Dateline May 11, 2011 Prince George, BC

The ferry trip from Vancouver Island wound through the San Juan Islands and was

spectacular.  Landing in Vancouver we drove around and saw some of the sites.  It was raining so we headed on out to Hope BC for the evening .  The RV park in a beautiful valley surrounded by white capped mountains.

We then drove to Osoyoos, just north of Washington state and the beginning of the Okanagan Valley, one of Canada’s most renowned wine areas.  The valley may be one of the top 10 most beautiful places I have ever been. It is high desert and gets more so as you go north.  We visited some of the local wineries and of course added to the “wine cellar” in the RV.

The next morning we drove to Kelowna where we found a remarkable camp site right on the shore of Lake Okanagan.  We were in the first row on the lake looking out over the beautiful lakefront where we enjoyed a great steak dinner on the grill and some of the wine we purchased the day before.  I guess life doesn’t get much better.

We spent the day in Kelowna walking through many of the town’s parks and then drove to Apex Lookout on Knox Mountain which overlooks the lake and town.  The hiking to various viewing points was fun and the views themselves were just marvelous…views  down on the lake, the city of Kelowna, and the snow-capped mountains in the distance.  We then stopped at Quail Ridge Winery.  A beautiful setting above the lake owned by an individual that must have the first billion dollars to make his millions in the wine business, as our friend Nick describes these investments.

We then left in the morning for  Kamloops to play some golf.  The drive along the lake was beautiful.  The day was sunny and warm.  We had selected Tobiano Golf Club about 20 miles north of Kamloops.  The course is rated as one of the top 10 public courses in Canada. God it was beautiful, a good track and in wonderful shape…views weren’t hard to take as well.

I shot 82, John 91 not bad for the first 18 holes in a long time..

We continued down the road after golf  to Cache, the drive was beautiful, I learned why toilet is sometimes replaced with the word “pit” !

We continued our drive north on The Okanagan/Trans-Canada Highway(97/1) to Cache Creek and stayed overnight outside Cache at a very nice place right in the desert.  It was 77 degrees when we got there at 6pm…a lovely evening to grill and enjoy some more wine.

Today we drove all the way to Prince George on  the Cariboo Highway (97).  The sights were full of lots of pine trees and farms; a huge agriculture and logging area. We are going to “dry camp” in the Wal-Mart parking lot since it is pouring rain (or as we learned in Seattle, heavy “MIST”) no sense in going to a campsite. Tomorrow we shall see “what’s up”, depending on the weather.  We are excited about Sunday as we will meet the “Walk About Canada-Alaska Roadtrek” folks  in Dawson Creek.