Today our journey takes us from Revelstoke to Vancouver, we are going the quickest route, but this also takes us somewhere I have always wanted to visit. But more of that later.
Breakfast
I didn't wake up this morning, all be it after a later night than usual last night until 5:00 am (which was realy 6:00am by yesterday's time zone - an amazing lie in, a sign I think that the holiday is winding down to its end.)
I made coffee for Drew at 5:30am and we went down to breakfast at 7:00am. As with the previous Best Western, the breakfast at the Best Western, Revelstoke was served on china plates and used metal utensils.
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| Breakfast at the Best Western, Revelstoke |
We leave the hotel at 7.50am and go for Petrol at Chevron, next to the hotel, and head on our way.
Today's Route
Today we head down the BC1 until Kamloops, and then the BC5 along the Coquihalla Pass until we rejoin the BC1 at Hope all the way in to Vancouver, and beyond to North Vancouver
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| Revelstoke to North Vancouver |
Revelstoke to Kamloops
Drew begins the drive and we head on to the BC1 - Trans Canada Highway - towards Kamloops. For the first ten miles we are travelling with a Outsize Vehicle in front of us, it is carrying a huge tire for some industrial vehicle.
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| An Oversize Tire |
For most of the first journey we are alongside Shuswap Lake. We travel past Sicamous and the larger town of Salmon Arms. The road meanders along besides the lake turning right and left to hug the lakeside. The last town in this area is Chase.
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| Shuswap Lake |
Shuswap Lake is famous due to the Salmon migration that takes place each year. Sockeye Salmon take a 4,000km journey that starts and ends in this lake. The fish migrate to the Gulf of Alaska and back, navigating by magnetic fields and the scent of their home waters. There was a time when Sockeye were so prevalent here, that you could pick them up by putting your hands in the water, there are less of them now, but the nutrients of the Lake form a big part of their life-cycle as they spawn forming the next generation.
We carry on past the Shuswap Lake and arrive in an area that looks more like the American wild west than anywhere else in Canada.
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| British Columbia or Oregon - they look the same near Kamloops |
We next come to the delightfully named place of Kamloops.
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| Welcome to Kamloops |
We arrive at Tim Hortons in Kamloops at 10.20am. Drew tries a Boston Cream Donut. This is a chocolate donut with baker's custard inside and went down very well. I have a sesame seed bagel with ‘plain' cream cheese (remember the options from earlier in the holiday - just ask for plain!!). We both have dark roast coffee.
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| Boston Cream Donut and Sesame Bagel |
Kamloops to Abbotsford
We leave Kamloops at 11.15am and leave the BC1 for a while as the direct route to Vancouver takes the BC5. As it leaves Kamloops it becomes a dual-carriageway and the speed limit goes up to 120kmph (75mph) for the first times since Saskatchewan. Drew drives this Coquihalla Highway which has no stops or services or anything other than remarkable drives first up and then down the mountain. The route appears on the list of most dangerous roads in North America, but Drew drove it with ease.
We reach the top of the Coquihalla Highway at the Coquihalla Pass (1244m/4081ft). We travel down sharply past some impressive mountains and gorges. We went through today's first snow shed, having only found out what one was yesterday in the hills around Revelstoke.
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| The Mountains along the Coquihalla Highway |
We pass through Merritt and Hope on our way passing huge qualities of trees in the mountains (none of these ones are burning, thankfully).
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| Trees along the Coquihalla Highway |
The road begins its steep decline and just outside Hope at 1.00pm we meet the BC1 which has been on a meander which it follows due to road building technology not being able to broach this area until the new highway was built in 1988.
We eat up the distance on this wonderful road until Chilliwack when the amount of traffic around the City slowed us down. At 2.07pm the temperature reached 95℉ (35℃) our highest temperature for the holiday.
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| We are grateful that the in car air-con keeps us at 63℉ |
Abbotsford
Those who have been following the blog faithfully will know I mentioned a few days ago that there was one objective for the holiday still to be fulfilled. This was to visit Abbotsford, so I am so pleased to be here. Why? I hear you ask. Well for no sensible reason! You will have read my admission in Winnipeg that I am a fan of what Drew calls: Christmas Crap movies. Well Abbotsford is a centre for such productions. According to IMDB, Abbotsford has had 69 films shot here, 14 of them Christmas Movies including On Strike for Christmas; Trading Christmas; Sleigh Bells Ring. I'm almost ashamed to say that all bar one of the films I've seen, and that one is in post-production for this Christmas.
Two of my favourite films, based on the novels of Donna VanLiere, The Christmas Secret and The Christmas Note have been shot, not just in the town, but in the Spruce Collective, a store in the town. So guess where we headed.
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| The Spruce Collective, Abbotsford |
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| Haydn finding his true North in the Spruce Collective - Christmas Town of Abbotsford |
It was a real thrill to walk in this place, called Wilson's Collective in the films, and to feel like I had found a part of Christmas.
Looking for Betty's Cookies
A character in both The Christmas Secret and The Christmas Note is called Betty and runs her own cookie shop. The story that looked most like it closed at 2pm, but nearby was Tracy's Bakery. A lovely location which we visited for coffee. Drew's deal in letting me come to Abbotsford was that he got to go to Betty's (or equivalent) and this seemed to fit the bill <<Co-pilot's note: hmmmm. Bringing me two thirds of the way across a country, so that he can visit Christmas Crap town!!!>> Their display of Cupcakes and small, so called, Babycakes, was amazing.
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| Tracy's Bakery - Cupcake Display |
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| Drew's Selection |
Having arrived in Abbotsford at 2:20pm we left at 3:10pm with me feeling warm, fuzzy and happy.
Onwards to North Vancouver
After our wonderful time in
We arrived at 4:17pm and checked into Room 404 very soon afterward.
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| Comfort Inn and Suites, North Vancouver - A nice apartment style hotel - this was our room |
What an interesting idea a snow shed is - I don't recall them being mentioned before and wonder if they do them in other snowy countries in Europe.
ReplyDeleteWe first drove through some on Sunday, on the way to Revelstoke. I drove through the first three thinking that they were just tunnels. But the left hand side (the side away from the mountain) is open, so not like a normal tunnel. It was after I'd driven through two more that Drew noticed the sign called them a snow shed, so we had to google it - which is the link today.
DeleteI guess Europe tends to use more tunnels - Mont Blanc comes to mind - so I haven't heard of them here, but this doesn't mean they don't exist.
I must look out for mention of them.