Day Tripping to Hope BC

All of the fabulous pictures from the day can be found here on my Flickr web site. Go ahead and click on the link to see the full day's sights, you know you want to! 

Winter was almost over and Spring was just around the corner, a warm weekend was the perfect time to go out and explore some local history.

We picked the city of Hope, which is inland from Vancouver and the Pacific Ocean by 100 miles. Hope is a transportation hub, sitting at the crossroads of three routes. West takes you back to the city of Vancouver, north takes you along Hwy #5 to the Interior of BC via the infamous Coquihalla Canyon. The lakeside playgrounds of Kelowna and Penticton in the Southern Interior are favourite destinations for Vancouverites. Heading  east will take you to the Southern Interior towns of Osoyoos and Grand Forks on historic Hwy #3 also known as the Crows Nest Highway.

Hope is also the location of Fort Hope, one of the original Hudson Bay Trading Company's trading post established in 1849. The Sto:lo First Nations people have been here for more than 8,000 years, far preceding European traders and settlers. The 1,375 km Fraser River was a natural route for First Nations and later for French voyagers and British trappers hunting furs for the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) to send back to England  

Today our crew consisted of myself, wife Annette, grand daughter Adalyn, brother Ken and his wife Linda. First order of the day - BRUNCH !

From home to Hope is a 1.5 hour drive, we agreed to rendezvous at a Hope restaurant and see where the day's plans took us. As it turns out, both parties were a bit early into town and we met up at a local bookstore where Adalyn picked out four books for herself and Grampa picked up three local interest books. Ken picked up a bunch of magazines which the owner had been holding for him as Ken is a semi-regular there.

Our first stop of interest was the Hope Slide, located 15 minutes east of Hope. The Hope Slide occurred in 1965 after an earthquake shook the area. Several people were killed when the slide occurred, and the original road is buried under more than 200 feet of rock.

It was a fair bit cooler at the slide area, as we had gained 2400 feet in elevation and snow was still on the sides of the road and parking area. We all got out to have a look at the slide area, which is marvel to look at as half the side of the mountain had come down and we were now standing on it.  

Adalyn had fun playing on the rocks while the adults conversed about adult stuff and grumbled about how cold we were. 😀

Back in the cars we headed for the main street of Hope to look at the chain saw carvings which make Hope the self proclaimed "Chainsaw Carving Capital of Canada." 

What started out as a way to save a beloved, dying city tree turned into a tourist attraction for the town and a new industry for the local people. More than 80 carvings can now be found around the town; Maps can be found at the local tourism bureau to use for your self guided walking tour.

After looking at some of the carvings and Adalyn playing on the playground, we headed a few blocks to the north side of town to look for a geocache on the banks of the Coquihalla River where it meets the Fraser River. We did not find the geocache, but the Fraser River is very wide here and the once flooded shoreline forests are a stark reminder of the furies of a river during the Spring freshet as well as when the winter storms come calling.   

After our playtime at the river and our disappointing defeat of failing to find the geocache, ice cream was in order ! The local Dairy Queen as just what a 10 year girl (and the adults) needed to recuperate and feel better about ourselves. And so it came to be, continuing the tradition of visiting the DQ in Hope BC, a tradition which has been carried on through four generations of family !

Ice cream in our tummies and our pride restored, we headed west along Hwy #7 for our next point of interest. We stopped a couple of times along the way to find geocaches as Adalyn loves "treasure hunting" and Ken and myself kinda like it too. No day's outing is complete if we don't look for a few geocaches.  :)

Saturday was the first day the Kilby Museum was open for the season, at least that is what their website said. Apparently things did not work out for them as the museum was still closed for the season when we arrived in the afternoon. (No pictures to tease you with, will save that visit for a future day)

With the museum closed, we visited nearby Kilby Park located on the Harrison River. The parking lot was full but we managed to stop and grab a cache in the bush near the parking lot. Adalyn had the sharp eyes here and found the cache for the team. Which made us feel good as Ken's ego (well, maybe mine as well) is easily shattered if we can't find an easy-to-find geocache right under our feet.

We headed west a bit further and stopped off at a local slough which is a haven for the endangered Western Painted Turtle and found two more caches in the area. Ken spotted the cache and Adalyn made the grab. The cache  was hidden on the back of a sign advising the area is a nature reserve for the turtles, and attached to the cache container was a plastic turtle - how fitting.

With the latest two caches found and the day winding down, we said our goodbyes to Ken and Linda, and headed west still on Hwy #7 which would bring us to Adalyn's house. We stopped in for a short visit with our daughter Samantha and the other grandkids Rowan and Camden before continuing on another 30 minutes to home. 

Once home Annette's first order of business was to entertain the cat, while I downloaded the pictures from the camera and logged the geocache finds for the day. Now, where can we go next week ?

Thanks for sharing the trip with us, please leave a comment down below if you enjoyed the story.