On Canada's Cariboo Chilcotin Coast, travelers can get a taste of the Western cowboy lifestyle with a ranch stay, where survival skills and equine etiquette are all part of the adventure
“In some ranches, horses are treated like a bike you pulled off the rack,” laments Mike Christensen. He’s wearing a dog-eared cowboy hat and has a salt-and-pepper beard. “They don’t even know the horse’s name and degrade it to a vessel of transport,” he adds, shaking his head. “Here, we teach you how to build trust.”
Having joined their Horse Harmony experience, I found myself in the ranch corral with Mike, the sun making us squint. Years ago, Mike used to sell suits in Denmark but came out to try riding and got a taste of the Western lifestyle. He started by living with a ranch family in Montana before migrating across the border 11 years ago. “I’m a cowboy now, absolutely!” he enthuses, his accent still Danish.
Plodding along the trail, I catch glimpses of the Fraser River cutting a 5,778ft-deep canyon through the Marble Range, sage brush growing on the hillsides. I spy abandoned wooden cabins once used as offices for the river ferry that transported prospectors travelling from Lillooet, in southwestern BC, during the days of the gold rush. I think of those late-19th-century pioneers on horseback, too, surviving amid this wilderness, hunting and foraging to supplement their canned food rations.
We return to the ranch, hop in a 4x4 and head toward Fraser River. According to Daryl, it “runs red because it’s so full of salmon”. We roll the car to the edge of Marble Canyon, which yawns so wide it seems to swallow the sky. A few hardy ranchers can be seen in the valley below.
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