Sunday, Sep 18 - Monday, Sep 19 Cache Creek & Hope, BC
We awoke to a somewhat cool morning - when I looked at our indoor/outdoor thermometer, it read 0C / 32F. By the time, I turned on my phone, fortunately the temperature was on the rise.
Today we drive down to Cache Creek to Brookside Campground. We have stayed there before.
Here are a few of the highlights. If the pictures give you the impression we are descending, we are.
I didn't take any pictures of Cache Creek or the campground (which is for sale). This area was badly damaged by flooding a couple of years ago. I suppose the current owners have had enough and have decided to move on.
The next day, Sunday, we continued south to our good friends in Chilliwack. We visited with
Sonja & Barry for a few days at the end of May on our way out to the Kootenays.
Here are a few highlights. Once we get to Lytton, we enter the Fraser Canyon, one of our favourite drives in BC
Just a short distance to go - coffee at the Packing House in Spences Bridge - our usual stop when we come this way.
Well, that's disappointing. You can't see it but the Packing House is for sale. I guess we just haven't stopped here enough. A shame!
We sat out front and enjoyed our coffee in the sunshine.
Back on the highway, once across the bridge, the scenery starts to get more dramatic.
By the looks of this road sign, this is the area that the floods last year wiped out a section of the highway. It will be interesting to see the damage as well as the repairs to date.
As the highway descends to the Thompson River river, it crosses over the Canadian Pacific rail line. After running beside the river, the highway goes under the same rail line. Well, that is the way it used to be.
There was so much damage at the far end, so much so that the rail bridge over the highway was replaced with a level crossing. That must be fun what with the length of the trains Canadian Pacific and Canadian National operate these days.
This is the rail bridge that was washed away in the flood. As I mentioned there is now a railway crossing at this location.
Methinks we are getting close to Jackass Mountain. The highway here suffered major damage.
Even after all these many months, there is still a long way to go to repair the damage. Looks like a Bailey bridge on the Trans Canada Highway at Jackass Mountain summit.
I've said it before but the Fraser Canyon is a favourite of ours. The scenery is spectacular. Here's one of the seven tunnels in the canyon. If you want to see the rest of them, check out this blog entry from ExploreNorth.
We continued on through Yale and stopped at the Owl Street Cafe just west of Hope. We've stopped here many times. We enjoy this cafe because it is out of downtown Hope and we know we can park the rig across the street.
After lunch, we went looking for a quiet place for Jen to have a rest (me too!). We parked on the north side of the Hope airport in the shade of some trees. It wasn't as quiet as we hoped due to a fire on the mountains to the south. Fire fighting helicopters buzzed all around.
We headed for Chilliwack about 30 minutes later.
Thursday we head to BC Ferries in Tsawwassen to catch the 1 p.m. ferry to Victoria. See you then.
