A pay phone installed on Seymour Main Forest Service Road in the Shuswap.

Image Credit: SUBMITTED/ Christina Mykituik

An old pay phone is installed in the dirt 26.5 kilometres up the Seymour Main forest service road in the Shuswap.

It is a point of conversation and laughter for outdoor enthusiasts who use the trail.

“It wasn’t an old, old one, it was probably one of the last phone booths that were made,” said Vernon hiker Christina Mykituik. “I don’t know how long it would have been there, the receiver cord had been cut but nothing else was damaged, it was very cool.”

Mykituik was hiking in the area with her partner to see Alba Falls earlier this month when, to their surprise, they saw the pay phone “in the middle of a forested area” on their way down the forest service road.

They hit the brakes and backed up to take a closer look.

“It isn’t just tossed out there, it is cemented in but of course there are no phone wires anywhere,” she said. “There was a newspaper box beside it.”

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Mykituik thought the find was funny so she shared it to hiking groups on social media.

“It was a hoot, there were all sorts of silly comments about it,” she said. “A lady said she lives in the area and when it was installed it was just for fun, placed there as a joke and conversation piece.

“Apparently there used to be a Bell satellite disc above it.”

Mykituik loves hiking around the Okanagan and Shuswap, looking for interesting things.

“This was one of our best finds,” she said. “It was very neat.”

The coin operated pay phones used to be prevalent worldwide but have become far less common in the 21st century as mobile phones have taken over. 

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