Spectacular Myra Canyon trestles
The series on the best Okanagan trails continues today with the Myra Canyon section of the former Kettle Valley Railway (KVR), which is undoubtably the most spectacular part of The Great Trail (a.k.a. Trans Canada Trail).
If the Okanagan Rail Trail is the ultimate rail trail in the valley bottom, then Myra Canyon is the ultimate rail trail in the highlands.
The Sheriff has described it as the ultimate combination of manmade marvel and Mother Nature at her finest – 16 wood trestles, two huge steel spans and two rock tunnels precariously hanging onto cliffs over a deep, really deep canyon with views of Okanagan Lake and the city of Kelowna far, far below.
The Sheriff has had a 40-year love affair with Myra. In so many respects, his recreational and journalistic history in the Okanagan is mirrored in its modern history.
• May 1980: The Sheriff is hired as senior reporter at The Kelowna Daily Courier just as the CPR began removing the rails from Midway to Penticton and turning the right-of-way over to the provincial government.
The Sheriff wrote numerous stories as the non-profit Kettle Valley
Railway Heritage Society in Kelowna tried unsuccessfully to raise $10 million to buy the rails and ties to establish a tourist train attraction similar to what happened in Summerland.
Several society members owned speeders, a railroad maintenance cart powered by a one-cylinder engine, putt-putt-putt. The Sheriff was one of the last people to ride the rails. As we smoothly clickclick-clicked over the steel railjunctions, the Sheriff thought:
“This is the way that this incredible canyon and ‘McCulloch’s Wonder’ are meant to be experienced.”
Photos and stories covered the removal of rails and ties but the Sheriff in his red Land Rover and many others began driving through the canyon, thump-thumpthumping over the trestles until vandals started throwing their timbers over the side creating huge gaps.
• 1993-95: After the provincial government considered closing the canyon due to serious injuries suffered by trestle users, the Myra Canyon Trestle Restoration
Society was established, and volunteers spent three summers using donated lumber to nail down decking and attach handrails to all 18 spans.
• May 1994: As the improvements proceeded, Kelowna cyclist, Carol Faye Fingler, 26, fell to her death from a trestle yet to be done. The Sheriff – tears in his eyes – took a photo of her bike, its front wheel twisted, as her body was carried off the trestle. A memorial cairn, decorated with flowers and a bicycle helmet, marked the site.
• January 2003: In a stroke of unknowing genius, the society got the National Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada to designate the canyon as a place of national historic significance.
• Mid-August 2003: A lightning strike in Okanagan Mountain Provincial Park sparked a massive month-long forest fire that destroyed 12 wooden trestles and damaged the two steel spans as well as burning down 270 homes in Kelowna.
• 2004-2008: The 12 trestles were rebuilt and two steel spans re-timbered, all with decks and handrails, with $17 million in mostly-federal funding (as a national heritage site) and a provincial grant (to use B.C. wood).
• June 22, 2008: The Sheriff donned top hat and tails to play the role of CPR president Thomas Shaughnessy at the official opening of the Myra Canyon trail.
• November 2017: MCTRS was awarded the BC Parks’ 2016 Volunteer Group of the Year Award. In 2018, the society celebrated 25 years of volunteer service to the Myra Canyon trestles, tunnels and trail system.
As word spread, visitors from around the world flocked to this unique historical attraction with bike rentals and tours going full bore during the warm-weather months. Trail counters tally more than 70,000 people a year. An annual bike ride every July starts in the canyon and ends in Penticton.
There are two accesses: the east end via Myra Station located up Myra forest service road off McCulloch Road in Kelowna and the west end via Ruth Station – named after one of chief (design/construction) engineer Andrew McCulloch’s daughters – up June Springs Road (Little White forest service road) in Kelowna.
At an elevation of 1,280 metres, the highest section of the KVR is around a deep, steep and wide chasm, carved out by two main creeks: today’s KLO and Pooley creeks. McCulloch creatively hung his railway on the sides of the canyon – less than a kilometre wide – using nearly 11 kilometres of track.
Completed in 1914, McCulloch commented that he had never seen a railway built in such difficult conditions. His engineers aptly called it “McCulloch’s Wonder.”
In addition to maintaining the trail, the trestle restoration society has added another objective to its mandate: the preservation and enhancement of the cultural heritage of Myra Canyon, for example, partnering with UBC Okanagan to sponsor archaeological digs at two of the original construction camps in 2007 and 2008.