Hope, BC

We left the Lac La Hache Provencial Park this morning and soon joined up with the Fraser River again. Then it was up and over the mountains and down into the Thompson River Valley where we followed it through a twisting canyon. The river had train tracks on both sides and as we sat in a pull out eating lunch we watched non-stop trains heading north on the eastern side.

The scenery had radically changed. I never knew British Columbia had a desert, but this area looked much like the area around Bakersfield, California. Everything was brown and low scrub covered except the farmers fields which were all irrigated. For the first time in a long time we had to turn on the air conditioner.

We joined the Trans Canada Highway at Cache Creek. I remember passing through here in 1967 when Bill Chapman and I drove from Vancouver to Montreal. The scenery down the Thompson River Canyon was quite stark as the sides of the canyon were steep and bare. When we rejoined the Fraser River at Lytton the sides of the canyon was still steep and the road winding, but the mountains were covered with trees and everything was green and lush again.

We stopped in Hope, BC at the Wild Rose RV Park. We have decided to stay here for three nights and cross back into the US on Monday. The RV park is very nice and does have free internet. It is not fast, and the connection is poor, but it is better than the connection we had in Prince George. This will give us time to eat up all our contraband food as well as keep us in place over the weekend. One of the rules full timers like to follow is to get somewhere on Thursday or early Friday and stay put until Monday. This lets the weekenders do their thing while we lay low.

Hope is where we broke down many years ago when we were pulling a trailer with our van. It developed an overheating problem and I had to have the radiator rebuilt. There is a lot to do in the area and it is a pretty place so we will find plenty to keep us busy.