After a great sleep last night we ate bananas and raisin bran muffins for breakfast and were on our way to Barkerville by 9 AM.
After 20 kilometres of foggy weather the sunshine broke through and it was a nice trip from then on.
A quick drive through tour of Wells was followed shortly thereafter by getting to Barkerville. A day that did not disappoint!
We were some of the first people to get there (and as only 200 are allowed in daily due to covid restrictions I had pre-paid our entrance). The entrance lady gave us the run down on how to get about in these pandemic days and a couple minutes later we were exploring. The town itself is only about half open so there were many buildings we couldn't get into however the town did not disappoint.
We knew we had lots of time so we took the opportunity to read all informational plaques and look into all the buildings we could (including the closed ones).
Lunch was in a Chinese restaurant and it was when we were leaving that the really interesting things started to happen. Just outside the door a old time miner man "in character" asked where we were from and when we said "Alberta" he stated that we were "Overlanders" and did we come on the boat down the Fraser (from near the Alberta/BC border) or did we come by raft? Caro said "Raft" so he commented "Oh you don't have money". Anyway he invited over to his little speaking area where he gave us a complete description of how the gold was actually found here and the history of the mining (and the tremendous wealth it produced). He was really awesome and I kick myself for not getting a photo of him because he really looked the part! We walked away saying that he was fantastic.
We continued our exploring visiting most of the other buildings (except of course where the horses were stabled).
Caro stopped in a building to chat with the fellow and I followed shortly thereafter. He was not in character but instead was wearing his native clothes as he obviously was native. He said that Barkerville only started having Indian (and he used the word "Indian") representatives two summers ago and again, just like the "old miner", he was great telling us stories from the native perspective. Very,very interesting (and not political). I told him at the end of our conversation that Caro was 60% Mexican Indian and that seemed to really please him and he commented that he had goose bumps hearing that. Cool! He seemed to be a very genuine fellow and it was obvious he was proud to be there telling tourists the history of his people from that area.
We left town after five hours exploring. I imagine that a complete full day would be needed when all facilities have been reopened.
An hour drive back to Quesnel and at 5 PM we went to an Italian restaurant that had great reviews with one stating "be sure to get there early". Unfortunately, due to covid it was not open tonight so we instead carried on to a very popular steak house. It was hopping with many people so we knew it would not disappoint, and it sure didn't. We split a Caesar salad and a pasta plate. MMMMM good.
The evening was nicely finished off by walking about 2.5km of the Riverfront trail along both the Fraser and Quesnel Rivers. Very beautiful. Along the path is the Old Fraser River Bridge which is the longest wooden truss walking bridge in the world (831 feet). Of course we walked it both directions.
After doing virtually no walking yesterday we did almost 9 km today. Gotta work off that pasta!
