From prairie fields to Nimpo Lake
When people arrive at Nimpo Lake Resort for the first time, they often ask the same question: “How did a place like this begin?” The short answer is: with one woman, a handful of simple cabins, and a long stretch of shoreline on the Chilcotin Plateau.
The modern story of the resort starts in the late 1960s, when Mary Kirner left the Fraser Valley and drove more than 500 miles north and west to Nimpo Lake. At that time there was no polished lakeside resort waiting for her. She found rough buildings, a basic shack to live in, hard winters and a lot of work that needed doing.
Mary had grown up on a farm, so hard work and basic tools were nothing new. She hauled water, cut and stacked firewood, patched roofs, fixed whatever broke and slowly turned a loose group of cabins and sheds into a place where people could actually stay. Over the years she added fences, gardens and outbuildings, always with the same goal: make the place work, keep it simple, and keep it welcoming.
A kitchen table for the West Chilcotin
It didn’t take long before Nimpo Lake Resort became more than just somewhere to sleep. Mary’s dining room and kitchen turned into one of the informal hubs of the West Chilcotin.
Loggers came in with sawdust still on their jackets. Ranchers dropped by between calving and haying. Bush pilots, park staff, conservation officers and visitors from the cities often ended up at the same tables. Local children sat half under those tables listening to talk about weather, cattle, timber, planes and local news. For many of them, this was where they first heard what life on the Plateau was really like.
Writers and wardens were part of that circle too. Friends like author and park warden John Edwards visited often, bringing stories from Lonesome Lake, Tweedsmuir Park and the Monarch Icefields. Nimpo Lake Resort became a place where that kind of story could be told and retold, with real experience behind it.
Floatplanes, fires and staying put
As floatplanes became more common in the region, Nimpo Lake grew into an informal hub for pilots. Even today it’s normal to see planes landing and taking off during the summer months.
In 2004 and 2006, large wildfires came close to the area. Helicopters used the lake. Fire crews, pilots and support teams used the resort as a base, sleeping in cabins and eating in the dining room between shifts. The property became a place to rest and regroup in the middle of very tense seasons.
Winters, storms and even a serious hangar fire tested the resort more than once. Each time, Mary and her neighbours did what they had always done: show up, help where needed, and then quietly go back to the daily work of keeping a small lakeside resort running in a remote place.
A new chapter on the same shoreline
Today Nimpo Lake Resort is in new hands, but it is still here for the same basic reasons. It offers a place to stay right on the shore of Nimpo Lake, a calm base on Highway 20, and a simple way to be close to the water and the surrounding country.
We try to keep the focus on the essentials that made the resort matter in the first place: cabins that are genuinely close to the lake, room for people who want to fish or paddle or just sit on a porch, and a steady, practical presence in the small community around us.
If you sit by the water in the evening and listen to the loons, it is easy to see why Mary chose this shoreline and why she stayed. The buildings have changed over time, but the basic feeling of the place has not.
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