About a kilometre up the old road is the first of the tunnels in the Fraser Canyon. Tunnel #1 is a short rock tunnel and tunnel #2 has a cut stone portal. The photo on the left shows the west portal to tunnel #2 with the date '1909' cut above the keystone. The photo to the right was taken above the retaining wall to the left of tunnel #2 looking downstream back to tunnel #1 and an eastbound CP chemical train led by Canadian Pacific AC4400CW 9539. The Fraser River can be seen in the background.

At Hell's Gate, there is an aerial tram descending to the Fraser River and the fish ladders. Rather than paying the $10 for the trip, Ian and I hiked down the access road (found about 500m downstream from the tram). While on the hike down, we saw a Canadian Pacific coal train westbound on the CN tracks (photo to left). Soon after, a Canadian National train passed eastbound on the far side of the river. The photo to the right shows the engines (CN 5533 and CN 5377) passing over a CP stone arch bridge.

Just downstream from Boston Bar, CN has a large bridge across Anderson Creek. The photo on the right was taken from below the highway bridge of a westbound CP intermodal train. We had been at this location about 10 minutes before this train arrived. As we waited, we noticed several people walking across the bridge who did not make it off before the train arrived. They stood on a water barrel platform about even with the second engine.

Both CN and CP have division points at Boston Bar and North Bend which are on opposite sides of the Fraser River. We stopped to get some food for dinner and cold snacks. During the half hour we were there, there was no train movement.

North from Boston Bar, we saw very few trains. The photo to the right is from a pullout looking downstream with CN on the near bank and CP on the far bank. About 8km down stream from Lytton at Cisco, the tracks exchange sides of the river. We ate our dinner at a picnic area several kilometres up the Thompson River with a view of both tracks but unfortunately no trains went by. Back at Lytton, we drove up highway 12 along the Fraser River through some farming country to Lillooet.

Just west of Lillooet is Seton Lake. British Columbia Railway has a spectacular route along the shore of the lake. Just as the sun was setting we caught a northbound mixed freight at the east end of the lake. The photo to the left shows the lead engines as they approach the end of the lake. It was taken from the Seton Lake Recreational Area on the lake shore. BC Rail runs a truck along the rails in front of every train. This has the fortunate side effect that railfans get 3 minutes warning before trains show up.

The recreational area closed at 10:00pm we were informed as we were setting up to spend the night. Instead we camped just above the lake under the transmission lines with a great view down the lake. We were hoping to watch a train traverse the lake at night. At about 10:30pm a truck went southbound and later around 11:00pm another truck and a train went southbound below the moonlit cliffs. The photo to the right is a 20 minute exposure of the truck and train southbound along the shore of Seton Lake. This photo shows the lake during daylight the next day morning.

The first train only had 3 cars so we waited for and chased the second train from the bridge up the Pavilion. The photo to the left shows the northbound BCR intermodal crossing the Fraser River. The train had 3 Dash8-40CM engines at the front (BCR 4618, 4617, 4621) and another as a helper engine (4622).

Highway 99 follows the BC Rail mainline very closely for the first 30 kilometres out of Lillooet. To the left is a view down to the Fraser River with the lead engines of the intermodal train we were following. The train has passed through the tunnel about 3 kilometres back. The photo on the near right is taken at the same location looking up the Fraser River valley with the same train crossing below fields on its way up to Pavilion.

At Pavilion, there is a large curve into the Pavilion Valley. The far right photo is of the same train climbing out of Pavilion and back to the Fraser Valley. The photo is taken from near the highway 99 overpass.

Leaving Pavilion, we drove back to Lillooet and via the Duffey Lake road to Pemberton. There are no rails on that stretch so there were no stops. From there the road follows the tracks all the way into West Vancouver. Between Garibaldi and Squamish the road is high up on the side of the Cheakamus Valley while the track goes through tunnels and bridges in the canyon floor. At a small pullout near the highest point on the road, we climbed through the bush to get a view down to the canyon floor. Just as we saw the track we saw the BC Rail truck driving up the canyon so we found a good spot and waiting for the train. The photo to the right shows an empty BC Rail chips train crossing the Cheakamus River.