British Columbia's Other Side

Coastal British Columbia tends to steal most of BC’s thunder, but there’s plenty of bedazzlement happening in its south-central heartland—behind the scenes without the crowds and inflated prices.

Here are the highlights from Canada’s Thompson Okanagan Region:

Kamloops is BC’s off-the-radar city of 90,000 open-minded folks that reveal pure Canada: no pretense or rush. An unsung hub of a province built on lumber, mining and ranching, this getaway certainly also rocks and hops—as in brewpubs.

Ribfest, an annual, free three-day riverside festival showcases 25 mostly local live bands, beer gardens and ribs galore. The straight-ahead rock, classic pop, country and folk bands play in a permanent bandshell that also has recurring summer concerts on beautiful riverfront greenspace geared up for family-friendly merriment.

This town also flexes its melody muscle by making the world’s finest acoustic guitars.

Founder/inventor Mike Miltimore’s Riversong Guitars uses indigenous Canadian tone-woods to build masterpieces with two extra frets, an “ear port” on top of the guitar, no hassle multiple adjustments and iPhone-attached electronic innovations that would dazzle Jimi Hendrix.

You can possibly meet the driven, wild, smart, hilarious guitar maker via a factory tour and definitely peruse their amazing lineup of axes at the family’s downtown retail music store.

There’s no shortage of handcrafted brews in Kamloops, either. Noble Pig Brewhouse is a sprawling multi-room party zone with a huge outdoor patio. Their Brett IPA is concocted with Brettanomyces wild yeast that gives it a fruity/tangy surge. Red Collar Brewing distributes throughout Canada; their nifty tap room adjoins to a sunflower-adorned patio.

Similar to the world’s best guitars being made from local wood, these brews use local Big Horn Hops, as this is one of the best places to grow them.

A First Nations-led farm tour on the edge of downtown Kamloops revealed that these non-GMO climbers grow 18-feet per year on a vine (really a vertically hanging organic string) and take seven years to mature. Another hint about the quality of these indigenous hops is that they sell worldwide to places like India, Chile and Taiwan.

(PS, compared to the U.S., a high percentage of Canadian women drink beer.)

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Boutique Hotel 540 is right in the middle of the action on trendy Victoria Street and a hit with travelers stopping over on their Rocky Mountaineer train tour. You can look back in this wide-open freight-train influenced quarter by riding the Kamloops Heritage Railway or peer ahead on the Tobiano golf course links.

Hang on, there’s a ton more going on beyond Kamloops.

East meets west at BC’s Echo Valley Ranch & Spa where Aussie wranglers, a Newfie sharpshooter and an incredible chef (RE: Madagascar peppercorn sauce) complement teams of cuddly Border Collies and resident Thai therapists who convey the best of Thailand’s healing traditions.

Set upon a Cariboo Mountains crossroads of four dynamic geographic terrains—mountainous, boreal forest, grasslands, desert canyons—means wildly varied landscapes and activities. This ultra-comfy guest ranch is heaven for horseback riding (25 including retirees), feeding the ranch animals (Tennessee Walkers need snacks, too), trail hiking and working out in a fitness room and pool with epic highland views.

The staff includes two Aussie wranglers, dogs and cats lounging everywhere (including at your feet) and a gritty-but-warm Eastern Canadian, Darrel, who wears many hats including target shooting guide (“Women listen, men don’t.”) using rifles with superb scopes and handguns.

Darrel also pilots the 4x4 Fraser Canyon Tour, a looping route that descends into Canada’s breathtaking “Grand Canyon of the North” and its mighty Fraser River where you’ll successfully pan for gold. The hairpin-turning road then ascends back into Cariboo Regional Provincial Park’s Douglas Firs and Aspen where Darrel spices in some local homesteader gossip, as even well-spaced neighbors have differences.

The incredible cuisine is enjoyed family style around two long tables in the no-shoes-allowed Dove Lodge. Breakfast and lunch are buffet style while the sit-down dinner menu is announced by the chef after sounding a gong. Most of the meat and veggies are grown on-property.

You’ll surely experience steaks n’ mash, but as most of the kitchen staff is Thai, there’ll be vegetable miracles.

No matter where you wander here, besides everlasting sunsets, one of the vistas is horses frolicking in rolling green-grass fields with peaks in the background. This inspiring outdoor recreation campus includes two stand-alone spa buildings—one a massive wooden ‘Baan Thai’ structured designed by a preeminent Thai architect who was frequently commissioned by the former Thai king.

The Thai-style healing goes beyond bodywork to include a dinner featuring Thai cuisine, dancing and smiling.

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The ranch hosts 25-40 guests in 20 accommodation options April through October. Loyalty speaks for itself as most guests return frequently. The international staff loves kids, who all seem to have a blast during the family period in July and August. Otherwise, the resort is 13-plus.

Families get a cherished break from gadget-addiction while kidless couples can still enjoy maximum privacy.

It’s a two-hour drive from Kamloops unless you arrive on their landing strip via Vancouver or Calgary. Owners Norm Dove (a British born long-time Canadian expat) and his Thai wife Nan have redefined family-style BC ranching. Welcome to Canada’s wild west with a lavish twist. And yes, that Border Collie is keeping an eye on you.

Whistler and Banff get most of Western Canada’s ski love, but in between them lies Sun Peaks Resort, an unhurried Alpine paradise where there’s no crowded Vegas-like scene (sorry, Whistler) and milder climes than chilly Banff. People come here to enjoy Canada as it should be: polite, hearty, delivering on what’s promised (no lines for epic skiing) and wide-open space.

The four-season resort—recalling the mellower, more affordable Whistler of 25 years ago—features summer music festivals including Retro Concert Weekends (think Janis Joplin and Bad Company) and thin-air golfing (4,000 feet) where elevation gives you an edge.

Sun Peaks’ 700 full-time residents send their elementary-aged kids to a school requiring a lift up the ski mountain from where they ski home.

You can also hike, paddle a First Nations-inspired Montreal canoe used during the fur trade era and roar down the mountain on North America’s only Mountain Cross Cart course.

A predictable 45 minutes from Kamloops, Western Canada’s “Whitefish, MT” has nine hotels and 21 restaurants—one of them, Mantles, features delectable Thai and Indian entrees. This getaway, Canada’s second largest ski area, is pretty darn happy being second and setting their own mellow pace.

Where others may value accolades, Sun Peaks values, well, values.

An hour east of Kamloops, Salmon Arm is a comfortable lakeside tourist town that keeps it real with restaurants like Shuswap Pie Company. One of the many things this town does well is its annual Roots and Blues Festival. At 25-years strong, it features acts on three stages that dazzle amid acres of food and drink bacchanalia.

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Clever 2017 workshop pairings included wonderful collisions of bluegrass stars sitting in with a traditional Irish band and the merging of Cuban talents from Canada and Cuba. The festival headliner was bluegrass legend Ricky Skaggs with his virtuoso bandmates, Kentucky Thunder. Compelling, small side-of-stage-acts made the main stage band transitions a cinch. Festival organizer, encyclopedic jamband historian and radio DJ Peter North gets it right.

Friendly accommodation options include the Prestige Harbourfront Resort, where Shuswap Lake-front rooms have decks overlooking the water as well as the multilayered mountain fantasia.

For an overview of Canada’s Thompson Okanagan Region, go here.