Kamloops Travel Guide

Roche Lake is located about 35 km southeast of Kamloops, British Columbia, and is world-famous among BC Parks as a top stillwater fly-fishing lake stocked with rainbow trout. The shoreline offers campsites and primitive fishing access amid a peaceful mountain setting, ideal for a relaxing day outdoors away from the city.

The Secwépemc Museum & Heritage Park stands on the south bank of the North Thompson in Kamloops, on Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc land, and is run by the Secwépemc community. Three galleries, an educational theatre, a tribute garden and a nature park centre Secwepemctsín language and history, holding archaeological objects, basketry, hunting tools, contemporary works and records of the Kamloops Indian Residential School. Guided tours of the school (1923-1977) move through its chapel, dining room, kitchen and dormitories; after the 2021 identification of 215 unmarked graves on the grounds, the site became a key place to confront that history. Photography is allowed but filming is not, and some displays are marked no-photo.

MacArthur Island Park sits on an island in the North Thompson River in Kamloops, covering about 51 hectares as the city's key outdoor green space. It offers a public sand beach, an accessible 3.1 km loop trail, a well-regarded skatepark, sports fields and a golf course with sweeping river views. Free to the public, it is lively year-round for swimming, picnicking, cycling and birdwatching.

Sun Peaks Ski Area, inland British Columbia near Kamloops, is Canada's second-largest ski area. It offers more than 4,400 acres of terrain across three mountains, 13 lifts and 144 trails, served by a ski-in/ski-out village. With heavy snowfall and over 2,000 hours of annual sunshine, it suits every level of skiers and boarders, and doubles as a mountain-bike and hiking destination in summer and fall.

The Adams River flows through Tsútswecw Provincial Park in British Columbia's Interior (formerly Roderick Haig-Brown Provincial Park), one of the most famous Pacific sockeye salmon rivers. Every four years a 'dominant run' brings millions of sockeye crowding the channel in early October, turning the creek scarlet in the celebrated 'Salute to the Sockeye', with guided festivals. Off-dominant years still see a run, only far smaller. Wooden viewing platforms and trails line the river for fish-watching, photography and ecology education, on a traditional Secwépemc fishing ground — 'Tsútswecw' meaning 'many rivers'.