Stewart to Prince Rupert

True to form, as we left Stewart around 10 am, we quickly come across another black bear.  This bear did not seem to be in very good condition.  Clumps of hair on his back, thin, and probably just kicked out by mama to fend for itself.  it walked from the left side of the highway to the right, and off into the woods.  My pictures did not come out nearly as good as Marcia’s did…this one was the best view of it.  As quickly as it appeared, it was quickly gone.

Marcia also got this nice picture of bear river as it run toward Stewart and into the Pacific.  With all the glaciers, this river runs pretty fast all summer long.

She also got some great shots of Bear Glacier with the blue glacier ice even when the sun is not shining directly on it.

Those mountains on both sides of Glacier Highway are sure nice to look at…hard to keep your eyes on the road.  Soon we were back on the Cassiar Highway.

    

On the Cassiar we follow the Nass River for much of the way to Kitwanga, where we were planning to stay the night.  As with other rivers in this area, there are lots of lakes and creeks which are associated with the river system.

There are few communities along the Cassiar…two places to get gas during the entire 120 miles we covered.  A few times I had to drive the speed limit (62 MPH / 100 KPH) due to cars or trucks behind me…but mostly I like to travel at 45 to 50 so that I too could enjoy the scenery.  Also, if a moose or bear jumped out at the last moment, it is easier to miss them at this speed.

A short three hour drive and we are at the end of the Cassiar Highway, and we pull into the Petro-Canada at the intersection with the Yellowhead Highway that we will be taking over to Rupert the next day.

We then backtrack over to the Cassiar R V Park in Kitwanga, passing back over the Skeena River which we will follow all the way to Prince Rupert.  I did not get any pictures of the RV park, but it was a nice little park.  At first I thought we were not going to be able to stay there because their Internet was down, and we did not have a signal on our aircard at first…but it turned out we had 2-3 bars of fast 3G as we drove through to park to leave...so we ended up staying after all.  Most 3G in Canada is much faster than the 3G in the states, and I was able to post two blogs about the Cassiar that I had written previously, and I worked on another that night which I posted the next day.  We also had dinner at a nice little restaurant in town there, I think it was called the 37 Grille.  Food was good, service was friendly, but this year old restaurant does need to set it priorities toward service to the customers.  One waitress had to cover ten tables, and three take out orders while we were there…yet the lady owner was in the kitchen with a cook, a food prep cook, and a busboy/dishwasher who only came out to bus one table, leaving three others dirty, while we were there.  Four in the back while only one out front…not the way to run a restaurant in our opinion.

As we leave the park the next morning around 9 am, we get this shot of the Seven Sisters Peaks of the Hazelton Mountains.  I am sure, depending upon the weather, that we will get a better shot of these mountains on our way back from Prince Rupert.

    

      

With the Skeena River to our right for most of the trip, Marcia can’t put the camera down.  It is another gorgeous drive, but it has more traffic than the Cassiar Highway had, that is for sure.

At the town of Terrace, we pass over the river, and it is now on my side for the rest of the trip…and we start coming into the Coast Mountain Range again. 

   

    

The view after the town of Terrace is better than the view before…but the entire drive is real, real nice.  So many of these nice drives…it is going to be hard to drive across Nevada in a few months on our way back to Kansas City to see my son.

Yep, it was one heck of a pretty drive…and guess what…we “have” to drive right back through it to get home since we are not one of the many who come to Prince Rupert to catch a Canadian Ferry to Vancouver Island…a 16 hour trip to Port Hardy, with an additional 2 hour sitting in line and loading onto the ferry, all to save around 600 miles of driving.  Heck, I can drive 600 miles in 18 hours…and “if” we were to do it, it would cost around $2,000 compared to $250 to drive it.

We finally get to Kaien Island where Prince Rupert is at.  This is a shot of the Hecate Strait from a pullout once you get onto the Island. 

Prince Rupert has one RV park, with another RV park located in Port Edward, about 15 miles away.  Without cell phones, I could not call…and it was hard to decide which one to go to first.  I choose Prince Rupert RV Park, and it was crowded because there were many RVs in the park getting ready to get on the Ferry Wednesday morning.  We were able to get a “dry camping” spot for the night, and then move to a full service spot this morning (Wednesday).  It was fine, but you can hear each and every RV leaving from 4:45-5:15.  Since we did not have power, we decided to go out to eat Tuesday night, and ended up going to Theaann’s Greek Palace, located in the Pacific Inn.  Now normally we don’t eat at restaurants associated with a motel/hotel…but yelp gave Theaann's Greek Palace Restaurant 4 stars.  Well, we couldn’t agree more…all the food was homemade, and tasted real good.  We had a platter for two which gave us an assortment of many of their foods.  Wow, some of it was even better than what we get back home in Tarpon Springs.  Had leftovers that we brought home and we added some Salmon from Alaska and some lemon shrimp, and had another great meal tonight.  It is a husband and wife team running the restaurant, and he is Greek, and came out and talked with Marcia for a few minutes.  Looks like they are going to shut down in November though because the Hotel has raised their rent to a level they cannot sustain.  That's too bad...hate to see another "home cook" style restaurant going out of business...especially one this good.