We awoke to smoky skies just before 8 and had a breakfast of leftovers in the hotel before grabbing gas and heading north up Highway 5 (Southern Yellowhead Hwy). Although we weren’t able to see much of the landscape, we were able to see the North Thompson River as we followed along the east bank of the river.
We stopped near McLure Ferry Road, which is just north of Kamloops, at a local fruit stand and grabbed some lovely cherries and nectarines. Just past the fruit stand, there was a pull-off with a historic plaque about the Overlanders of 1862. Although the plaque didn’t really interest us, I decided to take some pictures of the surrounding hills to show the smoky atmosphere as well as the remnants of a previous fire. The sun was a pale orange-pink as it fought to be seen through the smoke.
We continued north, hoping for a decrease in the smoke, and just as we were arriving in Blue River for lunch, a young black bear ran across the road not that far in front of us. Unfortunately I was unable to take a picture as I was driving and had no notice. We stopped at the Husky for lunch. My daughter and I stopped here almost a decade ago and we had both enjoyed our meal. This trip, although the food was good, the restaurant had gone downhill – over half the things on the menu weren’t available and the service was beyond slow.
We noticed that by this point, a lot of the smoke had cleared and the mountains finally started to appear. This made me excited as I had planned this route so I could get a picture of Mount Albreda’s glacier. I took a picture when I was on the trip with my daughter but didn’t have a great camera at the time. This time I was ready with both cameras and my iPhone. It turns out that my iPhone did a much better job than my point-and-shoot and I am glad that I was able to get a great picture.
Not long after we stopped to take that picture, we arrived in Valemount. It is a quaint little village that seems to survive on heli-skiing in the winter and hiking in the summer. It is also being used currently as a place for the firefighters to stay as they battle the local forest fires that are ravaging the area this summer. We checked into the hotel and Mum took a short nap while I went for a short walk. After Mum awoke, we decided to take a walk at the Cranberry Bog just south of town. It looked like a nice easy walk, however, we were unable to determine how long the loop actually was so we turned back after a kilometre. It was a nice walk regardless and I was able to take some pictures of the local flora.
After our walk we drove around the town and saw a sign to a local potter as well as a trading post. Since it was almost 6 on Sunday evening, we figured that both would be closed so we headed to the Info Centre to see what else was around the area. The girl at the centre was quite helpful and let us know that the potter left his wares out for people to buy on the honour system. We decided to go take a look and also stopped in at the trading post as we passed by and saw the open sign was on. The trading post was your stereo-typical touristy-like gift shop, and although they had some nice things, we left empty-handed. We continued on to the potter, and after navigating a considerably long driveway, we arrived at his workshop. Mum bought a small bowl that she could use for dip and we chatted with the potter whose son happened to live in Victoria.
We headed back to the hotel and decided to walk across the street to the Moose Pub for dinner. Mum had the Wild Mushroom Bisque and a Greek salad and I had the Beef Dip.
By the time we finished dinner, it was getting late and, due to the lack of good WiFi, I decided to postpone blogging our day.
We turned in not long afterwards, excited about all the wildlife that we hoped to see the next day.
Thank you for sharing our adventure and I will talk to you soon.
L