Northern British Colombia

Day 13

­­­­­Happy 4^th of July! Someone sent us a text message to wish us one. We have no idea who as they didn’t text their name and we didn’t recognize the number.

After a quick breakfast of juice, yogurt, and toast we left Prince Rupert. We drove up the Skeena River through some of the most gorgeous scenery I have ever seen. A few hours later we were in Terrace, B.C where we attended the Saturday market. We purchased us a locally grown and made cedar lazy susan. We also bought our lunch there.

Afterwards we drove about 10 miles past the town to Furlong Bay on Lakelse Lake to set up camp. We had reserved a spot and it was a very nice spot in the trees and out of sight of the road.

After setting up camp we walked down to the lake. It was just like a crowded beach with people (kids) swimming, boating, water skiing etc. It was quite warm so we didn’t stay too long.

We had a nice peaceful evening after our dinner of beef stew.

Day 14

This morning we got up and showered before anyone else was up. After breakfast we relaxed a little before getting ready for church. Church was probably 15 minutes away, but we headed out an hour early. Once we got on the road, we discovered that our GPS did not recognize the street where the church was located. Patty noticed that the GPS said there was an LDS church about 60 miles away in Kitimat--so we headed out. Then another church address showed up in Terrace, but different from the one she had found on the Internet. It took us to a house where no one was home. We were about 15 minutes away from the start of church. We were both silently praying we could find where to go. I was also praying that we could get there on time. We noticed a man next to the house the GPS had sent us to and we asked him if he possibly knew where this obscure street might be. He said he did and gave us such detailed and long directions that we were lost in what he was saying in no time. But we headed out and drove straight to it arriving 2 minutes before start time. What a miracle. I cried when I saw the little converted chapel with the LDS logo.

They began as soon as we took our seats, so no one greeted us. We were reminded at the pulpit that it was Fast Sunday. We had completely lost track of the days. Of the 14 people there, 12 of us bore our testimonies. In Patty’s testimony she mentioned that she would no longer take being close to a temple for granted again. She mentioned we were about ½ mile from one temple and that another temple would soon be dedicated in our city. (In Qualicum Beach where we had last attended church they were having a temple outing that would take two days there and back---Seattle Temple). We had no idea how far away these saints’ temple might be. After 45 minutes the branch president got up to close the meeting. He alluded to Patty’s testimony saying they didn’t have it so bad because they had two temples only two days distance away.

After the closing prayer about ten people gathered around us to talk. We were talked for about 10-15 minutes and I was thinking that was the only meeting. Then someone said we better get to Sunday School. One sister invited us to her house to eat after the block. We politely declined as we would not be in town.

After we changed our clothes, we headed up the Nisga’a­­­­­ Highway to view a 300 year old lava flow that killed 2,000 Nisga’a people. They had an interesting visitor’s center inside a large tribal house.

The lava flow is pahoahoa so it is round rather than sharp. The flow goes for miles and miles. We also saw some incredible scenery. We stopped to have lunch on the banks of Lava Lake. This lake was created by the lava flow from the eruption.

On the way back I thought I saw a little bear, so Patty made me turn around so she could see it since she is such a bear person. When we turned around, a VERY LARGE bear started lumbering down the road toward us. I asked Patty if we were okay as she is the bear person. Finally it ran off the side of the road and Patty made me turn the car around again. This time we saw the little one and Patty was able to get some pictures.

We then returned to the campground and made a wonderful Sunday dinner, relaxed and went to bed early.

Day 15

We broke camp early and headed for Stewart/Hyder. These are two small towns on the Pacific Ocean. Stewart is in B.C. and Hyder is in Alaska. As we got closer to our destination the mountains started getting larger and larger. We hadn’t really seen any what I would call tall mountains before now. These mountains are so high we can’t really take pictures of the whole mountain. They just go straight up from the floor. It’s amazing. We stopped and took pictures of Bear Glacier on our way into town.

When we came to the border to go into Alaska it was definitely like going into another country. The road into Hyder, Alaska is not paved and really rocky. It is miles from any other part of the U.S. or Alaska. It is named the friendliest ghost town in Alaska. Almost everything is boarded up.

We crossed the border back and forth several times. We had to go through customs each time we entered Canada, but nothing coming into the U.S. It was weird using American money and then going a few minutes away and using Canadian money.

We checked into our room that looked awful from the outside, but is really quite nice inside. It is 75 degrees here and we are dying of the heat! We have had to bundle up since we left, but now we are sweating.

We then drove up the dirt road to a bear viewing platform. It is a little early in the season for the salmon run, so we were not able to see any bears. It is an awesome viewing platform about 500 yards long over the Fish Creek River. Patty knew that it was too early to see bears because the salmon don’t hit their peak until the end of July. But she wanted to see the orcas, which are gone by the end of June. So it was a compromise we were willing to make. It’s not like we haven’t seen bears before!

On the way back from the viewing area we stopped at a “bus” to get lunch. We got grilled garlic halibut and a pound of peal and eat shrimp. The lady that worked there said her husband caught the halibut. We ate about a 1/3 of the shrimp and brought the rest back to our room to put in the fridge for dinner.

Day 16

We got up early to make a lot of mileage today. We had to show our passports when we went into Canada.

This was the only day we did not know where we would be spending the night. Map Quest said that it would take us 11 hours to get to Jade City. It only took 7 so we decided to drive a little further on. In Jade City there is nothing but a campground and a store with tons of jade and jade items. Patty went crazy and wanted to buy out the store---but she refrained. It was a fun store.

During our drive today the scenery was again incredible. We saw three bears along the way and a moose swimming across a lake. We ended the day in Watson Lake. We got a room and went to the visitors’ center. This is the place where they have all of the license plates from around the world and signs from various places. It started when a homesick soldier (building the Alaskan Highway) made a sign with his home town and saying how many miles away from home he was. There is now a forest of signs. We should have brought one of our old license plates from home. We saw two from Utah.

Vancouver Island, B.C.

Qualicum Beach


Day 6

Today we took the ferry from Vancouver to Nanaimo. It took a couple of hours and the ride was not too bad. We were dressed in our warm coats so we could be outside. Everyone else was wearing shorts and flip flops. It seems this is the summer vacation attire regardless of the weather.
From Nanaimo we drove up the coast to Qualicum Beach. Our room is overlooking the ocean. It has been raining since we got off of the ferry. Of course, it is a travel day. We went to dinner at a seafood restaurant that one of our bus drivers had recommended from our tour in Vancouver. It was wonderful.

Day 7

What a gorgeous day we had today. The weather was perfect. We began the day by driving to attend the Qualicum Beach Branch Sacrament Meeting. On the way there we stopped to take a few pictures on the beach.
The branch has a a beautiful new chapel. The people were very friendly there and many came up to meet us. There were about forty people. There was one Aaronic Priesthood holder and one baby. Every time the baby would make a peep either the mother or father would take it out. The meeting was very good and the congregational singing would put our ward to shame.
After church we drove back to our room to change our clothes then on to eat lunch at a beach. The day was quite cool so we were wearing our jackets. Afterward we drove through a town that had goats grazing on the roof of a restaurant. We drove on a little more to an area that had a very nice waterfall. When we came back to our rooms we walked across the street and along the beach. It was a very restful peaceful sabbath.

Day 8

There are culinary experiences we have in our lives that makes things memorable. One of those we had this morning at The Donut Shop on the dock of Port Alberni. Nothing else was open at 8:00 a.m. so we had to. They claimed to have, “the best donuts on Vancouver Island.” For me they were the best donuts anywhere-warm and fresh and not to sweet. MMMM!!!!!!!

Another culinary experience we had was in the Fish Tales Café in Qualicum Beach. The seafood was wonderful as well as colorful. We sat outside on the grass under umbrellas. We are getting too accustomed to this fresh seafood.

Today we traveled to the west side of the island. We set up camp on the beach just south of Tofino. This is the campsite that Patty got up at 1:00 am to reserve on January 1^st---the first day they were taking reservations. Boy did we get a primo one. It is gorgeous! We have an unobstructed view of the beach from our campsite. There are 182 campsites here. Some people have to hike to get to the beach. We, along with about ten others, are right on it. For the rest of the day, we just relaxed sitting in our lawn chairs, walking along the beach, reading etc.

Day 9

It did get cold last night, but we have wonderful sleeping bags. We both slept the night through. We got up around 5:00 and walked on the beach. Patty was still in her “jammies”.

We cooked pancakes and eggs for breakfast and headed out for our morning excursion. We met Captain Wendy along with three other passengers for our zodiak water excursion. (It is like a large rubber raft with a motor). It was a foggy day and the water was really rough. It was a wild ride and we had a blast going to our viewing spots. We were dressed in these giant suits that act as a flotation device if you fall in the water. But it was still pretty cold when we were speeding along. We saw sea lions and a sea otter. We also sat and watched a couple of whales for awhile. But it was not quite as fun without Amy oohing and ahing each time one surfaced. The excursion took us through the numerous islands off the west coast of Vancouver Island. The ride back was even colder as the water would splash on us every once in awhile.

We are picking up on the language around here. A girl asked Patty if she had a loony. She had one but the girl needed some more for the shower. Patty asked me if I had any loonies. I had one so I gave it to her for four quarters.

After we recovered from our boat ride, we started exploring some of the sites around Pacific Rim National Park. It is a rainforest set against a beach with cool forested areas and lots of gorgeous beaches. We had lunch overlooking one of the beaches at Wickannish Center. We had an incredible panoramic view and wonderful halibut and salmon. I’m sure you would all enjoy it (except for maybe April). After exploring for awhile our day pass expired and we headed back to camp. We made a fire tonight and had hotdogs and marshmallows. We had another peaceful evening on the beach and another very restful sleep.

Day 10 Canada Day ­­­­­­­­­­

The main obstacle to camping is taking up and putting down. It is a chore, but there is nothing like roughing it at certain locations. It took us awhile to break camp, but after a breakfast of scrambled eggs and hot chocolate, we headed on to our next venture.

The Canadians really love their dogs. They are everywhere. Some of them are very large. Not soon after we left our campground, a large creature startled us by running across the road in front of our car. My first thought was it was a dog. But it was actually our first black bear sighting. Later we saw a smaller one on the side of the road and we were able to get some pictures.

On the way out we passed a grove of trees that we stopped at and walked though. It is called Cathedral Grove. It has trees that are 800 years old. They were incredibly large. One of them was said to dwarf the Tower of Pisa.

After about a six hour drive we ended up in Telegraph Grove for the night. Our room is overlooking the pier. We enjoyed another seafood meal. Patty is now hooked on seafood chowder with salmon, halibut, and clams. We are definitely spoiled with all of this fresh fish we have been eating!

We called our Canadian friend, Lindy, from back home to sing “Oh Canada” to her and to tell her about our blog.

Day 11

Today we had another whale-watching excursion. Patty booked this one so maybe we could see some orcas. That was our big hope for this outing. We were on a larger boat with a lot of people that were speaking strange languages we did not recognize. The boat didn’t speed so it was not cold, with the wind resistance, like our previous boat trip.

Not too far out and there they were-orcas-a whole pod of them. Wow we couldn’t believe it! We were so excited and took lots of pictures hoping a few would turn out. Then we saw more and more. We finally had seen so many that we put our cameras away. We were so excited to see multiple pods. We had a great naturalist (unlike the one on the purple boat where we didn’t see anything).

We also saw a humpback and various sea lions and seals. We were late getting back I think because we stopped to watch so many orcas. We then headed out of Telegraph Cove for our next destination.

We drove to Port Hardy and found the motel where we would be spending the night. We were glad we could do some more laundry as it was piling up. Then we headed into the city center.

There seem to be a lot of First Nation people living here. We went and got some groceries and ice and picked up a hamburger at A&W. It didn’t quite meet the standards of what we had been eating.

Day 12

We didn’t sleep quite as well last night as we were apprehensive about catching our early morning ferry to Prince Rupert. We both set alarms and told the front office to call us at 4:30 a.m. I kept waking up and checking my watch and I finally got up at 4:00. Just as we were getting ready to leave our smoke alarm went off. It finally stopped, but it was certainly annoying.

We were five minutes away from where we got on the ferry. We arrived at about 5:15. It took awhile to board so we ate our breakfast of sweet rolls and milk. The ferry ride is fifteen hours. So now we are leaving Vancouver Island.

The ferry was quite pleasant except for the length. It was nice outside so Patty was able to hang out up top in the back so she wouldn’t get sick. We got into our motel room at 12:15 a.m.

Vancouver, B.C.

Day 4

As we drove from Mt. St. Helens to Vancouver, it rained both here and there. It was a good day for traveling. Going across the border was fairly simple as the line was not too long and we were only questioned for about a minute. In Vancouver we went to a really fancy restaurant for lunch. I have never had the waitress put a napkin in my lap for me while I was wearing jeans. I had a warm scallop salad and Patty had salmon. It was wonderful. The motel we are staying in is really nice. They have breakfast and a place to do laundry. So I did a batch.

Day 5

After yesterday's rain, we had an incredibly gorgeous day today. We took a bus tour that lasted almost all day today. They picked us up at our motel, in North Vancouver, around 11:00 and then we met up up with the rest of the group in downtown Vancouver. We toured for almost seven hours and saw all the highlights of the city. We had a very informative tour guide who let us know many interesting facts such as there are 2,000 Canadian words, they don't have water meters in their homes in Vancouver because there is so much water, there is a large German and Chinese population and so on. We visited the Totem Poles in Stanley Park, Gaston (the oldest part of Vancouver), Chinatown (2nd largest in North America), Prospect Point in Stanley Park, Granville Market, the Capilano Suspension Bridge, and many other places. The bridge was an interesting experience. You walk across this extremely tall and long suspension bridge (over the Capilano River) while it is swinging back and forth. It was very difficult to maintain your balance and it seemed to take forever to go across. When you finally reach the other side you realize that you have to go back over it to leave the park. Motion sickness---here we come.
Vancouver is a very beautiful city with day time temperatures in the 50s in the winter and 70s in the summer. I've included pictures of Patty on the bridge, a view looking down from the bridge, and me on a suspension bridge built between the tree tops.

Oregon and Washington

Day 1

We got started on the road about 5:30 a.m. 700 miles and 11 hours later we found ourselves in Hood River for the night. The drive was very pleasant ranging from 45-75 degrees and raining in a few places.

We had a great view of Mt. Hood from our room. (This is a picture of Mt. St. Helens, not Hood). We settled in after eating a spinach salad and a slice of gourmet pizza.

Day 2

We started our day early after sleeping 9 1/2 hours. We drove along the Historic Columbia River Scenic Highway. We could not believe the size of the Columbia River. It is as big as a lake in many places. There were many wind surfers and para surfers on the river. It was amazing how fast they were gliding along the surface of the river.

As we were driving along the Scenic Highway, we came across four spectacular waterfalls. We stopped at each to take pictures and to hike up to the bridge at Mutnomah Falls which is the second highest year-round waterfall in the U.S. Patty's the one standing on the bridge.

We then headed for Mount St. Helens. We are enjoying our trusty GPS to guide us. We viewed the movie in the visitors’ center and then had lunch on the veranda of the Hoffstadt Bluffs Visitor Center where we had spectacular views of the mountain. As we got closer and closer we were amazed that we could even see the steam coming out of the newly formed dome. We expected to see major desolation and destruction. However, they have replanted most of the Toutle Valley at a cost of 9 million dollars. They say that in about a year they will be able to start making money back from logging. We met a couple from the Netherlands that have visited the U.S. a number of times. She took our picture for us.

We are staying in a little cabin on Silver Lake for the next two nights while we explore the area around Mt. St. Helens.

Day 3

Today we drove to see the other side of Mt. St. Helens. They had part of the road blocked which was disappointing. Patty had read they close it during winter. Who would have thought that meant June? So instead we took a couple of hikes. Which was probably one too many for Patty. On one of our jaunts we saw large holes where 2000 years ago a lava flow burned the trees and the lava hardened and a mold was cast in stone of the tree trunks. I crawled down inside of one. There was a crawl space you could crawl into and then crawl along for about twenty feet or so. The thought of it really freaked me out.

The highlight of the day was going into a lava tube 3/4ths of a mile long. We were there early so we were all alone. It was pretty treacherous in places for Patty. We had two flashlights each, but could barely see. I ventured on alone for a ways. That was an experience as I was feeling emotions I had never felt before. It was scary but I felt brave venturing on alone. This cave was also created 2000 years ago---a mere moment in geologic time. The cave is called Ape Cave. We were amazed at how well the flashes on our cameras actually showed us in the totally dark cave.

The weather is perfect!