Any of you (John) know if there would be anything in the area worth exploring that time of year? The actual place we will be for a few days is
RockRidge Canyon Home. My cousin wants me to explore and find a good place to take some wedding pics.
Lots of places to explore close by there. With some old volcanoes nearby. If you get to the right vantage point it will be apparent as will be some of the old lava fields. Look to the West/North West. Here is a Google sat map link
jameson lake bc - Google Maps that puts you down on Jameson Lake near the old Willis Ranch road. (Noty sure why Googlle calls it the Wilies Ranch Rd. Probably a typo. My parents were friends of the Willis'. The lake near RockRidge Canyon (there name - not anything to do with folks in the Princeton area) use to be great fishing for fresh water ling cod of over 40 lbs. Not sure if you get freaked out by much, but I have always had a little bit of the jitters around those lakes. Jameson really gives me the jitters. It is in a very deep valley. So it doesn't get much sun which makes the lake look black. There are lots of creeks coming into the lake but rarely is there anything going out. The North end use to have the remnants of an old dredging outfit.
The corporation that built the retreat centre and gave it to Young Life ( an evangelical youth organization started in the US ) also started Copper Creek Ranch. They hold most of the grazing rights to that area. Neither Young Life or Copper Creek Ranch have had a good reputation with locals when they first started. It use to be that I could travel through the property and range land without issue. You still can travel through the range land. However, I understand that all the RockRidge property is posted.
Jameson is still accessible off of Copper Mountain Road. At the top of the hill above Smelter Lake ver left onto the main logging road. There is an old settlement with a small gave yard near the top of the hill there. Probably isn't much left now. Once you are on the main road, you will see that it is really a mess of logging roads up there now. On your GPS, you will see the old trail which runs through the trees and then along a shale hill side just above Jameson lake. At the bottom of the hill turn left and it is only about a km or so to the lake. If you keep going North, you will arrive back at RockRidge Canyon. I presume the access is gated. You can go back up to the main road to the old Forestry lookout at Red Bluffs on the main road which will eventually take you back to Stemwinder and Hwy 3. It is a nice view from Red Bluffs. I am not sure if it will be accessible in March.
The Red Bluffs would be a real cool spot for wedding pics. The Princeton area is usually variations of brown and white in March. The Princeton Castle
Historic Stone Ruins - Picture Gallery might be a decent back drop without snow and a chance of some green grass.
There is another road which comes out on the South end of Wolfe Lake. However, I am positive that this road is gated as it is through the Upper Similkameen Reserve. There is a Buddhist hermit who the First nations have invited to live on their land at Wolfe Lake. He does receive visitors. For years he lived in a cave just below the Mascott mine.
One word of warning, as soon as the snow is gone, the ticks are out in the Princeton area until we got our first hot day. The old Willis ranch area was always real bad for wood ticks. One day I picked of 9 ticks when I got home from hiking above the old ranch. I imagine a wedding dress would very well at collecting ticks.
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Lorne isn't scary unless she is scared of big fish or sea monsters. The lakes are considered bottomless and their are native legends attached to them. Some believe the lakes are connected via subterranean rivers to Okanogan Lake. Jameson Lake is really the only one in that chain of lakes that spooks me. If you go there, you will see what I mean.
