Road Trippin - Part 7 - Home to Kelowna

 As mentioned in part 6 of road trippin’ (if you haven’t read it please do) we drove back to Kaslo for breakfast at BlueBelle’s Café and Beanery after which we took a short tour through the town.  Not much was open here unfortunately so needless to say the tour was very short!!  Kaslo and the surrounding area is quite pretty and I am sure that it would be a great place to visit in the summer to go camping and fishing and maybe even try the “world’s best fish and chips” (we shall see JB’s at Woodbury, we shall see).

From Kaslo we drove to Ainsworth Hot Springs for a soak.  The hot springs here are similar to most commercially run hot springs in the region in that the water is housed in pools similar to what you would find at a public swimming pool.  However here there are caves that have hot spring water flowing through them.  The temperature of the water inside the caves is about 10c warmer than in the pools and it is dark and steamy so it was difficult to stay inside them for more than a few minutes at a time.  After soaking long enough to get wrinkled fingers and toes we headed to Nelson for a quick look. 

                                        

                                       

Nelson is the cultural hub of the Kootenays with a number of galleries featuring local artisan's work.  It is also very much like Byron Bay in that it is a melting pot of different types of people, from hippies, to the outdoorsy to the rediculously wealthy.  We took a little bit of time to explore one of the local galleries and the surrounding shops on Baker St.  The shop fronts have retained their old world charm, while the interiors are thoroughly modern.

After leaving Nelson we headed along highway 3 through Castlegar then onto Grand Forks.  The landscape flattened out and very little snow lay on the ground.  Grand Forks is situated in the Boundary Region of BC. The mountains to its south form a natural border between Canada and the US. 

Grand Forks itself was uninspiring for the most part save for a fantastic little gem of a cafe called the Happy Days Diner.

The interior is styled in a 50's theme with loads of memorabilia and menus inspired by movie and music stars of this era.  The food was fantastic, the service even better.  The boys won over the staff with their natural charm - even taking away a free donut each.

The drive from Grand Forks to Kelowna was fairly uneventful.  We stopped briefly in the desert like city of Osoyoos then headed north.  Just outside Penticton; a city at the southern end of Okanagan Lake; we spotted a loon and her chicks swimming mightily against the flow of the river that feeds Okanagan falls.  We then followed Okanagan lake through Penticton and Summerland before stopping at the quaint lake side town of Peachland.  The 'beach' in Peachland is made up of small pebbles and has a grand view of the lake.  Whilst in Peachland we once again saw snow and small hail falling lightly. 

The nanny and bumps effect had an impact just about everywhere we went on our trip.  Incredibly even as Mum and Dad left Kelowna their plane flew through lightly falling snow!  And not only that as they arrived back in Australia southeast Queensland experienced huge summer storms!!!   

Mum and Dad’s wish for when they came to Canada this time around was (apart from visiting us!!!) a winter experience.  That they certainly got – as well as some unforgettable experiences.  We had a great time with them and can’t wait for their return in the summer