“A little slice of heaven down a dirt road.”
That's how two journalists on an 11,000-mile journey described the scene at Spring Lake Ranch – a quiet, picture-perfect piece of Cariboo country, run for the last 34 years by John and Myrna Barkowsky, just northeast of 100 Mile House.
The pair of journos – Charlie Turner and Tom Ford – rolled through here in September in a brand new Ford Mustang, on assignment with the British Broadcasting Corp's very popular publication, Top Gear Magazine.
Their road trip last September was the biggest one in the widely-read publication’s history – 16 days and 220 hours behind the wheel through all 50 U.S. states – minus Hawaii, so 49 – to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Ford Motor Company's iconic Mustang automobile. (Their Mustang was actually the first 2015 model off the line.)
A huge narrative was already well underway when Charlie and Tom, dead tired at this point of the trip and looking for refuge, stopped at Spring Lake Ranch for a night's rest, on their way through British Columbia to visit Alaska.
It was a big and special project. So to keep the story under wraps until it was published, John and Myrna were sworn to secrecy. Even though the local ranching couple were at this point still unfamiliar with the Top Gear publication (and corresponding TV show), and didn't really know what to make of their two guests anyhow.
“They were just ordinary guys, like my neighbours, easy to talk to,” John explains.
“They told us this was a secret thing they were doing and we weren't supposed to tell anybody. I couldn't figure out what was so secret about it.”
After a night in one of the Barkowsky's log cabins, Charlie and Tom left for Alaska the next morning with the promise of returning in a week to spend another night at the ranch on their way back down to Washington. John and Myrna reserved the room.
Then John talked to his grandson on the phone and mentioned the two guys from the BBC in a new Mustang. His grandson, a Top Gear fan like its many viewers and readers worldwide, figured it out, and was beside himself when he did.
“I realized the guy [Top Gear editor Charlie Turner] was an important guy,” John laughs. “I had no idea.”
So John was ready the morning after they returned. It was still dark when he got up around 5 a.m., setting loose his horses and heating his branding irons. The rancher was going to add this very special pony to the herd.
“These guys were going to leave at daylight,” John recalls. “When they found out I planned this, they thought it was a really good idea. They stayed longer so we could do that.”
A photo of John branding the Mustang's license plate (covered with a wood block) with the Spring Lake symbol (a lazy S beside an L), and other scenic images of the ranch and the horses around the car, are featured prominently in the magazine's December 2014 edition and on the Top Gear website.
The rancher test drove the new car around the property, too.
“I didn't even know how to start it,” John laughs. “You press a button. It's totally top of the line.”
Despite having been sworn to secrecy, John did let parts of the story slip, one little piece at a time, in the weeks that followed with a friend from church – Leon Chretien, general manager at Sunrise Ford in 100 Mile House.
John says he teased Leon a bit about taking the special new Ford for a spin, and about having branded it, “adding it to the herd.”
“It was fun to do,” John says of the whole experience. “And it was fun to kid Leon.”