Thursday May 23                                  Partly cloudy & warm-ish                           New Denver/Sandon, BC

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Time for a visit to New Denver. It's about 50km. So off we go! 

Hwy 31A snakes its way all the way there, following the Kaslo River. I think there were only 2 short straight stretches in the entire drive.

We parked Alfie and walked back up the street to the Nuru Coffee Bar. 

Well, that's nice—it's closed for a "Short Break". 

Reversing course, we walked back, down the street, past Alfie, to the Apple Tree Sandwich Shop. 

Coffee and treats outside in the sunshine at a picnic table were most enjoyable. The garden is just starting to bloom with spring flowers.

Just a short walk away was the Silvery Slocan Museum and the Lancet, a restored motor launch.

This is Lancet's engine.

Back at Alfie, we drove to the municipal campground and walked to the water's edge of Slocan Lake.

During WWII, New Denver was the site of an internment camp for Japanese-Canadians. We strolled through the gardens but did not go into the buildings.

Okay, so that's pretty much New Denver. Time to head to Sandon—just a short distance away about 6 km off Hwy 31A on a gravel road. Jen read that it was a ghost town. Actually it has a population of 6 according to the 2016 census.

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We passed the Klondike Silver mine on the way to Sandon.

Arriving at Sandon, we were greeted by this view,

...then this.

Our new GPS, "M2", took us up the road past Sandon. When we realized we should have crossed the creek, we headed back down the road to the bridge. The picture above left was taken just as we turned around and went back to the bridge.

     

We parked Alfie and looked at the displays.

Ahhh, my favourites...

There must have been over a dozen Brill trolley buses from Winnipeg, Vancouver, and Calgary. The family that owns Sandon wants to refurbish the trolleys—about $350,000 each!

Water comes in through this pipe and turns the shaft that this equipment is mounted on. 

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The original equipment is still in use today.

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Every 10 years, maintenance is performed on the generating equipment.

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Surplus power generated is sold to BC Hydro.

The views on the way back to Kaslo were really quite incredible. Hard to believe that this area has been hiding from us for all these decades.

So that was our trip to New Denver and Sandon. Hope you enjoyed coming along.

Tomorrow we might drive north up Kootenay Lake. There is an RV park somewhere up we want to visit.

See you then.

We visited the Hydro-Electric Station and spoke with Kevin. He explained how the station functions.