NORTHERN BRITISH COLUMBIA: IS A BEAR COUNTRY
- coupkovasvatava
- Jul 14, 2018
- 4 min read
After weeks of travelling in Alaska and Yukon we had to cross the border with Northern British Columbia to remember that we don´t carry our bear spray wherever we go for nothing. To our first bear after Denali we ran into 10 minutes after we said goodbye to our old friend´s, Mira and Tom. Mum complained to them about the lack of wildlife in Yukon and there it was. Once we entered British Columbia, the feed of bears never ended. And if it was only bears…
From Marsh Lake, that is huge and where we went kayaking, to Liard the drive was just amazing! No people, no houses, no towns, just dense forest and the winding road and wood bisons all along it. I had never seen those guys before and I tell you: they are huge and they were everywhere. On Liard River there are awesome hot springs. Something happened deep under the surface and now hot water comes from there and it creates two cool – in fact pretty warm – pools: the upper one was boiling, but in the lower one I easily spent an hour. In the meantime I learned a new word: “bathing suit”.
Muncho Lake sits in a beautiful valley and it is surrounded by huge mountains but when we arrived there and the next day it was so windy and the waves so big that we couldn´t go kayaking at all. Instead we drove to Stone Mountain Provincial Park and went kayaking on Summit Lake when the storm came and we ended up soaked and frozen. When mum finally managed to reach the shore I couldn´t feel my hands and feet and she had to tuck me in my sleeping bag to make me warm again. Which took a minute since my bag´s extreme temperature is minus 17 degrees and it is just roasting in there. It was a good adventure.
The next day we climbed Mount St Paul. Well, we wanted to, but we didn´t. It was blowing so much again that we had to turn around and go back. I still managed to built a few cairns and I would still be building them now if mum didn´t say it was time to go down, so much fun it was!
In Dawson Creek the Alaska Highway starts. We went to the Alaska Highway House museum to get to know more about how they built it in 1942 and now I know it must have been pretty hard. There is the Mile 0 post as well and that´s about it. At the visitor centre mum let them convince her that we can´t just go straight to Prince George but we had to take a detour.
So in the evening we ended up in Tumbler Ridge. That is a small town and a gate to the UNESCO Geopark. We stayed in the campsite for 20 dollars that we didn´t paid because there was supposed to be someone to come in the evening to collect the money but they never turned up. Good value. The next day we hiked to the … Falls, 100-meter high waterfall and one of the highest in British Columbia. If it was not enough we went to see dinosaur tracks printed in mud ages ago, now turned into rock. And there I learned another new word – “footprint”. I am getting pretty smart, aye?
Prince George is a very strange name for a city that happens to be the capital of Northern British Columbia. It was not pretty at all but they had a great playground and a spray park there and that was good enough for me. I wanted to climb Teapot Mountain on my own but once we got off our car at the trailhead we got attacked by millions of mosquitos and mum had to run us up there to save our lives. And there on the top there was something amazing and it was not views. There were teapots everywhere! I couldn´t believe my eyes but then I remembered what the name of the mountain was and it made perfect sense. If only those were on all the mountains we climb! Great fun exploring what is inside, taking things out and putting new ones in.
Kayaking on Lasalle Lake was better success than Summit Lake. First it was a pretty small lake so we could actually go all around and second it was nice and – quite – calm. Plus it was not raining at all.
Our last stop in British Columbia was Mount Robson Provincial Park. Mum didn´t want to go there at all but lucky we were that our friend´s told us that it would be a big mistake. It was beautiful. We couldn´t explore it properly the first day because it was raining. At night we even got a huge scary storm but in the morning we woke up to a beautiful sunny day. Mount Robson is the highest mountain in the Rockies and we went to admire it to gorgeous Kinney Lake.
And that was it. Time to cross the border and head to where we came from. Alberta.
Your Annie
Some facts: When: 7. 7. – 14. 7. 2018 Where: Liard River Hot Springs – Muncho Lake – Stone Mountain Provincial Park – Dawson Creek – Tumbler Ridge – Prince George – Mount Robson Provincial Park How long: 8 days How far: 1 771 km
