The Road Runs West: A Century Along the Bella Bella / Chilcotin Highway

by Diana French

Book Overview

This is the unusual story of a very unusual road: the 456-km Chilcotin Highway, which runs from Williams Lake to Bella Coola and is known as the 'loneliest road in BC. The highway took ninety years to build through some of the roughest terrain in Canada. Its history is served up here with plenty of photos and lots of anecdotes about the people who built the highway and the people who needed it.

It all started during the Cariboo Gold Rush of...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1550171410
• ISBN13: 9781550171419
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: Harbour Publishing
• Length: 275 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.9" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

A Well-Researched Narrative of the Freedom Road

The Road Runs West is a thoroughly researched, well-written narrative of the land and people of the Chilcotin-Coast region of central British Columbia. Diane French was not born in the region, but came as a school teacher who married into the community, and came to know the land, its people, and Highway 20 (the Freedom Road) very well. The book chronicles the history and development of region from the time of the first European explorers, as what was to become Highway 20 evolved from a trail to a rough track, to the present time when most of the road is paved or well-maintained gravel. It is an excellent reference for anyone planning to travel from Williams Lake in the interior of British Columbia to Bella Coola on the Pacific coast.