BRIDGING PAST & PRESENT

&BRIDGING

PAST PRESENT

In addition to a build-your-own experience model, Big Bar Guest Ranch is a rich resource of First Nation information, culture and community – and, the first Indigenous guest ranch in British Columbia. STORY BY ALEESHA HARRIS PHOTOS BY HANDOUT/BIG BAR GUEST RANCH

British Columbia’s Southern Cariboo region is home to a historic destination known as Big Bar Guest Ranch. The outpost, located 85 kilometres southwest of Williams Lake, driven largely on a gravel road, has all the elements one might expect from a rustic getaway — horses, cabins, homecooked meals and the like.

But there’s an underlying ambition of the tourist destination that goes beyond welcoming guests for an adventure that includes horseback riding and the opportunity to disconnect from omnipresent tech devices — an element of the guest experience that’s made possible, in large part to, a complete lack of cellular service.

“We’re remote,” general manager Elyse Godard says with a laugh. “It’s not for everybody. But for many, it’s a nice break.” The ranch’s focus, according to Godard, is to become known as a rich resource of Indigenous information, culture and community. Situated on 162 acres of the traditional territory of the Stswecem’c Xgat’tem First Nation, the ranch originated as a private homestead in 1936. Big Bar, once part of OK Cattle

Company, has passed through the hands of several families since its founding — six to be exact, according to Godard — but it wasn’t until the 1970s that the ranch began welcoming visitors.

“They only had two cabins, which were also from the 1930s at the time, and they did do trips,” Godard, who is also the executive chef at the ranch, explains of the site’s original working ranch model, which saw guests ride alongside cowboys doing activities such as pushing cows.

These days, the itinerary at Big Bar is noticeably more relaxed. Guests are offered a build-your-own experience model, which can include activities such as trail rides, fishing and hiking. The Stswecem’c Xgat’tem First Nation took over the ranch in 2018. And, since then, a growing number of activities that celebrate Indigenous heritage have also been built into the ranch’s programming.

Today, the ranch, which features four cabins, “glamping” tents, the main original lodge, which boasts several guest rooms and a hotel, offers a variety of cultural activities such as guided medicinal walks for guests to explore. Additional cultural classes for guests to learn about language are also in the works, according to Godard.

“We really try to focus on allowing people to educate themselves on the culture,” Godard says. “And then they get to bring this knowledge home with them.”

The activities, Godard says, are designed to showcase the relationship between the “western world” and the Indigenous cultures preserved by the local communities of Dog Creek (Xgat’tem) and Canoe Creek (Stswecem’c).

“We’re more toward wellness and sustainability,” Godard says. “We’ve

really tried hard to be a conservation ranch, just like the Indigenous were. … The Indigenous peoples, they really were the first conservationists of the area.”

When Godard, who is originally from Ontario, joined the Big Bar team fulltime nearly four years ago, her ambition was to get the ownership on board with promoting its Indigenous connection.

“We wanted this to be the first Indigenous guest ranch to exist in B.C.,” Godard says. “I’ve always had an appreciation and a good knowledge and understanding of the culture. And I really wanted to be able to make a change and to integrate this into our everyday lives.”

Godard says a trip to New Zealand helped to inspire her mission to further incorporate Indigenous history and traditions into Big Bar’s plans.

“Their culture is everywhere. It’s so blended in their everyday lives,” she says of the visible nods to the country’s Māori people. “It’s in the schools, it’s in the malls. It’s absolutely everywhere — even the airport.

“It kind of clicked a light bulb for me, like, you know what? We need this in Canada. We need to be able to assimilate the two, in a way that they work together.”

Godard admits that her plans to incorporate the cultural programming were initially met with some resistance from within the community.

“When I first got here there was a little hesitance about a new person coming in and saying, ‘You know, I’m going to sell a package about what you know and what you’ve gone through…’,” Godard says. “That doesn’t always sit well with people.”

But she continued to explore the issue, approaching the elders with her plans in the hopes of eventually gaining their support.

“Indigenous tourism is, in my personal opinion, a great way to educate. But, to some of these elders, they felt as though we were just profiting from their knowledge. And that’s the last thing that we want to do,” Godard says. “So, we allowed them to have a say in everything. And they honestly have the last word to all of the activities that I host here. Every activity that I do here, we bring it up to them, and we give them the opportunity to tell their side of the story.

“And also to give it the way that they feel comfortable sharing it.”

The ranch’s approach to education that incorporates programming into a guest ranch model is an important avenue to help Canadians face the facts about the country’s treatment of Indigenous peoples, Godard says.

“Tourism and activities and opportunities around this is going to be the new

Guests can choose guided trail rides of varying lengths during their stay.

way to educate people. Because, not everybody wants to sit in a classroom and listen to all of the bad things that Canada has done,” she says. “But, if you bring them outdoors and show them all of the good that there was at the time, and what it can still be now, and that you can still live with that culture simultaneously, it’s not going to make people feel so ashamed of being Canadian.”

Godard says providing people with access to Indigenous communities is an important step forward, especially during a time that has shone a light on Canada’s residential school systems following the discoveries of mass burial sites at several residential school locations across the country. To date, more than 1,505 bodies have been discovered.

“It’s really taken, I think, some traumatic experiences, unfortunately like what has happened in Kamloops — to remind people that you were not the first ones here,” Godard says. “And I think the passion to learn about it is also wanting to give the place that we live a second chance.”

In addition to educating others, Godard says emphasizing Indigenous programming at Big Bar is also about encouraging the community to celebrate itself.

“I think that is something that has been missed in a lot of generations,” Godard says. “And, only now are a lot of people understanding that this is something to be proud of, and not ashamed.

“I think I’ve given a lot of community members a voice.”

The influence of Indigenous culture also plays prominently into another major element of the ranch: its horses. Big Bar Guest Ranch keeps 25 horses on its string.

“In Indigenous culture, they use their horses for absolutely everything,” Godard explains. “The horse itself, was used as a mirror to another world for them. It was a form of communication to the land …

“They did everything based on just body language and communication. And that is really where we want to be with our horses. Especially as they get beginners on their backs often, or people who are newly introduced to riding.”

Riders are given a lengthy introduction

“If you bring them outdoors and show them all of the good that there was at the time, and what it can still be now, and that you can still live with that culture simultaneously, it’s not going to make people feel so ashamed of being Canadian.”

- Elyse Godard

Big Bar Guest Ranch features a main lodge, tents, cabins and a small hotel.

The ranch celebrates its connection to the Indigenous community by offering an introduction to culture and language.

to their horse, along with an explanation of where the rides will take them on the local lands.

“It’s not just a nose-to-tail kind of thing,” Godard says. “We’re really going up and down the hills, taking some of the paths that have so much history for the community around us, including some the elders used to take in order to hunt.”

Many of the horses in the Big Bar string came from the feral herds in the community, according to Godard.

“All of our newer, younger horses are from this land,” she says. “And I think that’s one of the best things for us because they grow up on the land for about two to three years, and once they’re that age, they are so confident and so brave because they have had to fend for themselves for quite some time.“

In addition to promoting the local bloodlines of horses from the community, the domestication of feral horses also helps the local farmers whose fields are at risk of being overgrazed by the roaming animals, according to Godard.

The horses at Big Bar ranch are joined by an assortment of goats, chickens, ducks and pasture-raised heritage breed pigs. The ranch partners with a neighbouring rancher to purchase cattle that are then used by the ranch for meat.

“We really are working toward sustainability,” Godard says. “All of our compost from our kitchen goes to our pigs. So, not only are our pigs a food source for us, but we use them in the garden, as well.

“At the end of the season, we put them through the garden. They harrow everything as they burrow with their noses. And then we plant a winter crop that we’ll then use in the spring to feed the chickens.”

The property, Godard says, is working to become a “full-circle” ranch that’s selfsustaining.

“We have our own garden; we raise all of our own meat. We have a really good recycling facility and program within the community that we use, as well,” she says. “We really want to focus our experiences on how you can farm and work the land, and have resources, while respecting where you are and the things around you.

“It’s very similar to how their ancestors did it.” WHR

Elyse Godard is the general manager and executive chef at Big Bar Guest Ranch.