1906-7. TRANSACTIONS. 23 



covered several summers, but an account of an imaginary trip 

 from Hope eastward to the Columbia seems the easiest way to 

 describe the route and the country on either side of it. We shall 

 imagine ourselves, then, with an outfit of pack-horses about to 

 start from Hope. No guide is necessary for the ver est tyro in 

 the woods could not lose the well-built, well-travelled trail we 

 are to follow. The glory of Hope has departed, temporarily at 

 least. A single store, a so-called hotel, and a few houses occupied 

 chiefly by old-timers who have chosen this lovely spot in which 

 to spend what remains of their lives, make up the white man's 

 habitations. There is also a considerable half-breed settlement 

 and near-by an Indian reserve. Travelling a mile or so along 

 the rich alluvial flat which borders the Fraser, past orchards and 

 gardens, the trail turns up the valley of the Coquihalla, Ander- 

 son's old route. The trail for fourteen miles to the summit, 

 which separates the waters of this branch of the Coquihalla from 

 the Skagit, is the most beautiful I have ever travelled over; 

 built originally for a wagon-road it is wide and well made — a 

 glorified "Lover's Walk." Between the Fraser valley and the 

 summit it rises some 2,200 feet, but is nowhere very steep. Wind- 

 ing along the sides of the Coquihalla valley it crosses innumer- 

 able gorges and mountain torrents, plunging now and then into 

 the dense forest to emerge again on the side of a ravine where a 

 magnificent view across the Fraser to the north tempts one to 

 loiter. Just after the summit is crossed and the waters of the 

 Sumallow branch of the Skagit are reached good feed for horses 

 is. sufficient inducement to camp. Easily climbed mountains 

 served to keep me there for two weeks last summer. They rise 

 to an altitude of something over 7,000 feet on both sides of the 

 valley and though very steep are easily climbed. Fish and game 

 are plentiful, too, the small trout caught here having the finest 

 flavour of any I have eaten in British Columbia. It may be said, 

 however, that British Columbia trout cannot compare with those 

 of the east either in firmness of flesh or delicacy of flavour. The 

 common species, the " Rainbow Trout " and the " Dolly Varden " 

 are very beautiful in appearance, as their names indicate, and 

 _they vary in quality in different streams, but at their best they 

 are not so good as eastern fish, and in some streams they are 

 soft and insipid. Like hares and blue grouse they make, however, 

 a very agreeable change in ordinary camp diet when more palat- 

 able game is not to be had. Deer are very plentiful in the Skagit 



