Day Four | Riding North

Day Four

Camped at Francois Lake Sunday night, it never really seemed completely dark. It’s pretty weird. I got up about 5:30 and made coffee with the stove and coffee press. First cup was too weak, fixed it with the second cup. Finally got everything packed up, took awhile for everything to dry from the dew before we rolled up the tents, and left about 8:30.

We decided to take the scenic route on the way out and took dirt roads 60 miles towards Houston, B.C. It was a fun ride, really pretty along Francois Lake. Found a nice little campground and cabin spot where we stopped for PIE at Norleens, fresh blueberry yum. We may stop there on the way back as we’ll be passing by when we head south. Got to the highway and turned north towards Smithers where we had lunch Alpenhorn pub. Judi would love the Smithers, lots of little shops to see along main street.

Stopped and watched people catching salmon in nets at a narrow spot on the Skeena River, it narrowed down to a small walled in area, looked like a great rapid to kayak.

Headed north again after a gas stop, made a right onto Hwy 37 towards Stewart B.C. Shortly after we ran into Russ from Castro Valley who had run out of gas on his motorcycle. Gave him some of my extra I as carrying, enough to get him to the next station. Yesterday was cool all day, today started cool but quickly warmed up and Dave and I were shedding layers to keep cool. It got as high as 88 on the ride to Stewart. We also got a few minutes of rain, it was refreshing and gone quickly. On the ride down into Stewart we were all getting low on fuel as we expected a station about 40 miles before Stewart. Unfortunately we didn’t find it and headed in hoping to make it. We all did with plenty to spare. On the way down we stopped to see the Bear Glacier, it was an amazing site. Tomorrow we’re off to the bear viewing platforms in Hyder, maybe I’ll get a shot of a bear catching a salmon in the air.

Time to go to sleep, it is after midnight here and it finally got dark.