My friend Brian and I went on a road trip to Bella Coola, British Columbia, in March, 2003. It was an interesting trip through what must be the most remote country within a one to two day drive from Seattle and Vancouver. The drive took us through areas along the Fraser River that resembled the high deserts of the US Southwest, accross the BC Coast Range and into one of the wettest areas in North America.

This map shows our route. We headed north on I-5 from Seattle to Bellingham, then took WA 539 to BC 13. This took us to Trans-Canada 1, which we followed east to Hope, then north to Cache Creek. In Cache Creek we got on BC 97 North to Clinton, where we turned off onto back roads, which took us up to Williams Lake by way of the tiny towns of Jesmond, Dog Creek and Alkali Lake, with a side trip down to the Fraser River at Big Bar Creek. From Williams Lake we followed BC 20 all the way west to Bella Coola (470 km, 290 miles). Then it was BC 20 back to Tatla Lake, where we headed south on some back roads to Tatlayoko Lake. We continued on the back roads from Tatlayoko Lake over to Chilko Lake, then back up to BC 20 and Alexis Creek. From there it was BC 20 to Williams Lake. We returned to Seattle by heading south on BC 97 to Clinton, then backtracking the way we went up.