[Riding South] All roads lead to Prince George

[Eric]

Greetings!

I'm staying with an eclectic group of people here in Prince George, BC. They are a mix of hip hippies, musicians and square businessmen, inventors. Prince George is proving to be like most places on the trip - getting there is the easy part, leaving is hard.

I left Whitehorse, YK three weeks ago and bicycled along the Alaska Highway. After a few days along the ALCAN, I turned onto the much nicer Cassiar Highway (RT 37). The Cassiar has mostly been made redundant by the ALCAN. It has a quite, intimate feeling. Trees grow right up to the pavement and trash and dead animals are rarely visible. Instead of the low-angle grading of the bigger ALCAN the Cassiar tends to follow the terrain. This means lots of short steep hills. It was quite fun to zoom down one side, pedal like mad to reach the top of the next hill and then repeat until exhausted.

The next few days were sunny and full of solitude. Except for the occasional RV or truck (who were forced to slow down by the narrow, twisty road) the road was quiet. A black bear and it's cubs wandered across the road and lots of mountain goats eyed me suspiciously as they crossed. The occasional bald eagle could also be heard. A few times, at rest stops, people invited into their RVs for tea or a meal. It was most interesting to see the inside of these things. They seem to match the personality of their owners. Thus, the ones I saw were small and homey.

I thought at this point I'd do a 'Day in the Life of Eric' for those who want more details. On this particular day I wake up at 6:30am by my bladder. I lay in the warm sleeping bag for a few minutes listening to the rain on the tent - a cold and rainy morning. Once out of my bag, sleep evaporates and I pack up. The sleeping bag goes into the panniers (bike bags). The tent comes down and is bungied to the back rack of the bicycle. After 1/2 hour of packing, I get on the bike and ride for a few miles before stopping in a big gravel lot. Breakfast is like most meals, I start with some sort of bulk grain (rice, oats or wheat), add some fat (oil or margarine), some sweetener (honey, sugar, chocolate) and a few spices. Today is cream of wheat with honey, milk, raisins and cinnamon. I sit on a cement piling, sheltered a bit from the wind, look out at the snowy mountains rising into the fog and try not to burn my tongue.

After eating, I pack up the stove and tackle the increasing difficult hills. What started as small, roller coasters have turned into long, wet uphills slogs followed by short, cold downhills. I ride through the wind and rain for a few hours lost in thought before stopping at a rest area to have a morning snack (homemade granola and fruit). I eat about 5 meals a day to meet the 5000 calories burned. After the snack it's back onto the bicycle for a few more hours. When I reach the grocery store, I find that it no longer sells groceries. This is not unexpected as much of this section of highway is littered with abandoned, three building towns and the skeletons of old gas stations. I eat the last of my lunch food (peanut butter and nutella sandwiches) and take a detour to the closest town with groceries. The closest town happens to be a little tourist area on the Alaska/Canada border. I ride east into town, fighting a bit of a headwind. The road travels through lots of snowy mountains, past blue glaciers and follows a steep glacier fed creek down to the coast. Around late afternoon I pull into the small town sister towns of Stewart, Canada and Hyder, Alaska and buy a bunch of basic food.

As I've got a bit of time before night falls, I decide to check out the local tourist attraction - bears eating fish. It's a few miles out of town along a narrow dirt road. It doesn't take long for me to find a bear. In fact, coming around the corner I almost collide with a grizzly. Luckily, it isn't eating and, other then looking at me in a scary sort of way, doesn't seem much concerned. It walks off into the bushes. All my bear encounters end up like this. I don't cause trouble for the bear and the bear doesn't cause trouble for me. A few nervous miles later (I've been riding past the dead salmon that litter the road - apparently the bears often get distracted and drop them) I reach the tourist attraction. It turns out to be about 50 tourists. They are standing on a boardwalk watching a bored looking bald eagle pick out the eyes of a dead salmon. I watch the tourists watch the eagle for a few minutes and, a bit bored myself, decide to find a place to camp. I ride further up the road and turn down an abandoned 4x4 track. It leads to a large clearing next to a small stream. I unpack, set up camp, cook dinner, and read and write for a bit. I've ridden an average amount - about 75 miles. My pillow cover is a rabbet skin a wild haired lady gave me a few days before. It's very soft and soon I'm asleep. The end.

I spent a lazy day in Hyder and then rode back to the Cassiar. One night I camp with a Vancouver cyclist heading north. He is interesting and welcome company. Then I ride for a few more days to the end of the Cassiar. The next highway, the Yellowhead - Rt 16, heads east across Canada. I again find myself dodging dead animals, broken glass and trash. At one point a watch a bear nearly get hit by an 18 wheeler. A policeman tells me to take care because "this is the highway of death" although I never find out why. I start passing through large towns with large supermarkets. I start eating healthy looking fruit and vegetables again. I also stop in a small museum on the edge of Smithers, BC. The museum is contained entirely in a domed room with mountains painted on the walls. It contains every large mammal of the area - all stuffed and in action poses. Now I can say that I've seen every animal that can be seen - from the towering moose to the big-pawed lynx.

After leaving Smithers I meet my partner for the ride into Prince George. I've found that a quick look at the bike of a cyclist gives you clues to his or her personality. Billy, a retired Vietnam veteran who is "retired, retarded - whatever", has piles of stuff tied to his bike with string. As he proudly tells me, in between stopping to pick up stuff that has fallen off, he started biking at the age of 48. Now, at 62, he boasts that he is strong as ever. I find this to be true, as whenever I try to ride away without him he always manages to catch up. Unable to escape, I consign myself to his interesting and amusing company. I hear stories about Vietnam and his many (possibly imaginary) female conquests. We ride together until Prince George where we are accidentally separated.

Prince George seems a bustling metropolis. It's the biggest place (80,000 people) I've come across since Anchorage. In town I meet the friendly Ryan who invites me to stay with him and his friends. I also meet another British fellow who is riding from Alaska to Argentina. Dominic is doing his ride a bit different than most. He started alone on a tandem bicycle and is filming a documentary about the people he convinces to ride with him along the way. You can check out his web page at www.takeaseat.org and if anyone is near his route, he seems great fun to ride with.

Once again, no pictures. The camera, perhaps distraught by the previous loss of it's pictures, has suffered some kind of internal malfunction. I'll be buying a new one today.

Until next time,

Eric

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Posted by Eric to Riding South at 8/16/2006 09:10:00 PM