Vagabond RV Park Nimpo Lake, BC, Canada

Mileage:  49,164

I couldn’t go to sleep last night and so I got up to read at 10:30.  The sky was an inky black and glittering with thousands of stars.  The white wash of the milky way was visible across the lake.  I don’t know if I have ever seen a more beautiful sky.

The morning air was cold,with frost on the Jeep again.  The flock of white pelicans was feeding in the water.  The lake was still, and calm; serene.  The fish were jumping.  The morning light was soft and lovely.  Sometimes I have to remind myself that this is not a dream…but our real life.

Today we just drove to the next town.  We camped at the Vagabond RV Park.  The afternoon was spent cleaning the bathroom and vacuuming and washing floors and doing laundry.  It was too cold and windy to really enjoy being outside for very long.  Our campsite was up on the hill away from the water.  We could hear the loons calling to one another.

I took a walk.

Later we walked across the street to the general store just to get out for awhile.

This beer was a pleasant surprise.

We have to be in Williams Lake by Monday evening to take the Jeep to be fixed.  So, we are creeping back to town.

Escott’s Bay Resort Anahim Lake, BC, Canada Day 2

I woke up really early and saw a solitary white pelican on the water in front of the RV.

I worked on the blog for a couple of hours before Tim got up.  He saw a flock of white pelican further across the lake.  Our plan today was to drive the Jeep on the infamous Highway 20 dirt and gravel hill to Bella Coola. The gravel portion is 39 miles long. Full of switchbacks, sheer drop-offs and with 18% grade it is one crazy ride.

This road was built for the landlocked community of Bella Coola back in 1953.  The government refused to build the road so the citizens built it themselves.  With a single bulldozer working from Bella Coola and later a second working from Tatla Lake, the road was carved along the mountainside.  The two dozers met and touched blades.  There is a sign on the rocks commemorating the moment.

The road was called the Freedom Road because of the added opportunity it offered the citizens of Bella Coola.

Today was cool but beautiful for a drive.  Many people who have never been to British Columbia in Canada might underestimate the wild beauty here…we certainly did before we took this trip.  This trip was all about Alaska, but many of our favorite campgrounds and drives have been here.  It is all about the journey…not just the destination.

The view around the first curve of “the hill” was breathtaking and we were really happy we decided to do this side trip.

We went into 4WD mode on the Atnarko Tote Road.

Then a little further along we took the backroad to the McCall Flats Recreation Site and then the forest service road across the way.

The Jeep smelled a little like burning rubber but we had been heavy on the brakes all the way down the hill.  There was an area of road construction with rough gravel and that is when we noticed the weird whining noise.  It went on for awhile before we could stop and check.  There was a piece of a belt hanging underneath the Jeep and reddish fluid leaking from somewhere down there.  Tim determined that it was power steering fluid.  Fortunately, we were not too far from a service center.  The guy there was already in vacation mode for the 3-day weekend.  He said he and his boss were going to Williams Lake and maybe they could tackle our Jeep on Saturday night and NO they did not have power steering fluid…but maybe the general store down the road would.  The general store did have power steering fluid and we bought 2 quarts.  We filled the reservoir and continued toward Bella Coola.  We finally had enough cell service to look up mechanics.  Albert’s Repair Services was 8.4 km away and had a 5-star rating.  The mechanic got us in fairly quickly after taking a quick look in the parking lot.  He took the Jeep back and came out shortly to pronounce “Worst case scenario, new power steering pump.  The seal is broken on the pump.  It’s a holiday weekend so hopefully we can get the parts by Wednesday of next week.” Oh, and it’s going to cost $700.00 – $800.00 for the parts…his best guess. Okay, the parts have to come from Williams Lake…300 miles away…the closest Jeep dealer.  This is the equivalent of driving from Reisterstown to North Carolina somewhere.

Oh my…our RV is back over the hill…approxitmately100 miles away…safe and plugged in with all of our stuff.  We were just going into Bella Coola for a fun day trip. Okay, we will stay in Bella Coola until the Jeep is fixed next Wednesday…unless the truck can’t get here and then we are looking at next Friday!  The guy says we should rent a car and just drive back and get the RV and camp in Bella Coola until the Jeep is ready…actually he tried to convince us it would be better to stay outside of town.   Okay, drive the RV over that huge hill with all of the switchbacks and the steep grade and the acute drop-offs…NO!  Okay, so yes, we will rent a car and stay somewhere close by.  The mechanic calls the rental company for us.  Great, they can be there in 20 minutes.  $100.00 per day for the rental.  Okay, can you recommend someplace we might stay.  They tried again to convince us to stay out of town…I am thinking cute little town on the water with shops and restaurants and it would be fun to stay in town.  They give us a bunch of options and phone numbers.

The mechanic went back into the bay to take the car apart and figure out what parts to order today so that they can hopefully get here on Wednesday.  Tim went back with him to start to collect the cooler and his tennis shoes so that we could be ready when the rental car guy got there.  The mechanic found another piece of what was a part of our serpentine belt.  The piece was wedged against the seal of the power steering pump and the pulley and when he removed it the seal resealed itself…wow!  “I think I fixed it” he said.  It was a mini miracle.  The serpentine belt had lost a rib but was still functional.  The mechanic took it for a test drive and there was NO leak!

He called the car rental guy “Steve, hold up, I think I fixed their Jeep.”  If you have cash it will be $75.00.  Gladly, happily, we paid him.  His name was Jeff.

Jeff saved the day!

We still kind of wanted to go see Bella Coola.  It would be a good chance to test the seal, I reasoned.  We went into town and really there were no cute shops, no seaside town, no nice restaurants…it was a kind of sad and rundown place and then we understood why the mechanics thought we should stay elsewhere.  What would we have done here for all of those days!?!

There was a harbor area for fishing boats and for the ferries on the maritime highway.

We were afraid to be to giddy…we still had a couple of hours drive back up the hill and all the way to Anahim Lake.  I felt like we were both holding our breath.  But we made it!  Thanks to Jeff!  The Canadian people have been so kind, and so hospitable, and so gracious.

We will start to head back to Williams Lake tomorrow, towing the Jeep, where we have an appointment first thing Tuesday morning to have the serpentine belt replaced…of course not covered under warranty…but oh well.

We did get a little worried but it’s all part of it…another day in our adventures!

 

 

Escott’s Bay Resort Anahim Lake, BC, Canada

Mileage:  49,149

When we got up this morning there was a thin layer of frost on the Jeep.   I couldn’t believe it.  The woman working at the gas station said she had to scrape her windows…it is August!!!

We were headed west and our goal was to get to Anahim Lake.  We stopped at Puntzi Lake for breakfast.  This is a lake where white pelicans nest and raise their young before heading south for the winter.  Trumpeter Swans migrate through here and stay until the lake begins to ice over, then they also head south.   Tim drove the RV on 5 miles of gravel road to get to the lake.  These ladies were in the road on the way there.

Nice lake but no migrating birds today!

Further down on highway 20 we drove over a cattleguard on the highway!  More ladies in the roadway here.  Open range territory!

We arrived at Escott’s Bay Resort in mid-afternoon.  I enjoyed sitting by the lake and watching the birds.  There were families of mallards feeding on lake vegetation.  Bottom up they would go and then they would resurface.

There were ospreys diving for fish and an eagle fishing as well.  The osprey tried to take the fish from the eagle and the eagle did a barrel roll to get away.  I am so easily entertained!  This is a picture of an osprey flying overhead with his fish.

We also saw a white pelican on the far side of the lake.

Where are we?  We are here at the pen point.

The orange dots on the map are the places we have camped in Alaska and Canada.

We grilled our zucchini and Alaskan sockeye salmon and then took an evening walk.

 

 

 

 

Bull Canyon Provincial Park Williams Lake, BC, Canada Day 2

As Tim was drinking his coffee and watching the river a bald eagle flew above the water.

We saw this fox after we turned out of the campground.

The rain overnight seemed to have washed away the lingering smoke.  The rain stopped for awhile and then sprinkled on and off while we drove.  We took the Jeep to Big Creek and then to Farwell Canyon.

Breakfast stop.

There were men dipnetting.  They have built wooden platforms along the river’s edge.  The men are supposed to tie off with a rope and then they lean out over the rushing water with the net.  It looks like hard work and we didn’t see the guy get a fish while we were watching.

We saw this sign beside the road.

Then we saw some horses, a cow and a calf, 2 bunches of sheep and a bull all along the roadside.  This was ranch country.  They have a free-range mentality.  The livestock is kept on property boundaries by fences and cattleguards in the road.

There were acres of scorched earth and trees from last year’s fire.  This whole mountain was bare.

The serpentine road consisted of steep switchbacks down into the canyon and then back up and out.  They were actively logging in the area.  The truckers had to negotiate the winding, slippery, muddy roads.  It looked like the drivers had their hands full.  You wouldn’t want to stop quickly in front of them…they probably couldn’t stop.

Farwell Canyon was gorgeous.  Unfortunately, it was pretty misty and cloudy so the pictures truly are inadequate.

We returned to the RV at about 3 this afternoon and within minutes the heavens burst and we had a thunderstorm.  It was a quiet, lazy afternoon.

Bull Canyon Provincial Park Williams Lake, BC, Canada

Mileage:  49,014

We left Quesnel and continued on 97S or the Cariboo Highway.  We saw a field full of Canadian geese and sand hill cranes…hundreds of birds feeding and resting in a huge grain field.  They must also be headed south.

The road followed the course of the Fraser River.  There were great steep cliffs and canyons.  The air was still vaguely smoky.

There were more migrating birds as we traveled further.  Today we were in a quandary.  We had no idea where we wanted to go next (this is nothing really new).  We had gotten lots of literature from the visitor center in Quesnel but that didn’t really help us to make any decisions.  There was another visitor center in the town of Williams Lake.  I went to the information desk and basically asked them to tell us where we should go.  The girl who helped us there was patient and informed.

Now we found ourselves on the Cariboo-Chilcotin Highway 20 traveling west.  The opportunity to be in the wilderness and to continue our adventure was something we couldn’t pass up.  Looking on the map, this road crosses an open expanse of Canada from central British Columbia to the Pacific Ocean at Bella Coola.  As soon as we made the turn, we were immediately glad.  The scenery was gorgeous with amazing views of the rivers and the canyons.

We stopped again at the Chilcotin Information Center.  This was a small cabin.  Lynn helped us to determine our route.  She made copies of maps and gave us pamphlets and brochures.  She was so kind and helpful.  We asked her about all the evidence of fires that we had seen as we were driving.  The wildfire in this area was last summer.  The damage was extensive.  On July 7, 2017, six houses were lost and hers among them.  Her family is building a new house.  Lynn had an incredible attitude of resilience and gratitude in spite of her family’s misfortune.  She was very gracious.

We traveled as far as the Bull Canyon Provincial Park and camped right on the Chilcotin River.

We took the Jeep out to explore for a short while this afternoon.  We saw this First Nation man dipnetting across the river.  Only First Nation peoples are allowed to continue this method of gathering fish in keeping with their tradition.

Tonight, we grilled avocado, pineapple, and ahi tuna.

The Jeep trip we have planned for tomorrow to Farwell Canyon will take most of the day.

Robert’s Roost RV Park Quesnel, BC, Canada

Mileage:  48,865

Today we experienced a perpetual haze from the fires.  This is a view from our campsite and then from the road as we headed east toward Prince George.

Prince George is another big hub and we decided to do our replenishing there.  It was 1 pm before we were ready to head south on 97 toward Vancouver.

On the horizon beyond the ridge of mountains we could see billowing clouds of smoke.  There were highway signs warning of dense smoke and poor visibility but that never happened.  We were looking at camping options and just decided to drive for awhile and see what the conditions were and how our driver felt.  He needed a nap and so we pulled into a roadside rest area.  The drive today was through agricultural and foresting areas.  Lots of hay and lots of logs and lots of lumber and lumber mills.

We looked at Ten Mile Lake Provincial Park and decided to move on.  We ended up in the town of Quesnel.

We left the RV at Robert’s Roost and drove back into town with the bikes.  We enjoyed biking through the town.  There is a major construction project underway to upgrade the downtown area and you can tell that it’s going to be very nice when it is complete.

We were on this bridge when Tim noticed something in the water.

He thought it might be a calf.  The guy in the blue shirt said it was a black bear.  He had seen it get into the river.

We watched the bear take the current to the bend and then swim to the gravel bank.

That bear was a strong swimmer!

The bike path led us to the area where the bear had clambered out of the water but we did not see him again.  Up ahead, the bike path had this sign.

We of course took the route by the water.  There was a hospital and a funeral home within ¼ mile of the detour…but thankfully none were necessary.

We continued our ride and found a nice Greek restaurant called Ulysses where we had our dinner.

 

White Swan RV Park Fraser Lake, BC, Canada

Mileage:  48,685

As we travel east there is more farmland, more hay bales, more livestock.

There is less wilderness.  The towns are closer together and offer more services.  The prices of gas and groceries has come down considerably.  The longer we are up here the more it feels like fall.  The air is breezy and chilly and crisp.  All the more reason to keep heading south.

We decided to go to White Swan Park in Fraser Lake for lunch.  The park is pretty and sits right on the water.  There is free RV camping here so we decided to stay.

We had a pleasant afternoon spent reading and walking and resting and taking pictures of the ever-changing sky.  A quiet Sunday.

There was a noticeable smoky haze here.  The air quality was fine.

We rode into town and passed this fire camp.

We asked if the roads were open and they are.  The cashier at the grocery gave us a wildfire update.

According to the update, we are in the rescinded evacuation alert area.  There is a fire 6 km to the north…the Shovel Lake fire and then to the south…the Island Lake fire.  We are thinking of all the firefighters that are working to keep the fire from spreading.  They really need cooler temperatures and rain to help them with this seemingly unsurmountable task. There are more than 600 fires in British Columbia.  Some are small and managed…others large and requiring huge amounts of resources.

Smoke cross the water.

The mix of smoke and clouds did make for an incredible sunset.

Smithers Riverside Municipal Campground Smither, BC, Canada

Mileage:  48,550

12 weeks yesterday and 10,000 miles today.

I like to take pictures of clouds and today was a good day for it.  The day began grey and rainy but as we traveled east we could see patches of blue sky.  I think that the clouds looked dramatic.

This is Carwash Rock.

There was a glacier in the mountaintop.

Today we were just driving/riding east with no particular destination in mind.

At about 12:30, Tim asked what the camping options for the evening might be.  Smithers sounded like a cool little town.

We have heard that there are bad fires near Prince George.  We noticed the faint smell of smoke a couple of times today but nothing more than that.

On our way into the campground we passed a lemonade stand. There were 5 kids of all ages, the oldest was probably about 12.  They were serving cookies and lemonade and were collecting donations for the fire relief effort…so cool!!

We took our bikes and rode around the town.  Smithers is designed to look like an Alpine Village.  There were lots of neat shops and lots of beautiful flowers.

We learned that there was a Bulkley Valley Fall Fair this weekend and we decided to check it out.

There were old tractors.

Wagon rides.

4H animals.

A petting zoo.

A rodeo.

And live music and carnival games and amusement rides and cotton candy and lots of other junk food.  It was a very nice afternoon.  While we ate we spent time talking with Louise.  She was an older woman who was born and raised in Smithers.  You could tell that she was very proud of her community and she knew lots of people at the fair.

Our campsite is by the Bulkley River.

Prince Rupert RV Park Prince Rupert,BC, Canada

Mileage:  48,331

Today we drove to Prince Rupert, a deep port town that leads to the Pacific Ocean.  It was a lovely day for a drive.

I worked on the blog for several hours this afternoon and Tim rested.  We took the bikes into town.  It was hilly and hard work but good to be outside and moving.  The town is a little sad, but the harbor was pretty.

It began to rain so we put the bikes on the Jeep and went to Walmart for  few supplies.  It was a sad little Walmart.  More work on the blog until dinnertime.  We went back to the harbor and ate at a place called Breakers.  Nice food with a good view.  We watched a guy cleaning fish and 2 harbor seals were having  feast as he tossed fish entrails into the water.

It rained most of the day.  It was good to have a day to get caught up on our writing and it was nice to be on our bikes for awhile. Not everyday can be Christmas!  That is the reality of being on the road.

Kleanza Creek Provincial Park BC, Canada

Mileage:  48,228

Holding tanks empty, fuel tanks full, underwear clean, fridge stocked…good to go!  East on 37A back to the Cassiar Highway.  On the outskirts of town, we saw a pair of bald eagles in the trees on a gravel bar along the river.  Then we saw a black bear cub crossing the road ahead of us.

There was a steady stream of logging trucks loaded and headed toward Stewart and the Portland Canal.  We read that much of the lumber is shipped to Asia and Europe.

It was a lovely ride, looking through our picture window as the world went by.

At the wheel again.

Another look at Bear Glacier in the morning light.

These roads we have traveled have no guardrails, no streetlights, no shoulders, no rumble strips, no reflective paint and some don’t have striping at all.  There is not much cell service and there are very few services.  Today we saw a motorhome with a flat tire.  They were stopped in the middle of the highway to change their tire.  The roads though for the last several days have been relatively smooth.

We turned west onto Yellowhead Highway toward Prince Rupert.  It was a nice ride along the Skeena River.  The Seven Sisters.

We stopped at an organic produce market.  This farmer who is 83 years old chatted with us for quite a while.  He had just brought warm whole wheat bread down from the house.  We got that and some real tomatoes and zucchini.

We stopped at the next turnout to make sandwiches with the fresh bread and tomatoes.  We are going to have to stop there again on our way out.

We camped at Kleanza Creek Provincial Park.  There was a nice hike to the area above the creek.  We forgot to take our camera so you will just have to imagine how pretty it was from above.

Our home for tonight.