Oct. 17, 1983 Chilliwack, BC
Yesterday, Sunday, is the beginning of our seventh week away, and so far the horses and equipment seem to be standing up to the stresses and strains. Of course, since we’re in Al’s driveway, we haven’t been really camping in the strictest sense, but it’s certainly very restful and quiet. Our next move will be in a few days to the Greater Vancouver area, probably to a campground just across the Fraser from New Westminster. We have checked into quite a few, but since spending almost four months in a campground this past summer, we have developed what some might say is a severe case of campground snobbery.

We have been blessed with very fair weather, which for the BC coast at this time of the year is unusual. I can’t say that we’ve been suffering from brilliant sunshine, but it has not been raining, except for a few showers this morning. So we have been exploring some of the out-of-the-way roads that I was familiar with in the 1947-1950 period when I lived here.

The Chilliwack Lake Road, not passable at that time, has now been upgraded and leads southeast to a narrow five-mile long lake that leads to the US border. There used to be a narrow gauge logging railway up this valley, but it has long since disappeared. The scenery, as usual, is fascinating, and the lake is a campers’ paradise. Stumps from the original logging effort give some indication of the size of the primeval trees. Many of them are eight to 10 feet in diameter, and the cut was made eight to 10 feet above the ground! The natural campsites get a minimum of maintenance by the BC Forest Service, which is separate from the BC Parks, and are usually near a lake or stream. Some may have a rough log table. No hook-ups, no fees, often attainable via a rough mountain road, typically ungraded. You’re usually on your own, and if this is your bag, then BC is the place to be.

We drove up the Coquihalla River a few days ago from Hope, past Othello, but not as far as Portia or Romeo. These were a few of the names of stations on the now-extinct Kettle Valley Line, which had such spectacular scenery.

Another day we went south from Hope about 65 km to the US border. There is a Washington State Park there, but the only road in is the one we were on. It’s at the head of a lake created by the Ross Dam. Like the Chilliwack River area, this one also leads to a high snow-capped mountain area in which there many hiking trails.

We also drove up the Fraser Canyon Highway from Hope, through Yale. We’d been over this road before but had never had the time to stop. The Trans-Canada is routed through several tunnels, where previously, in the ’40s, the road was built out and around a ridge, and was a hair-raising experience for many when travelling between Yale and Boston Bar.

October 21 Vancouver BC
Although we’re now in a trailer park on the Fraser, we plan to move into the park under the Lion’s Gate Bridge — it’s less money, and there’s a bus into downtown Vancouver. On Sunday we’re going over to the Sunshine Coast to visit friends at Gibson’s Landing. On previous trips we have avoided Vancouver, mostly because of its almost constant rain. However, this time, we’ll take the time, and report later on what we find. Around the 30th we leave for Shasta Lake in Northern California, but before we leave here, we thought we’d take BC Rail’s dayliner to Lillooet and return. The route goes over a spectacular height of land from Squamish on the coast, eventually to Prince George. We think we can get to Lillooet and back the same day.

October 24
Yesterday on the Sunshine Coast was beautiful, and we caught the first ferry at 7:30 a.m. over to Langdale. We spent the day driving up the Sechelt Peninsula to end of road, returning to spend the afternoon and a delicious salmon dinner with our friends. They said it was "pinks," an inferior grade of salmon. They’re building a lovely home, well equipped with Easthill Pine, heated with two Fisher-type wood stoves. This modern home is 95 percent finished and very efficient, but we couldn’t stay to get all the details — we had to leave to catch the last ferry back to the mainland.

It’s time I end this epistle.