Williams Lake, British Columbia, Canada
108 Mile Heritage Ranch
We are driving along the old Gold rush
Trail and end up at the 108 Mile Heritage Ranch – yes the towns here are named
on far away they are from Mile 0 in Lilleot. This is actually super cool, it’s
along a little lake with a lot of old buildings from the Wagon Route time:
- It started as a post house on the cariboo trail in 1867
- In 1906 it got purchased with all the land around by Geoffrey Watson who started to raise Clydesdale horses – he did it until he died in WWI
- 108 Ranch continued on with ranching as well as lumbering wood until in 1969 part of it got developed into a settlement – but they set aside a greenbelt to preserve the history
Once here was a Road house, we had
sneak peaks in an old barn, in an old school house (which was super cool), an
old blacksmith, saw some old carriages,
walked around some old machinery, visited an old heritage church, saw
the equipment of a portable sawmill (yes they have them here), wen into the old
Clydesdale barn (which by the way was huge) and in the back here was even a
Sheriffs office with a prisoner holding a sing: “please give me a donation so I
can escape”, from there along the lake we had a look into a not so comfortable
trapper loghouse from 1930 (yes they still lived like that 90 years ago), saw
into an old Park Wardens house, visited the bunkhouse, checked out the old
store & post office building – the views were amazing, the sun was shining
and it was for free!!!
Rain at Lac La
Hache PP
- In case you wonder where the name comes from: “lake of the axe”: it is said that an early settler dropped his axe into the lake while chopping a hole in the ice
We decided to drive onto Lac La Hache
PP to have there coffee on the beach: not such a great idea, as it started to
rain as we approached the lake, as per internet it is one of the most
picturesque lake (I would say it is a lake). We walked quickly down to the
shoreline – but were not interested in camping in the forest and decided to
continue on towards Williams lake. In the rain we saw the lush green
countryside and also big areas where once were forest fires.
Williams Lake Visitor Info &
Cowboy Museum
Here we stopped at the visitor info as
Gine read that it is a log house. And it was super cool as it also houses the
Cowboy museum including the Cowboy Hall of fame – yes we are in Cowboy country
(by the way when we were at Save on Food there is a big sign at the entrance
where the mark off on how many days to the Stampede – that’s how serious they
take it). Super amazing was a giant Piano and the sign said it was brought with
a pack horse (that thing is gigantic!!) but then it was a wedding present and
was on the Alkali ranch (the oldest one in Western Canada – registered in 1861
– even today it is still one of the largest holdings in the province). And we
saw spores, metals, belt buckels and in the middle was a super cool bronze
Cowboy art.
Upstairs was some cool art and
downstairs was a museum with some old instruments (super cool) and even an old
dentist chair from the local dentist, some old cameras – as well some nice jackets
and baskets made by the first nations – so we did learn a bit about the area.
But then I think we saw nearly
everything we are interested in from the Williams Lake area – it’s not the
greatest so we decided to do some shopping – passed some huge sawmills (there
are not only thousands of logs).
What’s to know about Williams Lake:
- It is named after the German Prospector Wilhelm Dietz
- It’s known for it’s Stampede – the 2nd largest in BC – and it started in 1926
- In the old days the Cariboo Wagon trail bypassed it, because of a stubborn landowner
- The people here live from forestry – mining and ranching
- The Shushwap first nation lived here and it is first mentioned in 1842 when a bishop moved here and wrote about them – he actually talked about a Chief named William, and as it sounded a lot of the Chiefs afterwards were named William
- In 1862 small pox went through the valley and killed many of the first nations
- We are in the heart of the Cariboo
Coffee break at McLeese Lake
As the sun came out we decided to head
north for our Coffee break and Gine picked this spot and it was amazing: it is
a tourist info with a super cool picnic table (you sit on old tractor seats) –
you have view not only on the lake but old farm equipment and wagon too). And
the best we had an amazing coffee break in the sunshine.
Along the route we saw more farms and
more lakes and lots and lots of forest.
- By the way McLeese was in the late 1800s the postmaster here at Soda Creek
- Here is also the Gibraltar mine harvesting copper
Through endless farms
and we started our last stretch for
today towards Quesnel – after a lot of driving we made up one day in our trip
(yes we are still behind a few days) – and as we drove north the weather got
nicer and nicer with perfect sunshine as we arrived at the:
2025-05-22