so the visit meant all that much more. We would have loved to continue the visit after dinner but the whole exercise of getting out of the house and going out for dinner was too much of a strain for Wayne's health so we said our goodbyes for the night.


Sunday morning brought the threat of rain for the day. We didn't mind that too much as Wayne and  Inga had told us in conversation the temperature for the past three weeks had been hovering in the 40C degree mark. Way too hot to geocache as the heat just saps the strength out of you, and a fun day of geocaching quickly turns into sunburn, heat stroke, and a visit to the Dairy Queen instead of geocaching.

We cached in the morning in and around Vernon, one of the fun and pleasant things we seen was the community book exchange in some of the neighbourhoods. The city, or neighbours even, build these small elevated boxes and the residents donate books they have read. Other residents will visit, bring their own books, and exchange them for books which are in the box. This sort of idea brings the community together and as a visitor it is gratifying to see a positive vibe in the community.

We stopped for lunch and made that the break away point from our geocaching in Vernon, as we now had to start heading back towards Vancouver and we had a lot more caches to find on the way home.  Chris, Al's son whom had driven back from Kelowna that morning, joined us for lunch. As we were chowing down on our fine cuisine as presented by the local fast food chain, the rain started coming down in buckets.
Just as well, as we had an hour and half drive ahead of us to the next series of caches a couple of hundred miles away, so let it rain all it want.
We said our goodbyes to Chris, jumped in the truck, turned on the windshield wipers, and began the trip southward towards the Coast


The rain was just letting up as we reached our first stop on the new route of caches. We were now back in the range grasslands not too far from Merritt, with an old barn on a farm the location of our first cache.

A narrow glacier carved valley studded with low lands and intermittent small lakes and ponds headed south from the small community of Aspen Grove to Princeton. Along this valley were a series of caches amounting to 18 or more that would provide a few more notches on the belt for cache finds, as well as provide an alternative route home rather than the standard fast speed highways.


Many of the caches we were to find were located at roadside pullouts either along side on of the multitude of lakes, or they were on rises in the land which provided unspoiled views of the narrow valley.
     

Make no mistake, we were back in Cowboy land and if you forgot that for a minute, signs for dude ranches and country crafts helped you remember. So did the cow patties when you stepped away from the main roads and ventured on the side roads past the cattle guards.


It's surprising on how much time is taken up looking for geocaches, even if you have picked the ones close to parking so you can turn them into "park and grabs".
Between the miles to travel to Princeton and finding the caches along the route, it was dinner time when we rolled into Princeton.
A quick tailgate dinner was on the menu as we had another 135 miles to go and a 90 minute drive to our last few caches.


Our last cache to find was in Sunshine Valley just east of Hope.While the area is becoming increasingly popular as a weekend cabin area or year round out of the way home, it's original purpose was much darker.
This was the site of one of the internment camps for Japanese citizens during World War II.
It was wrongly assumed that if you were of Japanese heritage, you would turn against your own country and betray them during the war. Many families were rounded up, stripped of their monies, homes, business, and sent inland away from the coast to live in cold cabins more befitting a war criminal or POW.

Kudos to the local heritage society for keeping the memory of this painful part of history alive and in plain view of travelers lest we forget our mistakes of the past.

By now it was 7.30 PM and we still had a two hour drive to get to my house were Al had left his truck. Al still had another hour drive home after that while Ken's trip was considerably shorter.
We arrived home in the dark, emptied our gear out of the truck, had a chat about the weekend and when we should go again, then it was time to head into the house and get ready to head back to work in the morning.

Three brothers got to spend a weekend together, got to visit an ailing brother, and visit a son/nephew all on the same trip. And no band aids and gauze were required like one of our previous trips. (That's on another travelog report)  😉
   

The complete set of pictures can be found here on my Flickr photo web site.

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