Three years after it burned to the ground, a wilderness resort in B.C.’s Fraser Canyon is once again facing a challenging wildfire season.
The decades-old REO Resort near Boston Bar rebuilt after it was destroyed by flames in the summer of 2023. This year, it was forced to close amid the Brunswick Complex fires that have burned hundreds of square kilometres in the area.
“It’s pretty frustrating. This is my 44th year building my dream on the Nahatlatch River,” owner Bryan Fogelman told CTV Your Morning Vancouver on Monday. “We’re just trying to make it. We’re trying to make it.”
He said the property was much better prepared this year with water running continuously around the grounds. And luckily, the blazes have not reached the resort, only coming within about two kilometres.
But the summer has still been “catastrophic” for the business, Fogelman said, as the resort was unable to welcome guests in July and customers have cancelled half of their bookings for August.
“So it’s devastating to the same extent as the fire, and also we’re still rebuilding,” he said. “I don’t think a lot of people realize that we’re still investing in the future, which obviously takes time and money, and so we’re just barely getting by… and then to have this setback really takes us back a bit.”
After weeks of worry for residents in the Fraser Canyon, Fogelman says the fight isn’t over, but the fires appear to be moving further away.
According to B.C. Wildfire Service, the wildfires remain active on either side of the canyon but are no longer growing at a significant rate. It says cooler temperatures and higher humidity moderated fire activity over the weekend and the more favourable conditions are expected to last for the coming days.
Still, hundreds of people remain on evacuation order including the entire Boston Bar townsite as hundreds of firefighters continue working to protect the homes they have fled from.
