May 15th, 2024 Travel to Clinton and the RoadKill Cafe

We continued our journey north, following the Thompson River:

But we are now in the Valley:

Cute:

Nice church in Spences Bridge:

Cows on the plateau:

Old Settlements:

The scenery just keeps changing:

Time to prepare the fields:

Dandelions everywhere:

Another interesting site:

Our destination tonight was the Gold Trail RV Park in Clinton, BC.  When we pulled in, both of us looked at each other and said "We were here before."  (Yep in 2009.)

We found Mike, the owner, and had a great time talking with him.  He has owned this campground for 25 years and wanted to know why it took us 15 years to come back.  What a hoot!

He also has this great little restaurant called "Roadkill Café".  Interesting signs all around.

We had their BBQ Ribs and they were outstanding!  Here is Mike and Anna:

Thank you Mike and Anna for the great time.  We may see you on the return trip.

If you are passing this way, I highly recommend.  The food is great and the campground prices can't be beat.

Stats for May 15th:

Miles Traveled: 73 Miles

Routes Traveled:

Canada - British Columbia: CA-1; BC-97

We continue north tomorrow so stay tuned and enjoy today.

May 14, 2024 - Fraser-Thompson River Canyon and the town of Lytton

Today was road trip day!  Our first stop was the picnic grounds across from the campground.  It also looks down into the Canyon.  The river thru this canyon is the Thompson River.  Six kilometers south it meets up with the Fraser River.  In the different books I have read, this canyon has also been referred to as the Fraser Canyon or the Thompson-Fraser Canyon. (It gets a little confusing.)

Some interesting tidbits about the area:

So even though we are far from the southern deserts, this area is very desert-like.  In fact, in 2021, the town of Lytton, 6 km. south of here, recorded the highest temperature in Canada - 121.3 F.  "not only broke the record for the all-time highest temperature in Canada, but it became hotter than the historical high temperature of any single country in South America or Europe".

Sadly, the next day, it burned to the ground.

The picture below shows where we are - Skihist Park.

The Thompson-Fraser Canyon:

Trains tunnels and track protectors to keep the snow and landslides from the tracks:

Here is the canyon - the highway is on the left and the railroads (Canadian National Railroad and Canadian Pacific Railroad) are on either side of the river.  This is a busy corridor.  An interesting tidbit:

"CN’s trains are exceptionally long, with the majority now exceeding 10,000 feet in length and some being as long as 15,000 feet. These long trains include intermodal, manifest, and grain. In recent years, grain trains have exceeded 12,000 feet (or 200 cars), with two units at the front and one or two mid-train DPU’s. Intermodal trains can been extremely long, upwards of 270 cars. Some mixed freights consist of huge hauls of lumber coming from northern BC, and can be as long as 12,000 feet with support of a DPU. Potash trains are uniformly 170 cars (or 8,500 feet) and coal trains, while rare, usually an average of 7,600 feet.

CP’s trains tend to be heavy on bulk commodities. CP runs numerous coal trains a day that are uniformly 152 cars with DPU setup of either 1x1x1 or 2x1x1. The railroad also runs many grain and potash trains (the latter the same length of CN), along with intermodal and sulphur. Though CP trains may not be as long as CN, they are quite frequent."

Yes, we could hear them all the time.  No horns just the rumbling and squeaking - it was nice.

There is a tourist train that comes thru this area - might be a future stop.

A train!:

I found this at the top of one of the little hills - love the view:

From there we stopped at the town of Lytton.  Sadly this town burned to the ground in 2021 due to the forest fire that came thru.

They lost so much.  This is the best link to learn about the fire and their loss and the bell:

https://broadview.org/lytton-preserve-history-wildfire/

More information can be found here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lytton_wildfire

https://bc.ctvnews.ca/there-s-nothing-going-on-no-rebuilding-underway-nearly-2-years-after-lytton-b-c-fire-1.6410353

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/12/travel/lytton-fire-canada.html

The bell:

Lytton before the fire:

We continued to explore and found this ferry.  There are very few bridges across the river so this is the other mode of transportation:

The river was running fast:

Interesting tribute to the Chinese Canadians:

Beautiful area:

Our final stop today was this little cemetery in the middle of nowhere.  I could not find any information on it:

What a nice road trip.

We finished the day with another great campfire!

Tomorrow we continue our journey so stay tuned and enjoy today.

May 13th, 2024 - Skihist Provincial Park in British Columbia

We woke to cloudy skies - Bummer..   I did a trip into Chilliwack to break down some money and for fuel.  Before we left, I ordered Canadian money from Wells Fargo and I received mostly $100 bills.  So I needed to get much smaller bills plus coins for laundry and filtered water.

The fuel prices are..well..shocking!  I paid $1.79 per liter which equals $6.81 per gallon.  With the current exchange rate, that brings it to $4.95 per gallon - US.  (Deep breath as I filled the tank!)

Back home, Andy had everything packed up so we hooked up the truck and away we went.

Along the Fraser River Canyon:

The first of the seven tunnels of Fraser Canyon:

Information on all the tunnels can be found here: https://explorenorthblog.com/the-highway-tunnels-of-bcs-fraser-canyon/

The lower Fraser Canyon is very narrow.  It supports a road, the river, and two rail lines - Canadian Pacific Railway and Canadian National Railway.  

We are following the train - or maybe they are following us:

Many trees destroyed by the mountain pine beetle:

And many areas destroyed by fire:

The view from our window in the truck:

Going to the other side of the Canyon:

This area was devastated by fire in 2021:

We made our way to Skihist Provincial Park north of Lytton.  This park just opened after those fires in 2021.  We found a spot that overlooks the canyon and settled in. 

Our view - WOW!:

The fire did not go thru the entire park.  It was stopped about half way up the mountain (the campsites weave their way thru the mountain).

Life is returning:

The campground host stopped by and we chatted for a while.  He hosts here in the summer and winters in Arizona.  He is from the area so told us a lot about the history and about the fires.  So sad.

The sun came out, we put out chairs and enjoyed the rest of the day. 

We closed out the day, enjoying a campfire and cooking steak and potatoes over the fire!

What a great day.

Stats for today:

Miles Traveled: 96 Miles

Routes Traveled:

Canada - British Columbia: Bridal Falls Road; CA-1

Since this is such a nice place, we decided to stay for another day and explore so stay tuned and enjoy today.