Storyline: Westward Ho!
June 25 – June 26
When we started the trip, I had only 14 places booked out of 45 scheduled. These were the National and some popular Provincial Parks. And if all went to schedule, the trip would span over 3 months. What I hadn’t realised was that to Jasper we’d spent 42 days on the road and driven only two thirds the distance to our turnaround point at Haines Junction where we were expected five days hence.
I was somewhat tired and some pain, vaguely located in my abdomen, was bothering me. “We don’t have to go”, Alex suggested. “We can turn around here…” You see, the last two summers we had turned around earlier than scheduled because of his health. And for some reason he had stuck in his mind that this time would be my turn. I didn’t appreciate the notion, and I wasn’t going to play his game (Game!? While I didn’t want to be the cause of another early turn around, I also didn’t want Diana to suffer unnecessarily – A). I couldn’t even pinpoint the pain that would come and go. “No, we continue!” And so we did.
We left Jasper relatively early for us. Enjoying our morning coffee and tea before a leisurely breakfast usually gets us to about 9 am before disconnecting and possibly dumping the holding tanks before heading out. It was just before 8 am when we hit the road that morning.
The mountains, when cleared from the low clouds and rain, again were stunning.
The railroad was just up the hill next to the Yellowhead Highway, which we’d take east to hwy 40. The latter would take us to Grande Prairie, but more on this later.
Across from Edna Lake we saw bighorn sheep crossing the road. A first for me.
Drove along the shore of the Athabasca River for a while and in the rain, decided not to stop at the Jasper House National Historic Site. We had no final destination in mind for the day, but needed to make some advance towards the Alaska Highway.
The rain would stay with us all day. Low visibility would influence our driving speed. At Entrance (yep, there’s a place called Entrance) we turned north on Hwy 40, crossed the Athabasca River for one last time at William A. Switzer Provincial Park and continued towards Grande Cache, where I had planned to do some hiking in the surrounding mountains.
That was before the rain, or should I say I had hoped for a drier day. But one could barely see the top of the mountains if the cloud curtain eased.
Our advance wasn’t that great, but we’d make it to Grande Prairie. We knew that every city and town in the prairies has a municipal campground. So when we stopped for lunch at Grande Cache we found a campground at our intended destination and called. Yes, she had a spot for us. With the night secured, we continued our rainy journey.
Crossed Smoky River and drove by it parallel to the railroad for some time.
After all, roads and rail tracks in the mountains tend to follow the river beds.
There was a cool mining company along the river.
Tall white aspens were lining the narrow road at times. Windy, narrow and wet, but there wasn’t much, if any traffic. We eventually reached Grande Prairie in the early afternoon.
Checked at that lovely little Rotary Park Campground, where not only the roads, but also campsites were paved. Small lots, but nice and clean. After settling Doranya we walked to the shopping mall on the main road and in particular to the liquor store. As probably mentioned in earlier posts we didn’t find wine in Alberta cheaper than in Ontario. They just have a lot more selection of BC wine. But it comes at a price. Stocked with wine, and some groceries from the store next door and called it a night.
We were just off Alberta hwy 43 that would lead us through a few small communities and towns the last of which was Demmitt.
Shortly after passing by, it we stopped at the Alberta-BC border for the usual provincial crossing photo with Doranya.
At the border the highway numbering changed to BC hwy 2. The latter would bring us to Dawson Creek.
Here is where the famous Alaska Highway begins. With its even more famous Mile Zero sign. Of course, as everybody else, we had to take a photo with it. A short breakfast break and we are now driving on the Alaska highway. Here in BC it is BC hwy 97.
We crossed Kiskatinaw River and entered the BC landscape. At that point the double lane disappeared and the highway continued with single lanes, unpaved shoulders and terrain-dependent passing lanes. Not sure about their official name, but I call them forks. They are usually uphill to allow time to pass the slow traffic. Mainly heavily loaded tractor-trailers, but in this part of the world many big and heavy camper-trailers too.
Close to the Peace River bridge, we noticed a rest area with a sign indicating steep grades ahead and a “Brake Check” sign. Trucks were required to check their brakes before heading downhill. And then there was a sharp turn and we headed steeply downhill in our only lane with no shoulder and a few more signs indicating slippery areas and turns and the last one warning of a 10% grade for the next 500m. Not a big deal. We’ve been on a steeper slope.
Besides the upcoming uphill traffic had the passing fork with 2 lanes. Well as we rolled downhill just at a sharp turn with no visibility, we faced a tractor-trailer in our lane trying to pass another one despite the fact that they were not yet at the start of their uphill passing lane. Luckily, he noticed, hit the brakes (so did Alex) and managed to move into his lane before it was too late. This I should say was our only scary moment for the entire trip. And in all the previous trips we’ve done with Doranya (Well, I remember rounding a curve in Nova Scotia and coming face-to-face with a large deer. Not as scary as this, but quite a shock nevertheless – A). I will never forget I was still shaking as we passed through the community named Taylor on the other side of the Peace.
We stopped for a deep breath and lunch at Fort St John. Our destination for the day was Sikanni River Campground and RV Park.
That was the plan I had, which so far wed managed to follow to the day. Roads were wiggly but for most part empty. We reached our destination just after 2PM. There is a big drop towards the Sikanni River bridge and the road was clogged because of construction with one lane open for traffic waiting to pass at each end of the bridge. The campground was just downhill by the bridge. With all the roar of the heavy machinery, traffic, and the fact that we had reached it early in the day, we decided to continue. Didn’t even check the campground.
Fort Nelson wasn’t a planned stop on our way West. We’d stop there on our way back while taking a more northerly road towards Slave Lake and Athabasca. However things would start changing our plans fast after our turnaround point. We would not be able to take the northern road.
But this for a later post. The scenery on the highway began changing. The road was lined up with charred trees, some from previous years’ fires.
Approaching Fort Nelson, we drove very close to active wildfires. Little did we know that this area would soon be burning extensively, the reason we wouldn’t be able to drive through Fort Nelson on our way back.
For now, we reached Forth Nelson early enough, checked into a hotel, had dinner at Boston Pizza next door and called it a day.
See you on the famous highway tomorrow.
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