Abandoned mansion in the mountains of BC. Adventure #2

hey everyone sorry it's been so long since my last video I've been out a few times but I've had some troubles trying to find the spot that I was looking for so I've kind of shifted gears and gone in another direction but today's hike is something I've been looking forward to for about a year I've been there once before and it's a way cool spot I'm actually on the road for this destination today right now I'm stopped at pavilion Lake it's a lake on the way to Lillooet and it is just crystal-clear beautiful water it's actually the only lake in the world that has freshwater coral so if you're heading this way definitely stop by and check it out it's so clear I could actually see fish swimming by from shore and yeah so I'm just about in Lillooet that's where I'm heading today for the hike so when we get there I'll stop and tell you a little bit more about where we're going to be going today all right so I'm all geared up and ready to head for my hike I just want to start off and tell you guys that this particular video is going to be for educational purposes only this isn't really a destination that you can go this is all private property it's gated off there's two different families that live here and on the property and look over the place it's not open to public access I have permission to come and tell the story because it's such a unique story and there's so little information about it so don't plan a trip to come here if they start getting hundreds of phone calls from people I'm gonna have to take the video down and I really don't want that so just enjoy the video I'll be as detailed as I can as I go around and hope they don't miss anything the story I'm telling today is about a man named Vernon pic he was born in 1903 in Wisconsin he left home at 16 never graduated high school I joined the US Marines right after he left home after that he was a gold miner for a little while and he ran two different electrical companies after that he became a pilot for a little while he was a self-educated electrical engineer and I guess he had a flour mill that he turned into an electrical shop and it burnt down Insurance only gave him 30 percent of what it was worth so he cut his losses and bought a travel trailer packed up his family and headed across the country looking for jobs really when he was going through Colorado he heard that people were doing uranium mining so he decided to try it out and he did it for nine months I guess and apparently when he was down to his last three hundred dollars he found one of the world's biggest uranium deposits I mined it for about a year and got about a million dollars out of it and then sold the whole mine for around nine million dollars I think after tax he took around six and today's dollars it would be equivalent to about a hundred million I guess after that he was convinced convinced that there was going to be a nuclear apocalypse so he searched all of North America looking for the place to be most suitable to survive a nuclear apocalypse I searched he did geology I looked at wind patterns rain patterns because in a nuclear apocalypse the rain would be acid rain and I guess the place that'd be most suitable to survive in nuclear apocalypse is here in the Cayuse valley so he bought where he built a shop about halfway up the mountain and then there was a trolley that goes from the shop up to the top of the mountain obviously it's not working so I have to hike up but at the top of the mountain he built a huge house out of solid brick and concrete with bulletproof glass apparently the walls are two feet thick of solid brick and concrete and he yeah after he was done building that I guess shortly after he finished building it he died of lung cancer and all of his science equipment and everything got auctioned off the most remarkable thing about the whole place is it's all powered by hydroelectric dam that he designed himself and built with a team of engineers that he hired in my opinion is just a really remarkable story I mean he was a really wealthy guy but you couldn't tell from the stories you couldn't tell that he was wealthy I guess he wore a tore up leather jacket and a old beat-up hat drove an old Ford and it just seemed like a really kind of unique guy so I guess we'll start at the shop and go from there I'm behind me here is the shop all introduced put a picture up of it back in the day it's very grown over now but apparently he used to have just a team of high-class engineers here and outrageous science equipment of course after he passed away it's all been auctioned off but pretty cool this was this is below the house at the bottom of the trolley so this is actually the little pool kind of waterfall thing that you'll see in the picture very overgrown now well you've ever considered getting into video production because you think it's going to be easy I can assure you it's not this hill it's gotta be 60 degrees here's the trolley down there and I got my backpack full of gear my camera with the monopod and a slider and yeah this is a lot of work so for my research it sounds like shortly after he finished building this place he died of lung cancer and it's been abandoned ever since it's really sad but a lot of people have came and vandalized it so sorry about all the mess but there's nothing I can do about that I'm not sure if the story about the bulletproof glass was not true or maybe it's been taken out but all the glass here has been shattered out it's really sad to see actually it's cool though a lot of this place is actually built with bedrock as the foundation house is kind of built right around the rocks here this is obviously where get off the trolley comes all the way up the tracks they're very bottom wait cool I'll take you up to the top floor first obviously people have vandalized this very badly I like these lights up here this is way cool it's a big gun rack through this store here is the old office if you look right up there it's pretty cool there's a full encyclopedia set obviously a bedroom as we go down just kind of a middle floor creepy that corner I do have infrared on here this is pitch-black to me this is very creepy down here pick me I believe in ghosts don't know much I want to go down there oh I just ends you not such a fat darkus back here and back outside now this is the river the hydroelectric dam is just down there goes to a big waterfall and it take you a tour for a tour on the outside it seems like there's a lot of these paths going going off different places it's cool this whole chunk of house right here is just built right around the bedrock here's the back of the mansion seems like there's all sorts of trails going off on the mountainside I think I'm going to check this one out so this trail seems to kind of just end Nilla nowhere sure is a nice country around here I see there is mill lumber down there possibly there was a platform here or something not sure all right so that was the full tour inside and outside I hope you guys enjoyed it I hope you enjoy the story it's a really unique story it's really sad to see the inside of this place has just been completely destroyed like all the plates in the kitchen are broken everything's chucked off the counters all the windows are broken spray paint on the walls there's there's really absolutely no need to do that this is a historic place there's there's lots of historic places or allen bc or anywhere in the world really don't don't ruin them it takes one guy to go in and wreck it this place is ruined beyond repair now and it's really sad because it's ruined for everybody now so anywhere you go just be respectful don't break things don't litter just what I always say is take nothing but pictures leave nothing but footprints anyways you guys for me that's it I'm heading back to Williams Lake so I hope you enjoyed the tour thanks

Channel: Destination Adventure

Views: 753,030

Keywords: Abandoned, mansion, abandoned mansion, forgotten, walden north, vernon pick, vernon pick walden north, bc, british columbia, tour, history, adventure, hike, inspiring, story, inspirational, life, lived, uranium, mining, hydroelectric dam, electrical engineer, amazing, pilot, mountain top, tram, trolley, science, mystery, untold, apocalypse, doomsday, doomsday prepper, prepper, nuclear, nuclear apocalypse, gold, old, historic, inspire, nature, active, activity, lillooet

Id: G7E0y30M9yk

Length: 16min 58sec (1018 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 26 2016