DAY 38-46 ~ BRITISH COLUMBIA..again (June 24 – July 2)

We are now turning southwest and starting the return route to home.  We travel the west side of BC visiting some small towns (mostly for overnight stays).  Then we head to central BC for an overnight stay in Prince George.   Lastly, before exiting Canada and entering the US, we will visit one of our favorite places, a small town called Hope. 

We have a week to eat all our fruits, vegetables, meat and the many bottles of wine we brought with us.  The wine is almost gone so we won’t have a problem drinking up the rest.  The US border is very strict.  Even though most of this stuff was bought in the US, they still confiscate it.  On one trip when we returned to the US from Canada they almost fined us $300 for having a bag of “Cuties” (citrus), which we got at Costco, in the US!!!  We had told them we had no citrus.  We totally forgot about the bag with about 4 Cuties at the bottom of the crisper in the fridge.  We did not get fined, just warned.  They also took a container of Dave’s spaghetti sauce....unidentified meat.

DAY 38 ~ ISKUT  (June 24)

The Stewart-Cassiar Highway is a very lonely highway; narrow with two lanes.  Like parts of the Alaska Highway, the road was wavy and full of pot holes, so it was a very rough ride.  When we could, we drove the center of the road.  On both side of the road were dense trees and brush with views of snow capped mountains.  Despite the rough ride, it was a very scenic highway.  We saw two more black bear and at one point we were following a beautiful red fox walking along the side of the road.  Then it stopped, sat down and stared right at me, giving me a dirty look.  Just as I was set to take the picture, it got up and walked on by.

After a few hours we finally came upon civilization.  We saw maintenance buildings on one side and a gas station with a grocery store and deli on the other side.  It was just before we came upon this that the warning light for a low tire came on.  We stopped for gas and found we had a flat tire.

We put on the spare and then worried about continuing traveling along this road with no spare.  This is the country of flat tires.  Last time we were traveling through Canada and Alaska, all four of our trailer tires went flat, one by one.  So as we pondered over our situation we noticed a sign across the street pointing to a side street.  The sign said “Charlie’s Shop – Tire Repair”..... ... the Travel Fairies are watching over us today.  So we drove about two miles on this road and found an area full of dead tires, and dead car parts and then we found Charlie.  The tire was fixed and we where on our way.

ISKUT is a First Nations or Aboriginal (native Indian) community with a very nice RV park.  It was a 200 mile drive to get here so we stayed overnight before heading to our next stop.  Mountain Shadow RV park was a pleasant surprise.  This place is very clean and tidy and nicely laid out and it’s for sale too if you would like to buy your own little piece of heaven.  There were only two other campers and a couple with a motorcycle camping in a tent.  With the awesome view of snow capped mountains and a small lake just at the edge of the RV park; it was a very relaxing and peaceful stay here.  The woman who checked us in is from Novato, CA.  She is here running this place from April to November, then she returns to Novato for the summer.  

DAY 39 - 40 ~ STEWART & HYDER  (June 25 - 26)

   

We saw so much wild life on this 150 mile trip to Stewart.  Bears, bears and more bears; walking along side of the road and in the road.  We saw a total of 5 Black bears and most exciting a moose followed by two babies walking across the highway.  I did not believe what I was seeing and had no time to get the camera out before they disappeared into the bushes.  What a thrill.  Again we passed by some awesome and beautiful scenery with many waterfalls.  We are in glacier country now.  We saw Bear Glacier just outside of Stewart and will be seeing more in the next two days. 

Don’t know the name of this glacier.

Bear Glacier

Stewart and Hyder are interesting towns.  Stewart is a border town located at the toe of the Portland Canal, the longest fiord that separates Canada from Alaska.  Stewart has a population of about 400 people.  It is a rustic town that makes you feel like you are back in the 40’s. 

We found an excellent restaurant called Bitter Creek Café that had a great atmosphere and great food.  I had maple glazed pan seared salmon.  It was out of this world delicious. 

At the end of this very small town and around the corner is Alaska and the ghost town of Hyder.  Only it is not really a ghost town, yet.  This unique town has a population of about 50 people plus lots of bears in the summer time.  It is called the “Friendliest Ghost Town in Alaska” And it is “home of the glaciers and world famous bear viewing”. 

Hyder, the easternmost town in Alaska is just inside the border of Alaska and is separated by the main part of Alaska by the Misty Fiords National Monument.  There is no road that goes through or around or bridges that cross over the Misty Fiords so you cannot access the main part of Alaska from here.  The residents of Hyder are American citizens, but all the stores take Canadian $$. 

We went into the general store to buy some post cards and met the owner of the store and the town’s unofficial mayor.  We spent about an hour talking with him.  He is quite the colorful character and he was full of stories about the town’s residents and the visiting bears.  He pulled out his Apple and showed us quite a few pictures of bears.  

The town residents have named most of the bears and he was able to ID the bears in his pictures.  All the residents have shotguns.  His has rubber bullets in it.  The bears can get a little bit too chummy, thus the guns.  He lives above his store and has had bears climb up the poles onto his deck.  So he has put boards with nails at the top of the poles and that keeps the bears off his deck.  One day he found a bear lying on his rug inside the doorway of his store. 

  

Of course with a town this small, everyone knows everyone.  Several people came into the store and greeted each other by name.  Some joined in with our conversation.  It was a thrill getting this personal with the town.  

Home of one of the resident ghosts??

  

Even though Hyder is on US soil, no one pays sales, city, state, or property taxes.  There is no police, fire, or EMS in town. When required, fire and EMS services are provided by nearby Stewart, BC.   Alaska State Troopers will patrol the town but are not located in town.  The nearest policing is sometimes provided by stopovers by the Stewart’s Royal Mounted Police.  Most times the residents police themselves and some are trained EMTs.  The city is maintained by grants from Alaska legislature.

It is all very fascinating how these small towns and villages are run.  Everyone has to pitch in and do their share and be nice to each other.  We visited a gift store and talked to that owner as well.  Her store was a station for the Natural Weather Service.  She had the equipment to gage the temps and other readings.  So whenever you Google Hyder, AK for the weather, the readings are coming from her store.  
  
There was a crisis going on when we visited.  Someone sighted a strange object in the sky; a white dot that never moved.  She suspected a weather balloon.  While we were there she was constantly interrupted by phone calls.  Everyone called her to find out what that thing in the sky was.  Some people thought it was an alien invasion.  We never did spot the white dot or find out what it was.  So if we return to Hyder some day and it is no long there, or the people are acting weird and strange, we’ll know what happened. 

  

Some more interesting facts about this area; three movies you may recognize were filmed in this area.  Disney’s “Eight Below”,  1982’s “The Thing” and “Insomnia” (part of this movie was done at Bear Glacier).

We had lunch at the Glacier Inn.  The restaurant was in the bar and we were a bit unsure, but the food was good and the people very friendly. The mayor at the General Store recommended this place and highly recommended the fish and chips. The walls are covered with paper money; mostly from Canada, but we saw other countries there.  The Canadian money was all $1 and $2 bills.  These are no longer in circulation.  The $1 and $2 are now coins called loonies and toonies.

 Just outside of Hyder is FISH CREEK.  In July the salmon spawn in this creek.  There is a boardwalk along part of this creek where you can watch all the bears come down and fish.  We are visiting here too early so we will miss those great ‘bear’s catching salmon’ pictures. 
  

On our last day we returned to Hyder and beyond, climbing the mountain to view the glaciers and scenery. We came upon a rock slide that had been cleared, but we saw a pair of boots sticking out from under a very large boulder....poor guy...I wonder if he knew what hit him.......

 As we continue climbing the mountain the road turns to gravel and dirt.  It is long, narrow unpaved road that winds in and out of Alaska and British Columbia along the Salmon River.  You only get to view one glacier; Salmon Glacier.  The others are hidden behind the mountains and the last one, Berendon Glacier is at the end of this road, but it is closed at Salmon Glacier and we could go no further.  Salmon Glacier is the fifth largest glacier in North America.  It boarders on Alaska, but is in British Columbia.

A recent rock & dirt slide

Almost there!
One of many waterfalls along this drive


Water running under the glacier into Salmon River



Salmon River
Can you find Slowpoke?

Salmon Glacier  

Shadow Selfies

The rest of this road is closed at the point where this picture is taken.  You can see the road; follow the line.   The road ends at the Grandu Copper Mine.

Driving back; out of Alaska, out of Hyder and back into British Columbia.  We go through a Candian boarder check.  There was no US boarder check going into Alaska because the road ends at the copper mine and that’s as far as you can go. 

Next stop; more of British Columbia.