A couple days later in Oroville, I took my camera along with me on my bike ride, but first a picture of my rig all neat and trim.
The workhorse. Wasn't a bit of trouble for 13,560 miles.
Beautiful sunshine and a nice peaceful river right behind my space.
A view over to the RV park clubhouse. I got to like that hill in back.
I spent a full day riding around trying to get a flavor of the town. Just great weather, light traffic in the area, parks and lakes here and there. There were some newer business about but most of the establishments were pretty old. There is a strong arts community here, with a couple large galleries. I really didn’t see much art worth mentioning though. Well, art that I liked.
Riding to the Northern edge of town, I could see what some of the town does during the fall winter and spring, catering to fishermen, the rest of the year apple harvest is in full swing. There is a large campground/park with boat ramp and dock very close to downtown. Then when I was riding around I found a big box store, part of a local chain. Right next to that is a small row type RV park, snuggled up against a moderate hill with homes above. Probably 25 spaces available. When I checked on the place, it was $7 per night for W&E! With a dump station available. Couldn’t beat that so I decided to move there when my week was up at the other place. It’ll save me $100 per week. Since the cheap place didn’t have sewer at each site, but did have a dump station, I wasn’t giving up much. The view at the new place has only a portion of the lake, and it is right across the street from a tire store blocking the view, but saving $100 per week takes precedence. On the ride back to town, around 2 miles, I found a much older campground alongside the main road bordering the lake. But it was closed down. Fairly recently by the looks of it. There weren’t any campers but the trailer/office/home had someone there, and there was some grading going on. Too bad too, since the sign said it had free WiFi, and cable! And only $13 per night! It was a Passport America campground so it would have been half price for me, if it had been open, that’s where I would have stayed.
Here's the main business for the town, harvesting and warehousing apples.
In the main part of town are several of these warehouses, they grow allot of apples and other fruit in the area. I only took one picture but these big buildings are all over the town. As are those big wooden crates that are dropped at the orchards during harvest.
One of two main drags in town. Looking North.
One of the little parks in town. That's the library in the back.
What do we have here!??
I’d been in town a couple days before I noticed this pub! They make their own beer here. Imagine my disappointment when I found out that they only open a couple times a year. I did run into the owner one day making up a new batch of beer, but he told me that they only use this place to brew for distributors and probably wouldn’t be opening. The poor economy and all.
The copper brew kettle, one of several.
Big beautiful kettle.
It is a nice little pub too.
Even had a beer garden outside.
It’s really a shame they weren’t open. But I did find a bar with kitchen close by, just up the alley, where they had pretty good food and a low cost beer for me.
The river. Never did find out the name.
This river doesn’t come out of Osoyoos lake, the large lake just north of Oroville. It comes from the west. Then there is a creek that comes out of the lake and joins up with this river south of town. I rode my bike over several bridges in town, but neither of the rivers had their names mentioned on signs typically placed on bridges in this area.
The local museum.
Kind of small, not much of interest in the museum. They did have pictures of a neat water chute, built of wood in the early 1900’s, that was several miles long. They use to float apples from the various orchards down to the processing plant in town. It’s all ripped out except for a small section but I never found that.
The main drag. It is a sleepy little town for sure.
Interesting cloud formation. Looked like rain was coming, but never arrived.
This is a nice park right at the end of Osoyoos Lake. Not very crowded this time of year but I seldom saw more then 2-3 people here at any one time.
There were some ducks over there.
That’s all for now. I was in Oroville for 3 weeks and have plenty more pictures that I’ll put up soon.