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Published: September 9th 2016
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Our day started with a shoe purchase for me since my Nike's are bald and we're intending to do some hiking in Whistler. The sports shop guy was a sport enthusiast and very helpful. He had also run in NZ so there was much to talk about.
We had an amazing driving day as we went through dramatic scenery. As we left Kamloops we travelled alongside a large lake where we could see an incredibly long train on the other side so we stopped to take a photos and a video. The train must have been more than a kilometre long with two engines hauling it along. It looked like a long coloured snake against the mountains and lake. We drove through badlands with heavily eroded steep rocky hillsides dropping away to flat irrigated farmland. At Cache Creek we turned into the mountains onto a dual laned highway with double yellow lines down the middle for the whole way to Pemberton which is only 30kms from Whistler. It was a very slow trip stuck behind a bus, 3 campervans and cars going at 40 to a max of 70 km/hr for nearly 100km. It sure allowed us plenty of time
Fraser River near Lillooet
The road passes along on the left then across the river to Lillooet on the terraces on the other bank. The road goes through the steep valley in the distance to enjoy the scenery.
Most of the journey was through gorges with huge high rocky faces towering on either side. We would wind steeply up from a valley bottom and drop away steeply on the other side. Sometimes the river seemed so far down it was like looking into the Grand Canyon with layers of rock upwards and a deep ravine on the other side. The road was a marvel of engineering when you consider the terrain that had been cut through for the road and the rail. We stopped at a small town called Lillooet for lunch and heaven knows why that town exists. It's in the middle of nowhere and I can only assume it exists for serving the railway, the roads, timber and the dams of which all would require a lot of maintenance. The town seems to be perched up on terraces above the river on both sides. Other than this town there was the odd smattering of small farms where there was enough flat farms, some Indian reserve lands and pretty mean houses. There were many beautiful lakes along the way, high moutains in the background and trees turning to their autumn colours.
Finally, to the south the valley opened out to a place called Pemberton in a broader area not unlike Murchison where rivers meet creating a wide basin surrounded by mountains. From here we actually got some passing lanes and managed to speed up for the last part of the journey through to Whistler.
Whistler is not easy to see. It is set amongst the forest on the main highway to Vancouver for several kilometres. You can't see much of it from the road until you turn into the streets. The main village is quite large whilst we are further on at another smaller village called Creekside. Our B&B is 5kms from the main village and winds it's way up a hill to Clifftop Drive. There are 5 guest rooms in a lovely typical Canadian style mountain house.
After settling in we went down to Creekside to explore and get our bearings. The village area looks like it was created for the 2010 Winter Olympics as the setting, style and layout is quite lovely and quite unlike the usual town layout along streets. We had a beer and a light meal at Dusty's near the gondola while the sun
went down. Very nice. We appear to have arrived to improving weather as we were told it has been awful for the past 10 days. It certainly is cooler and not what is expected for this time of year.
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