Back in early June of 2015, I booked a few days off from work in order to attend my partner’s sister’s daughter’s (!) convocation in Kamloops. Apparently, some people are unfamiliar with this term–it’s another way of saying “high school graduation ceremony” but uses one word instead of four. It’s efficient. Our trip was five days in total, starting Wednesday, June 3 and ending Sunday, June 7.
(I started writing this post a few months after the trip and never quite got around to posting it. I am now posting what I had written to that point.)
The exciting day by day details follow.
Day 1, June 3
Technically it’s still spring on June 3 but temperatures were already climbing to 28ºC and higher as we* hitched the trailer to the truck and headed out to points east and north. Given that the Interior of the province is usually hotter than the coast it seems we may be leaving the frying pan for the fire. This turns out not to be the case.
Kamloops is about 350 km from Vancouver so we planned to make a pit stop or two along the way. Our first was in Chilliwack, famous (in Canada) for the band of the same name. I still hear “My Girl” in my head, whether I want to or not. The actual town seems to consist mainly of a strip mall. Maybe we missed the quaint downtown part. We were only stopping for gas, after all.
Having fueled up, we motored along the Coquihalla Highway where it began to shower. The showers continued for the rest of the drive. It was like normal Vancouver weather decided to travel with us. A few hours later we were hungry and turned off into the small town of Merritt (population 8,000) for lunch. Being such a small town there were a surprising number of sushi restaurants. They were all shut down so maybe we were witnessing the aftermath of a grand but failed experiment to bring raw fish to the Interior.
We dined at what seemed to be the most popular food joint in Merritt, a franchise restaurant called Home. It was just like home, too, except mom never wore a uniform and charged for lunch. I indulged in a hot turkey sandwich, something I haven’t had for years. I meant to take one of those inane “here’s a shot of what I had for lunch” photos that compete for space on Facebook with inane memes and inane political statements but I ate too fast so all you get is a dirty plate:
Speaking of dirty, this ad on the local A&W reads wrong (I grabbed this from Google Maps, the price has probably gone up since):
We arrive in Kamloops in the afternoon and having made it without incident, Jeff steers the trailer into a basketball hoop sticking out from the driveway, crumpling a corner of the trailer and scoring three points. The last points anyone would score on that hoop if you know what I mean.
It continued to rain. We were told the weather was never like this in Kamloops. A survey of the landscape suggested no one was fibbing because the hills have a desert-like aspect, with trees growing tiny and reluctantly along the slopes.
The convocation ceremony was to take place at 7 p.m. and I had no pants.
Well, I had pants but they were actually shorts. Even in Kamloops they expect better for convocation. Jeff and I drove to the local Walmart super-whatever, got lost along the way, then finally found it atop the mountain, where they like to build malls here, apparently. I bought some nice black denim pants in the closest size available, 32. I have since slimmed down to my normal waist size of 30 so these pants turned out to be one-use only. Given the price, I’m okay with that.
The convocation brought back memories of my own from way back in 1982, mainly in how it was long, hot and not exactly thrill-a-minute.I believe the law requires all Canadian convocations to take place in hockey rinks. Most of the speakers were wise enough to keep it short. The valedictorians were a young man and woman. The guy was somewhat engaging, the girl tried to be funny and was not. She also violated the “keep it short” rule. A well-made video put together by the daughter and a few decent musical selections by a couple of high school bands (not the marching kind) rounded out the evening and we were once again free to venture out into the pouring rain, which never happens in Kamloops.
Thus ended Day 1.
* Jeff
Day 2, June 4
Our second day was spent in Kamloops. As we awoke, it continued to rain hard, which I again remind you, never happens in Kamloops. Finally, by early afternoon the clouds parted and the sun came out. We pulled up lawn chairs in the backyard, enjoyed snacks and soda and I thought, “Gee, when the sun comes out here it feels a lot warmer than on the coast.” Was it because of the 1000 m elevation? The dry climate? Whatever it was, I continued to think this and instead of doing the logical thing and moving into the shade, I stayed in the sun and got royally burned on both arms and the back of my neck.
I can be dumb like that.
We walked along the North Thompson River trail, where we enjoyed the sight of collapsed trees…
The trail was nice, if a bit treacherous in places (there were multiple trees that had fallen victim to the collapsed shoreline), but I remain mystified by the directions on this sign:
I later went jogging along the nearby dike, which I described in this post: The Kamloops run
The parts that didn’t look like a dike looked like this. Note the ominous clouds in the sky, ready to bring another one of those “never happens in Kamloops” torrents:
The evening ended with a big family gathering with food and drink for all. Not pictured: the mosquitoes intent on eating me alive. I bundled up like I was wintering in Alaska and retired early so I wouldn’t spend the next three days scratching five dozen bites.
Day 3, June 5
We headed out of Kamloops to start the official camping part of the trip at Harmon Lake, south of Merritt and up yonder in them mountains. The weather was sunny but not overly hot. The overly hot would wait until we got back home, another example of the reverse weather of the trip.
Harmon Lake Recreation Site (as it’s officially known) is a provincial park with two main camping areas. Other than rustic non-flushing toilets there are no amenities. Luckily we arrived before fire bans went into effect across half the planet so we were able to cozy down with a nice fire in the evening. Alas, we had no weenies to roast. How did we forget the weenies? *shakes fist at sky*
Here’s a nice shot of the lake I took from our camp spot. I got as close to the water as I could and I think you’ll agree it’s very pretty. I also discovered a few moments after taking the shot that I was standing on an ant hill. I became aware of this due to all of the ants on my feet.
Here’s Jeff relaxing at the picnic table, safely out of reach of the ants.
We began to explore the area and came across a playground. It was rustic but required adult supervision. Fortunately, we are both adults so we were good to go.
Day 4 and 5: Sadly I never recorded events shortly after they happened so I don’t have the details. Perhaps they will come rushing back one day but for now, rest assured that we arrived safely back home.
