Most people picture British Columbia as rainforest and coastline, but drive a few hours inland to Gold Country and it starts feeling more like Arizona. Sagebrush, prickly pear cactus and a semi-arid climate have earned the Thompson Okanagan region the nickname "the Arizona of Canada," and the small town of Cache Creek sits right at its heart.
The name comes from its 19th-century role as a supply cache for trappers, but Cache Creek's real boom came in the 1860s, when gold prospectors heading for the Cariboo Mountains used the roadhouse here as a stopover. When the railway bypassed the town in favour of nearby Ashcroft in 1885, Cache Creek stayed small — until highway upgrades in the 1950s and 60s turned it into a classic road-trip stop, complete with motels and neon. A giant statue of a miner, Cariboo Sam, now greets drivers at the junction of the Trans-Canada and Cariboo highways.
History is the main draw. About 10 minutes from town, Historic Hat Creek Ranch restores an original roadhouse from the gold rush era, with costumed interpreters, stagecoach rides, gold panning and an interpretive site sharing the stories of the Shuswap Nation, who lived here long before the miners arrived. It runs May through September. Also seasonal and nearby are the McAbee Fossil Beds, managed by the Bonaparte First Nation — a former lakebed around 53 million years old with remarkable insect and plant fossils, and roughly five miles of trails. It's exposed, treeless terrain, so bring water and stick to marked paths.
If your tastes run to chrome rather than fossils, time a trip for September's Cache Creek Graffiti Days, a classic car festival dating to the 1980s with drag races, a dance, an outdoor market and a beer garden.
The food scene is small but charmingly old-school. Hungry Herbie's Drive-In has been flipping burgers and thick milkshakes since 1957, Cheryl's Place is a diner inside a gas station known for hearty breakfasts, and the Desert Hills Taco Stand pours a salsa bar with flavours like honeydew and blueberry.
Cache Creek makes sense as part of a wider trip: an hour west of Kamloops (the nearest airport, with flights to Vancouver, Victoria and Calgary), four to four-and-a-half hours from Vancouver along the Trans-Canada Highway, or a stop on the roughly 1,200-mile Gold Rush Trail loop that runs up to the artsy mountain town of Wells. You'll want a car here — but that's rather the point.
