My father is so prompt it hurts. Thankfully I was built the same way, so when he arrived on the dot of 7:45, I was ready and waiting.
Last year on an early summer day when the Fraser river was at its highest , we had taken the small ferry across to Barnston Island and walked its perimeter. After leaving Prince Albert Saskatchewan, Dad spent a year of his youth living on a farm with his uncle and aunt before his parents were able to buy their own farm in Haney. On our walk round the island we watched the Golden Ears bridge in the proces of being built. It was a natural starting point to this roadtrip to start over the newly open Golden Ears bridge, with the added bonus of being able to cross a couple of weeks before tolls are being introduced. 
Artistic license - Barnston Island through the bridge rungs.
Breakfast in Hope is a classic family start to any trip east of, well, Hope I guess. If we are going towards the Okanagan and points east we eat at the Home restaurant, and if we are headed north it's at Rolly's. It doesn't really matter which one we go to because they are both good, one-off local eateries with waitresses who have graced tables for as many years as I've had hot dinners and who always call us "dears" and fill coffee cups before we've noticed they are requiring filling. 
The tiny and practically unnoticed spot on the map of Yale is deserving of more respect than it is given because it was the source of the great provincial gold rush (resulting in Billy Barker and Barkerville) which lead to great concern that the territory would go the way of the Oregon Territory (i.e., become part of the United States). Thus the crown colony of British Columbia was born, in 1858. But even before that it was the location that Simon Fraser (who resulted in the univeristy known as SFU) landed in late June in 1808. I like to think we were celebrating the 201st anniversarty to the day of his landing. Well, it could be, today being June 26. Everyone I know would consider that to be a day in 'late June'.The little church was visited by royalty in 1901, the Duke and Duchess of York, but by then Yale's star was already fading. 
Spuzzum has fared even worse, as the lone sign "Spuzzum, unincorporated" is the only remnant of a town that may have saved my parents' budding marriage and allowed me to be born. On the very first day of their camping trip honeymoon, my Dad's 1950 car broke down, and the mechanic in Spuzzum had to get a part shipped up, then adjusted to fit, while my Dad and Mom tried to look cool and sophisticated. It didn't work, because the guy charged Dad only $5 for a good few hours of work. $10 crossed hands to save a bit of dignity and allowed them to carry on. There's no sign of any gas station now. Just a few rangy houses and 2 noisy dogs who chased the car 50 feet or so in a show of bravado.
Herbies' Drive In in Cache Creek is the business if you want a root beer float or a strawberry sundae, but not if you want to make a Dollar medallion using an archaic museum piece of a machine that seems to have been built to eat loonies. Oh well, it was fun trying to punch out the spelling of "Dad&Daughter Chilcotin Trip 2009" which constitutes exactly 32 items (including spaces), the maximun allowed around the edge of the coveted metal medallion. Another lesson in the falsity of advertising.
A welcome stop came at Green Lake, home of the Tupmans, father and mother to three little maids from school were they (well, one in my year and her two sisters, but now we are all contemporaries and sisters united). We talked hockey and music, books and teaching, family history and local history for a lovely hour, lubricated with iced tea. Very genteel (despite D's tee-shirt!).
I had been quite proud to have avoided the much ballyhooed and popular Williams Lake Stampede until I realized I had been basing my plans on a 2008 travel borchure. We rolled into town at about the same time as several hundred ticket holders (and those like us who watched for free from the grass above) who stood in the stands, rode on the rides, chugged on the beer and cheered all the cheers. We were struck by the large numbers of native Indians, the like of which we don't see in Vancouver except in (sadly) the poorest of neighbourhoods. Here rough and tumble boys and sweet faced, pink clad girls played next to placid young mothers and cowboy hatted fathers.
It's hard to imagine that even dinner didn't stop the flow of conversation between us, although it tried. Decent food at Carmen's but soooooooo sloooooowwwww. We spent the day reiterating known family stories, adding a few insights and remembrances to those as well as adding a few tidbits of new family history (the itinerary of the aforementioned honeymoon, Dad fainting in the hostpital as a boy when his sister had her appendix out and as a result had to take cod liver oil for years, him having to shoot a rat that was in the pig trough and feeling so awful about it that his shot only wounded the rat (as big as a cat) which made his dad mad because it would only die in the walls and stink up the place (Dad never shot anything else again), having to tell his mother of his dad's death). We are both awed by my sister dealing so magnificently with a card she's been recently dealt and hope no one we know and love (including her, especially her) won't have to deal with it again.
We talked so much we forgot about the jelly bean travel game!
Last year on an early summer day when the Fraser river was at its highest , we had taken the small ferry across to Barnston Island and walked its perimeter. After leaving Prince Albert Saskatchewan, Dad spent a year of his youth living on a farm with his uncle and aunt before his parents were able to buy their own farm in Haney. On our walk round the island we watched the Golden Ears bridge in the proces of being built. It was a natural starting point to this roadtrip to start over the newly open Golden Ears bridge, with the added bonus of being able to cross a couple of weeks before tolls are being introduced. 
Artistic license - Barnston Island through the bridge rungs.
Breakfast in Hope is a classic family start to any trip east of, well, Hope I guess. If we are going towards the Okanagan and points east we eat at the Home restaurant, and if we are headed north it's at Rolly's. It doesn't really matter which one we go to because they are both good, one-off local eateries with waitresses who have graced tables for as many years as I've had hot dinners and who always call us "dears" and fill coffee cups before we've noticed they are requiring filling. The tiny and practically unnoticed spot on the map of Yale is deserving of more respect than it is given because it was the source of the great provincial gold rush (resulting in Billy Barker and Barkerville) which lead to great concern that the territory would go the way of the Oregon Territory (i.e., become part of the United States). Thus the crown colony of British Columbia was born, in 1858. But even before that it was the location that Simon Fraser (who resulted in the univeristy known as SFU) landed in late June in 1808. I like to think we were celebrating the 201st anniversarty to the day of his landing. Well, it could be, today being June 26. Everyone I know would consider that to be a day in 'late June'.The little church was visited by royalty in 1901, the Duke and Duchess of York, but by then Yale's star was already fading. Spuzzum has fared even worse, as the lone sign "Spuzzum, unincorporated" is the only remnant of a town that may have saved my parents' budding marriage and allowed me to be born. On the very first day of their camping trip honeymoon, my Dad's 1950 car broke down, and the mechanic in Spuzzum had to get a part shipped up, then adjusted to fit, while my Dad and Mom tried to look cool and sophisticated. It didn't work, because the guy charged Dad only $5 for a good few hours of work. $10 crossed hands to save a bit of dignity and allowed them to carry on. There's no sign of any gas station now. Just a few rangy houses and 2 noisy dogs who chased the car 50 feet or so in a show of bravado.Herbies' Drive In in Cache Creek is the business if you want a root beer float or a strawberry sundae, but not if you want to make a Dollar medallion using an archaic museum piece of a machine that seems to have been built to eat loonies. Oh well, it was fun trying to punch out the spelling of "Dad&Daughter Chilcotin Trip 2009" which constitutes exactly 32 items (including spaces), the maximun allowed around the edge of the coveted metal medallion. Another lesson in the falsity of advertising.
A welcome stop came at Green Lake, home of the Tupmans, father and mother to three little maids from school were they (well, one in my year and her two sisters, but now we are all contemporaries and sisters united). We talked hockey and music, books and teaching, family history and local history for a lovely hour, lubricated with iced tea. Very genteel (despite D's tee-shirt!).
I had been quite proud to have avoided the much ballyhooed and popular Williams Lake Stampede until I realized I had been basing my plans on a 2008 travel borchure. We rolled into town at about the same time as several hundred ticket holders (and those like us who watched for free from the grass above) who stood in the stands, rode on the rides, chugged on the beer and cheered all the cheers. We were struck by the large numbers of native Indians, the like of which we don't see in Vancouver except in (sadly) the poorest of neighbourhoods. Here rough and tumble boys and sweet faced, pink clad girls played next to placid young mothers and cowboy hatted fathers.
It's hard to imagine that even dinner didn't stop the flow of conversation between us, although it tried. Decent food at Carmen's but soooooooo sloooooowwwww. We spent the day reiterating known family stories, adding a few insights and remembrances to those as well as adding a few tidbits of new family history (the itinerary of the aforementioned honeymoon, Dad fainting in the hostpital as a boy when his sister had her appendix out and as a result had to take cod liver oil for years, him having to shoot a rat that was in the pig trough and feeling so awful about it that his shot only wounded the rat (as big as a cat) which made his dad mad because it would only die in the walls and stink up the place (Dad never shot anything else again), having to tell his mother of his dad's death). We are both awed by my sister dealing so magnificently with a card she's been recently dealt and hope no one we know and love (including her, especially her) won't have to deal with it again.We talked so much we forgot about the jelly bean travel game!
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