Summer Skin

Trip Report: Okanagan / West Kootenays – Summer 2021 Pt I

Our trip to Argentina was scheduled for April of 2020. I wanted to depart earlier to catch more of the southern hemisphere summer and itching as I am to go somewhere, anywhere, at nearly all times. Two years ago it was Peru with Brazil the destination of choice two years before that. This time it was to the land of steaks, wine and wide open pampas. We were so close, but you know how this story goes. No bueno.

By the summer of 2021, there was at last a break in the COVID fug that had consumed our lives and all I could think about about was travel. The trip I felt we were owed would have to wait. For now we would Build on our recent outings close to home. There was so much unexplored nearer to home. We would make this an adventure one way or another. I got down to planning.

The thing about exploring nearer to home is that you invariably retrace well-travelled ground. You have to get to the places after all. And there’s always a tradeoff between going far and going deep. I decided to go deep. We wouldn’t go to new places, per se, but perhaps we could experience them in a new light.

Every time you leave the island, you need to account for the ferry. Our decision was to take an evening ferry, make some progress, and start the next day fresh with some transportation hassles behind us. This was our only reason for stopping in Abbotsford. It’s not a nice place – sorry.

That first night I felt some worry for our stuff sitting atop our car. This was the first time that it had been exposed. A thief didn’t have to be sneaky to wander through the parking lot, cut the netting and peek inside. What might this mean for Mexico? This time, nothing happened and we moved on.

The lack of ways to go (border, sea, and mountains conspiring to drive traffic through a limited number of byways) means that anyone holidaying in the region drives past the same stuff. As a youth, we spent several summers on Lake Osoyoos and each time we crossed the mountains we would stop at the Coldstream pullout in Manning Park to eat a packed lunch. There we would search out chipmunks. The whiskey jacks found us. A little further up the road was Manning Lodge, its grounds inhabited by overly trusting and overly prolific ground squirrels.

But it was always a brief stop for us and for me years on as an adult whenever I had cause to travel this way. I wanted to get out and walk around a bit and so that’s what we did. Follow the road behind the lodge for ten minutes and you arrive at Lightning Lake. There’s a campground at the far side and a lovely grassed day use area at the near end. You can rent things to take on the water. The mountain lake is even nice enough to swim. And the squirrels are here too. We walked around the whole thing over a couple of hours (actually not quite – there’s a narrow connector between an upper and lower lake and most people cross here, while the more intrepid venture deeper into the park). I highly recommend you build some slack into your schedule – it’s not just a race to get over the mountains – and walk round the lake.

Our second night was spent in Princeton. Again, if you know the region, you will know the town and may be scratching your head at our choice. Is there anything there, you ask? Perhaps you didn’t know even know it was an option. It’s the place to stop for gas, the transition from mountain to hot semi-desert. Almost everyone would press on to other destinations, but of course I had to do things differently. [Full disclosure: there was also an issue of price. That year (and maybe now, forever) the usual spots were over subscribed and priced accordingly. This is a problem. It is too expensive to enjoy my own country. I find this frustrating. This will be a recurring theme.]

Princeton, we learned, was the spot that we were looking for. Not enough to bring us clambering back for more, but the right mix of unique sights to make it a special stopover. It’s a town of rivers. Here the smaller Tulameen runs past a tidy (and mostly empty) downtown to join the larger Similkameen. The latter forms one of the most beautiful valleys in the province and I could return to its winding ways year after year. But these rivers have a problem – this close to their headwaters, they are usually rather cold.

It was the hottest June. Period. Victoria, wet-slap-of-ocean-air-in-the-face Victoria, had downtown temperatures as high as 37, 38. Records were smashed. A town burned down in a snap. It was very strange, dangerous, foreboding, marvellous, and by the time we left for vacation in early July everywhere had a head start on the season.

A secret spot (not a secret of course to those it matters to most) in Princeton is a bit of sand on the Similkameen just meters upstream from where it merges with the (colder) Tulameen. Take the road that’s heading off to Penticton and peel off before the bridge into a strip of undeveloped public land, cool beneath birch trees. We went back a few times over our two nights in Princeton for a picnic and a swim. It’s dog friendly, the banks are sandy, and is remarkably quiet for a site only steps away from the town proper.

The other thing to do while you’re here is to take a drive up the Tulameen canyon. It’s a wild, scenic route, but there aren’t really any places to stop until you reach its end. Here, you’ll find a piece of history in the town of Coalmont. Aside from a few short streets of small homes, the impressive Coalmont hotel is the only clear evidence of its mining heritage. Too bad it was in between owners/operation. Just not enough travellers come up this way. Because soon the road ends at a strange little lake community. Strange because it’s jampacked with vacation homes so far from anything. And the lake itself is small, all the action clustered at one end. The place felt like a big campground, but with homes instead of tents and RVs. Did anyone actually ‘live’ there?

Next it was on to Christina Lake, another place I had driven through plenty of times before but never had cause to stop. That was, I realize, a kind of unofficial theme to our journey. Not too far from Princeton (albeit winding and passing through numerous small towns), I was pleased with how balanced our driving time was. Again, often when travelling closer to home you don’t have time to go slow. You have an end destination and you just need to get there. We still had to make tracks, but there was at least breathing room for deviation.

It was time to break out the camping gear after three nights in hotels. Our spot was not actually on the lake, but a simple yet lovely spot called Cascade Cove [Note: the place has since moved to seasonal/long term visitors only – glad we got it while we could]. It was a pleasant switch from the Provincial campgrounds we had done so far. Here the land was more open and grassy, our little tenting spot very informal. There were no other tenters: all the other guests appeared more settled, long term, the spot they would regularly return to and we would quickly discover why.

The day was hot and we wasted no time checking out the beach situation. What would it be like on a river instead of a lake? Absolutely lovely, it turned out. There’s a pool here, deep and free of the pull of the current. At the near bank is sand where a few families have positioned themselves at the water’s edge. It’s busy that first day, but not crowded. Across the ‘pond’ you can see where the Kettle River disappears upstream, a tight section between high rocks. You can swim over there to jump from the rocks or play in the current. Up above, the highway we took to get here crosses the gap as it descends towards the Lake proper, a few kilometers away.

I can’t say enough good things about this private spot. We blew up our air mattresses and floated around. Gidget dug like a maniac in the sandy banks. In the evening, we wandered down again and saw a family of beavers swimming about – it was their turn. In town we got ice cream and tried out the local beach. Restrictions for dogs and over subscribed – better to take the road out of town to Gladstone Provincial Park. The lake water is suspiciously clear and warm and the mountains rise up steeply all around, and I feel the magic of our special corner of planet Earth.

I’ve written too much! There is a second part to this epic retelling. From Christina Lake, we set off to the north for another spot I had passed through before but never stopped to appreciate. It was us dipping our toes in the West Kootenays before looping back to finish our adventures with the inlaws and a night in Vancouver.