British Columbia – TooBusyForWork

On the way to the end of the caravan trip (with some forgotten Teslin shots too)

On Saturday we left the boondock runway to head to Stewart and Hyder. We exited the Cassiar (Highway 37) and took dead end Highway 37A to Stewart. Lovely views even though it rained the entire time. One of the big sights is the Salmon Glacier, and it was fabulous.

People go to Stewart, YT in order to go to Hyder, AK to see bears feasting on salmon. We stayed at the Kitawanga River RV Park, a pretty nice place. I was still feeling poorly, so we laid around more than we normally would. We did cross in AK to see the salmon spawn, hoping to catch a view of bears at the Fish Creek Wildlife Viewing Station. It is a NPS official spot that requires a ticket to get to. Easy and inexpensive to get one online, and we got three days of viewings through our caravan. We went on Sunday, crossing an amazingly simple border crossing into the US. It was totally unstaffed without any notice required. A nice ranger checked out tickets at the viewing site, and we went in. It was a lovely place.

And since it was raining (still!) we just enjoyed the day for a couple of hours without seeing any more bears than the one we saw crossing the road on the way in. If anyone else wants to do this, I highly recommend getting a chair and a water proof poncho or something to cover the chair while you wait. I was still not feeling well (darned sinusitis again), and Kevin’s knee couldn’t take much more just standing g around, so that was our one attempt. Others in the group went back a few times and stayed longer. Their effort was rewarded with some good bear photos. Oh well, we have seen lots of bears in other places. I tried for an artsy-fartsy shot of some dangling Old Man’s Bear glistening with raindrops, but the focus on my iPhone just wasn’t up to the task. I am going to order a new camera as soon as I get home!

The only border control between Stewart and Hyder is a Canadian border patrol spot that actually serves both countries. We had filled out our ArriveCan app ahead of time, showed our passports to the nice agent, and she checked everything. The information is then transmitted to the US, or so a sign at the office said. One of the rangers in Hyder said the two communities actually act as one and did so through the entire pandemic.

On Monday we went to Smothers, BC for a simple overnight spot. We stayed at Fort Telkwa Riverfront RV Park, a very nice place. All the sites are directly above the river for some great views. And guess what? NO RAIN! In fact, there was so weird blue color to the sky! I was starting to feel a bit better since I started the steroids for my sinusitis, though I still cough an awful lot.

I actually forgot the pictures from Teslin I took on Wednesday on the way to Watson Lake. We first stopped by the Teslin Tlingit Cultural Center, but they were unexpectedly closed. They had some great totem poles and a fabulous boat though. I was disappointed they were closed.

We did stop by the George Johnson Museum, a fabulous curated museum that was not the standard small town historical spot. Mr. Jonnson was born in a completely isolated village, and had no schooling until he went to Juneau at 16 to stay with an uncle. He taught himself English and mathematics, and was a born visionary. He came back to the area, opened a store, brought the first car to an isolated area without roads except in the winter when he used the frozen lake, and was an absolute local legend. They had some fabulous Tlingit history and costumes that the docent, a longtime white resident, was excited to share with us.

Today we are in Prince George at the Sintich Campground. Sites are decent sized, but they have small trees too close. We had to do some maneuvering to get so our door would open without running into the tree. We have a dinner tonight and breakfast tomorrow as a caravan, and then we are done. We have decided to go through the big Canadian National Parks again on the way home, but just a drive-by. The town of Jasper still doesn’t have electricity after a fire wok out the lines, so it will be interesting. I probably won’t post again until we are in the US. Buying enough cellular data to post in Canada has been expensive!

From Dawson Creek to Ft. Nelson to Liard River to Watson Lake

I finally have decent cell service so I can post. It has been quite a while. I finished the last post with us in Dawson Creek at the Northern Lights RV Park. One thing I didn’t do was post the mandatory photo of us at the Mile 0 sign. This isn’t the tourist version which is much more grand and located a few feet away. The folks who took our picture thereput it on a photo sharing site and I haven’t had enough service to download it! This will have to do.

After we left Dawson Creek, our wagon master started warning us of seriously deteriorating road conditions. Let’s just say that he has a much different view of bad roads than we do! A few frost heaves, some pot holes, but I have been on much worse roads. We ended up in Ft. Nelson at the Triple G Hideaway. We just spent the night there after a fairly long trip, and it was nicely unremarkable. The road to Ft. Nelson was the most productive for animals of our trip so far though!

I like this because of the water drops, not because it was the best picture I took of her

Thought it was a grizzly, but a naturalist friend this is another black bear

We found two small nursery herds of woods bison. It is a subspecies of American bison – larger and native to the high forests instead of the plains.

The babies were already losing their red coloring

Part of a herd we passed while they were grazing

One of the not so pretty parts of the drive was the man camps we still came to. These were used for the petroleum and mining industries. Interesting.

There have been lots of these throughout Alberta and BC

The next morning we headed to Liard River and the hot spring there. The scenery was the most spectacular we had seen, full of rocky crags and big rivers.

We went through the Stone Mountain area, hoping to see some Stone sheep, a subspecies of dall sheep, but we didn’t see any. We did see even more gorgeous scenery though.

I wonder why they call it Stone Mountain?

I saw the most spectacular debris field of stones too, either an avalanche path or an alluvial fan.

Well over a mile long with rocks the size of baseballs

Liard Hot Springs was sadly a wash out. The mosquitos were thick enough to carry off small children, and we stayed happily back in the motorhome, looking at the hundreds of mosquitos trying to get in. They drove the cats crazy trying to chase them. The campground was a private one right across the road from the hot springs, and they had a boil order for their water! Glad we always keep at least a 1/2 tank, just in case.

After Liard we headed to Watson Lake and the Northern Lake RV Park. It was right across the road from the famous signpost forest. There are thousands and thousands of signs.

We also attended a decent planetarium like show at the Northern Lights Center. There was an old film (2020) about how the Big Bang created the universe plus descriptions of various components of the universe. Dated, but decent. Then there was a much better show about the Northern Lights. I have seen the northern lights as both general green color in the sky (in Iowa, far south of most of the shows) and as green moving blobs outside Ely in northern Minnesota. I hope to see the ribbon style before we head home, but between my early to bed style and the daylight that lasts forever, it isn’t a sure thing at all.

Today we drove to Whitehorse, YT. The roads are gradually getting slightly worse, but still not too bad. I generally drove about 80-90 mph, or 50-55 mph (the speed limit was 100 mph or 62 mph). It was slow enough I could react to the occasional bad spot in the road and do sightseeing without spending forever. I admit, I do have a bit of a lead foot! We saw some lovely places.

And yet more fireweed because I love fireweed!

We just relaxed when we got to Pioneer RV Park. Very crowded sites and poor electrical infrastructure. We can’t open one of our four slides due to a small tree, and the power fluctuates enough to make operating AC and any other power hungry appliance problematic. Luckily we are quite capable of dry camping without much trouble. The people with the big all-electric coaches can’t even operate their stove without electricity. Thank goodness for propane!

I thought I would post a picture of how Minnie travels, just for grins. Luna generally sleeps on Kevin’s lap.

We had dinner at Klondike Ribs and Salmon. Fabulous! I had salmon, and Kevin had the ribs. I will post what we do during our stay here later.

Dawson City and the Alaska Highway Mile 0

I hadn’t planned on posting again so soon, but our wagon master says we may have a few days of extremely limited or no cell service.

We arrived in Dawson City late yesterday. We are in the Northern Lights RV park. Pretty nice with level sites, but it is what I euphemistically call “satellite friendly” – very few trees. It is fine because the weather has been mild with highs around 80 and lows in the 50s. I was going to paste our obligatory Mile 0 photo, but the guy who took them hasn’t sent it to us yet! Hard to believe the army built >1500 miles of road in the wilderness in only 8 months!

We started the day with a nice buffet breakfast and a presentation by the local visitor bureau chief. We got our certificates saying we just started the Alaska Highway, a pin, and a few other tourist goodies. This type of thing is one of the good things about traveling in a caravan; this isn’t available for regular travelers. Next to the visitor center is the only remaining old wooden grain elevator. There used to be a string of them from Alberta into British Columbia along the train tracks, but the others were torn down when better storage methods were invented. Still an impressive building, and it now has a nice art museum in it.

They also had lots of flower gardens, and you may have figured out I enjoy taking pictures of flowers.

After the breakfast, visitor center, and art museum, we visited a fabulous historic park run by the local historical society. They had a few dozen buildings either brought to the site or recreated based on historic information. It is interesting g to think that just over 100 years ago there was nothing here.

This shows probably 1/3 of the buildings

This house was built in the 1920s and lived in until 1966

And a sign about how far north we are is that the peonies were blooming in late July!

After the fabulous pioneer village we went to another Alaska Highway historic site, the historic Kiskatinaw curved bridge. It has a wooden structure, and it was in use until 2 years ago when a landslide compromised its foundations. Some people walk across, but Kevin decided a short stroll was plenty far! The construction of this single bridge took as long as the entire rest of the highway – 8 months.

We also saw our first moose of the trip. Sadly he or she had met a vehicle and lost. It must have just happened before we drove by because the carcass was very fresh without any birds at it at all. This is an unusual sight. Most of the time a car hits a moose they both lose.

We take off tomorrow up the road to Fort Nelson, BC; Liard, BC and the hot springs there; Watson Lake, YT; and then Whitehorse, YT where we will stay a few days. I will keep taking pictures, but I don’t expect to post until we get to Whitehorse.

Jasper area

After our boondock parking at the Columbia Icefields, we went to a very nice KOA outside of Hinton, AB and just north of Jasper National Park. We spent some time in the town of Jasper, and I like it much more than I did Banff. Fewer people, interesting atmosphere, and really good food!

We enjoyed the architecture of the town – very British with additions of more modern style. Here are a few.

Provincial government building with modern addition

We ate lunch at a fabulous downtown upscale restaurant called “The Raven.” I had macaroni and cheese with onions and ham, and it was the best I have ever had. Note to self: grilled onions add a wonderful sweetness to Mac and cheese! Kevin had breaded tenderloins that were gluten free. The breading was made from seeds, and it was very good also.

And then we went back to Jasper, almost to the Icefields, to see the things you just can’t see from a motorhome.

And braided rivers below the glaciers and snowpack

This one captures so many things about Jasper National Park

And this was one of my favorite waterfalls. Note the guy in red, center left.

See the braided river with the purple flowers along the shore

We took the following pictures on the way back to Hinton. Still in JNP.

All that melting ice and snow flow into rivers that widen into lakes

We left the Hinton KOA today for an almost 300 mile trip to Dawson Creek, mile 0 of the Alcan Highway. It was an easier drive than our wagon master said it would be, at least for us. We are used to smaller state highways and a bit rougher roads than those who stay primarily in resorts. We transitioned from the Rocky Mountains to foothills to the Alberta plains. The foothills are heavily forested, and logging is the major industry. As we moved to the plains, oil and gas became the largest industry, though we still saw quite a few logging trucks and huge piles of logs in various locations. We crossed into British Columbia just before we reached Dawson Creek, so I haven’t formed any impressions yet.

We did see our very first grizzly bear, or at least Kevin did. We had stopped at a roadside pullout to take a break, and this big boy was grazing in the ditch next to the roadside. As we pulled up, he started moving away, but Kevin got enough of a picture of him to see it was a grizzly. I always prefer a nice long distance between me and grizzlies!

We are here in Dawson Creek two nights, then we have three travel days in a row.

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