BC Electric Street Cars In The Fraser Valley

 

To view a larger size of the pictures, click on any picture and you will be able to view them all in the larger format

Vancouver is a young city by many standards but the growth of the city and the surrounding suburbs has been astounding in its short life.

Although the First Nations have lived here for over 10,000 years, the newcomers, the Europeans, first arrived in 1792 and by the 1860's sawmills were exploiting the rich forest and miners were exploiting the gold and silver found in the mountains.

Vancouver was incorporated in 1860 and by the 1890's streetcars were being introduced to handle the needs of the people to get around Vancouver and its immediate suburbs.

Further to the east in the Fraser Valley, pioneer settlements like Cloverdale, Bradner, Mt. Lehman were only acessibil by a ferry ride across the Fraser River from the north shore where the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) ran daily through to Vancouver.

By 1809 - 1810 the British Columbia Electric Railway (BCER) has pushed through tracks as far as Chilliwack and was running Interurban street cars to these "remote" settlements.

While Ken and I have visited and followed many sections of these tracks over the years, today we limited our day to just three of these locations.

Our starting point was Matsqui, just south across the Fraser River from Mission. Matsqui is a floodplain which provided fertile soil for farmers to grow crops for their own use. With the coming of the Interurban line, the farmers could now expand and begin to sell their crops commercially into the big city of Vancouver.

We had a late breakfast in Abbotsford, just south of the Matsqui Prairie area, and then headed west to our next stop of Mt. Lehman. Like so many parts of our history, the community and the historic buildings which centered on the rail line have mostly gone.

In Mt. Lehman we were able to visit the old Mt. Lehman Community Hall and the Mt. Lehman United Church. Sadly, even some of the buildings that were still standing not so many years ago have now been knocked down and only an empty field remains 

Our next stop to the west was Bradner where all that remains to identify a busy pioneer centre is the general store located right next to the tracks. Further north on Bradner Road is the Bradner Community Centre, and right next to that is the old Bradner Elementary School. 

While the community centre and the school are still in use, unless you know the original history of the area, you would be hard pressed to conjure up the ghosts of the settlers which have been so neatly pushed aside.

Final stop of the day was the community of Fort Langley. While Fort Langley was not actually on the BCER Interurban line, it still represents a major part of the growth of the Vancouver area, in particular the province of BC.

Fort Langley was the birth place of the province, and the first capital of BC before that title was given to the downstream community of New Westminster, and then eventually to Victoria on Vancouver Island.  

Today the quaint shops remind us of the early days, and the actual fort itself on the hill above the town reminds us of the original days of BC

The one thing that rings true is that the railways still play a big part of the Fraser Valley's daily life, with the main lines of the Canadian National Railway (CNR) running along the riverside right next to the original Fort Langley train station building

If you liked the story drop a comment, always happy to have the feedback.

 SPENDING A SATURDAY IN HOPE BC

Hope BC is 95 miles east of the big city of Vancouver and is the junction of three mountain highways and a site of a former Hudson Bay fort located on the banks of the Fraser River.

The Trans Canada Highway, also known as  Highway #1 heads north into the rugged Fraser Canyon which splits the Coast Mountains and the Cascade Mountains. 

Highway #5 heads north-east into the Coquilhalla Pass, known by many around the world as the Highway From Hell due to the TV series which follows the real life struggles of commercial tow truck operators winching 18 wheelers back up to the highways after they have gone off the road.   

Highway #3, known as the Crowsnest Highway, heads due east and follows a lower elevation route that is a two lane winding lane for most of its path. While the elevation is lower, the highway is no less dangerous.

The town of Hope sits at the western terminus of the three mountain highways as they exit the mountains and enter the flat land of the eastern end of the Fraser Valley. From there it is a relative straight shot west to Vancouver and the edge of the Pacific Ocean.

Today we would be settling for the town of Hope itself to wander around the town, shop the stores, and find a few geocaches which were new in the past few months.

Hope is also known as the chainsaw carving capital of Canada as there are no less than 80 carvings, most of them life size or larger. 

We have seen many of these over the years, for the grandkids along today this was a first for them. We looked at a few of the carvings and then let the kids play of the local playground before we head on to find some geocaches.

One of the fun caches of the day was located next to a residence which had two old stumps on the city property by the sidewalk and the family had turned the two stumps into a showcase of colourful birdhouses. Bird figurines are hidden among the bushes of the garden to complement the esthetics of the bird houses. 

Next geocache on the list was at the Pioneer Cemetery, which is always an interesting place to visit. What often strikes me was the short years most of the original people lived due the hasher lives they lived. 

Young Rowan found this cache, it was a plastic stick which had the cache tucked into one end of it. For a plastic stick, the cache blended in well with the other wooden debris on the ground.

The last three geocaches were located along the old Kettle Valley Railway right of way which headed east out of the town in the direction of the gold and silver mines of Southern BC.

If you followed this trail for another mile or two you would come across the Othello Tunnels, a wonderful feat of engineering where they blasted 5 tunnels through a short, steep canyon to allow the train passage through impossible terrain.

Pictures of Othello Tunnels and the Hell's Gate Air Tram from a previous visit can be seen here 

This section of the trail is less than a kilometre and is an easy walk and a great place for the kids to stretch their legs.

We found the cache at the start of the trail, with second cache being at the end of the trail. About halfway between the two, the youngest grandkid looks around a good hiding spot and found a geocache I did not have on the list. As I had found that cache previously, I had ignored it on my new search  Kudos to Camden for finding that one!

We continued on and found the last cache at the end of the trail, which much to the kids delight was a scary looking skull staring at you from under the forest debris.

By now it was the end of the day, we had all had our share of exercise for the day. The grandkids had scored some books at the book store, where all books are only $2.00 each, and the adults had a chance to get out of those house after days of winter rains.

We headed back home just a little tired and somewhat cold from the unexpected windy day in Hope. The temperature was mild at 12C, (54F) but the cold breeze just blew right through our hoodies and light jackets. Oh well, we survived.  😀 

Thanks for reading about the day's adventure. Leave a comment if you liked the story and you must click on the link to look at the pictures to get gain full appreciation of the day.

ALL PICTURES FROM THE DAY CAN BE SEEN HERE

FORT LANGLEY AND SENDALL GARDENS 

The Fab Foursome of myself, Annette, brother Ken and his wife Linda took advantage of the sunny weather and headed over to take a stroll around the village of Fort Langley, once the capital of BC.

We arrived mid-morning slightly ahead of the main crowds but parking was already at a premium. We wandered around the stores on the side streets and then meandered down Glover Road, which is the main street through town.

We popped in a few shops which caught our fancy, then settled into A restaurant with an outdoor covered patio for lunch.
We sat next to the fireplace, so we had the benefit of the sun and the fire. The good food had us ready to continue on with our day of touring.

After lunch we headed for Sendall Gardens, a 3.67 hectare garden which includes a small creek.

Originally owned by the Sendall family, the property eventually found its way in to hands of Langley city for preservation.
The city has done a great job of expanding access to the property via pathways to the surrounding neighbourhoods.

The city has also cleaned up some of the land and created paths within the small park which allows visitors greater access to the full property.

After our tour of the gardens, the group split up to go our separate ways to take care of some shopping chores on the way home.

ALL PICTURES CAN BE SEEN HERE ON MY FLICKR WEB SITE