North through British Columbia - Alaska and Points North: Tips and Tales from the Road - page 40

spot for salmon. During spawning season they literally queue up here for their turn at the
fish ladders.
Historically, Hells Gate always was a wild ride but that was exacerbated by the building of
the Canadian Pacific Railway through the canyon in the 1880s. Carving a bed for the tracks
in the canyon walls required the blasting and excavation of a lot of rock, most of it dumped
into the river and its banks.
Unfortunately for them, the Fraser River is the route home for the millions of Pacific coast
salmon migrating to the spawning beds that are hundreds of km upriver. Dumping tons of
rock into the river made the trip even more challenging. Still, they managed.
But one railroad west was not enough. From 1912 to 1914 a second railroad line was built,
requiring a great deal more blasting and rock removal. In 1914 the situation was made even
worse when a huge cliff collapsed, dumping 100,000 cubic yards of rock into the river.
That catastrophe virtually destroyed the salmon run.
The authorities finally got it. Much of the fallen rock was removed, but the river had be-
come an insurmountable challenge. Too many fish were not making it through alive so in
1945 the first fishways were completed to facilitate the movement of salmon through Hells
Gate and on up the river.
Today we drive up the canyon to Lytton, renowned as the hot spot of Canada with temps
in the mid to high-30s each summer. I know, I know. I can hear the Aussies snickering,
“That's hot?” But in Canada, that's hot.