A whole day of bus travel in rain through the Cayoosh Range and Canyon, narrow and twisting with a rock wall between 5-7,000 ft in height, with the highway clinging to the mountainface. It’s a zone of extreme aridity and high summer temperatures, featuring lizards, cactus, and sagebrush. “Nkoomptch” is the historical name for this locality historically and means “water crossing over” in the St’at’imcets language.

Cayoosh Falls to the Fraser river was the scene of the Cayoosh Gold Rush of the 1880s, in which 300 Chinese gold miners were estimated by the local Government Agent to have taken out around $6 million in gold. The creek’s riverbed throughout this stretch was literally turned upside down and remains of Chinese gold-mills and gold-furnaces can be found near the Hydro campsite, as well as piles of washed rocks which are byproducts of Chinese mining methods.