The Gates Valley is a valley and group of communities in the Lillooet Country of the Southern Interior of British Columbia , Canada , located between the summit of Pemberton Pass and the head of Anderson Lake at the community of D'Arcy . Though the term strictly refers to the valley of the Gates River , it is usually used more in a sense of the communities located in the valley and is not a term used for the river's drainage basin, which is much larger.
18-616: The valley was part of the route of the Douglas Road , which was built during the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush of 1858–1860. Birkenhead Lake Provincial Park is accessed from the Gates Valley, via a turnoff up Blackwater Creek near the community of Gates. The communities of the valley include: 50°30′00″N 122°32′00″W / 50.50000°N 122.53333°W / 50.50000; -122.53333 This article about
36-484: A cosmopolitan mix of British , Americans , Chinese , Mexicans , Scandinavians , Kanakas (Hawaiians), Germans and others signed up for the job. Controversy erupted at the end of construction over whether prices at the Port Douglas end of the trail or the more expensive rates at Lillooet would be used to reckon the reimbursement as promised. The Governor settled finally on the cheaper Port Douglas prices. But
54-767: A location in the Cariboo Regional District , Canada is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Douglas Road The Douglas Road , a.k.a. the Lillooet Trail , Harrison Trail or Lakes Route , was a goldrush -era transportation route from the British Columbia Coast to the Interior (NB another route known as the Lillooet Trail was the Lillooet Cattle Trail , which used some of
72-458: A mixed land and water route was built, named the Douglas Road , a.k.a. the Lillooet Trail, Harrison Trail or Lakes Route. During its rowdy heyday, Port Douglas's population numbered in the thousands, and many of the B.C. mainland's first companies had their start here, including the famous B.X. Express and other freighting companies that relocated to the Fraser Canyon with the completion of
90-684: Is a remote community in British Columbia , Canada at east of the mouth of the Lillooet River , and at the head of Harrison Lake , which is the head of river navigation from the Strait of Georgia . Port Douglas was the second major settlement of any size on the British Columbia mainland (after Yale ) during the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush . It came into being in 1858 when Governor Douglas ordered that it be laid out. From Port Douglas to Lillooet
108-576: The Cariboo Wagon Road in the mid-1860s. Port Douglas dwindled in size rapidly with the abandonment of the Douglas Road . Today, there is nothing left - other than the place-name and the adopted name of the local First Nation, the Douglas Band of the In-SHUCK-ch Nation . A land alienation pattern on the lakeshore to the southwest of Douglas, across the mouth of the Lillooet River and down
126-806: The Colony of British Columbia , Sir James Douglas . The Indian reserve community of Xa'xtsa, home to the Douglas First Nation , who are part of the St'at'imc cultural group but have many ties to the Sto:lo of the Lower Mainland, is located on Douglas Indian Reserve No. 8 which is across Little Harrison Lake, as the bay which became the site of the steamer port is known, from the location of what had been Port Douglas proper. The name Port Douglas today generally refers to that community and its location, as nothing remains of
144-520: The Fraser River ended in the 1890s, although the town was already in decline, only a handful of non-native residents remained. In the 1970s, a large logging operation bulldozed the last remains of the town, which were only vestiges of a few foundations. Both Port Douglas and the Douglas Road , as well as the Douglas Ranges to the west of Harrison Lake , were named in honour of the first governor of
162-454: The 1890s, although small-steamer traffic on Anderson and Seton Lakes continued for decades after, ending on Seton Lake only in the 1950s. Starting at Port Douglas (now abandoned), a trail led to 25 Mile House (abandoned and lost). From there a route by boat and road went to Port Pemberton. A trail then went into Pemberton and made a wide turn to Port Anderson. From there, another water to road route went straight to Lillooet, where it joined
180-558: The Short Portage (today known as Seton Portage ). There packers and ultimately a short mule-drawn "railway" shuttled men and freight to the head of Seton Lake , where another collection of steamers carried them to the foot of that lake and a final five-mile wagon road to the boomtowns of Cayoosh Flat, Parsonville and Marysville (today's Lillooet ). In response to the Cariboo Gold Rush , a toll road from there to Fort Alexandria
198-522: The construction work was of very poor condition, such that when the Royal Engineers resurveyed the route a year later it was unusable, and further public funds were dedicated to fixing and improving it, adding bridges and taking down steep hills. Despite their efforts the route was little-used by 1861 or so, although it remained in use by locals and the occasional traveller for years afterwards. Regular steamer service to and from Port Douglas ended in
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#1732848973672216-768: The dangers of the Fraser Canyon to access the gold-bearing bars of the Fraser around today's Lillooet . Pressure for an alternative route to the Upper Fraser had mounted in the wake of the Fraser Canyon War of the winter of 1859, and miners were wary of travelling through the territory of the Nlaka'pamux (Thompson Indians), even though the war was over. Thousands had travelled the route already, in nightmarish conditions including heavy rain and even heavier infestations of mosquitos , when Governor Sir James Douglas decided to formalize
234-487: The lake a bit, remains on the map as Tipella City (also known as Tipella, or Tipella Hot Springs). It was a port and land-promotion scheme from 1898 that never went far, although a number of investors and buyers were taken in by it. The port was a wharf for the Moneyspinner silver mine at Fire Lake which operated for a few years. Regular steamboat traffic to Port Douglas from Georgia Strait and New Westminster via
252-521: The old Cariboo Road. The route begins at Port Douglas, British Columbia , at the head of Harrison Lake and the head of river navigation from the Strait of Georgia . From there a land portion of the route follows the lower Lillooet River to Port Lillooet at the south end of Lillooet Lake , where steamers and canoes carried travellers to Port Pemberton, at the mouth of the Birkenhead River near present-day Mount Currie . The next land portion of
270-584: The route with the construction of a wagon road over the land portions in order to avert starvation among the thousands already on the upper Fraser . As one of the first acts of the newly incorporated Colony of British Columbia , the Governor commissioned the building of the road in an unusual road-development scheme whereby men willing to work on the road would invest twenty-five dollars each, which would be paid back in goods upon reaching Cayoosh ( Lillooet ). In 1858 five hundred men, in two teams of two hundred fifty,
288-609: The route, known as the Long Portage or the Pemberton Portage , follows the lower Birkenhead River then diverges from it to Birken Lake (a.k.a. Summit Lake or Gates Lake ) and then via the Gates River to present-day D'Arcy at the head of Anderson Lake , then known as Port Anderson. From there a motley variety of watercraft, including the "Lady of The Lake", a small steamer and the ubiquitous native canoe , ferried travellers to
306-448: The same route but was built 25 years later). Over 30,000 men are reckoned to have travelled the route in, although by the end of the 1860s it was virtually abandoned due to the construction of the Cariboo Wagon Road , which bypassed the region. Originally traversed by Hudson's Bay Company employees in 1828 and charted by HBC explorer Alexander Caulfield Anderson in 1846, the route was heavily travelled by prospectors seeking to avoid
324-654: Was built by entrepreneur Gustavus Blin Wright , followed the Fraser Canyon for about twenty miles, then cut up eastwards onto the Cariboo Plateau via the town of Clinton , where the later Cariboo Wagon Road met the older route. Lillooet was numbered as "Mile 0" of this road, with its roadhouses taking their name from their distance from a certain point on Lillooet 's Main Street. Port Douglas, British Columbia Port Douglas , sometimes referred to simply as Douglas ,
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