Day Seven: Grand Prairie to Fort Nelson

It was a peaceful morning.  Despite the overnight low of upper 40s, I slept good.  The sun was out when I finally woke up.  Blue sky!  The town looked nicer in sunlight, but I didn't stick around for another aimless drive around town.  I continued on CND43 West toward Dawson Creek, 80 miles away.  And when I arrived in town at 8:30am local time, it was like coming to a party.  It's not a big town, but it has all the amenities.  I stopped at a Tim Horton's for coffee and then in town posed by one of several plagues and signs designating Dawson Creek as "Mile 0 of the Alaskan Highway."  It was 55F and a promise to a good day of travel.  It was a relief to see the horizon again.  I could see snow-capped mountains in the distance.

Dawson Creek is an agricultural town.  Plowed fields are on either side of the road outside of town.  Yellow canola fields add some color. The town itself stretches along the Alcan (CND97), but I didn't linger for long.  Once on the official road, I wanted to get started.  Weather was lovely, sky was clear blue, and it was warming up.  I would go as far as I could but stop to see all the sights. Just being on the ALASKA highway got me motivated.  Kevin would have enjoyed this stretch.

I wasn't on the road for long when I stopped at the first historical sign, the Kiskatinaw Curved Bridge, a 10km (6.2 mile) detour to the last remaining wooden trestle bridge built for the AlCan.  It's 531 feet long. The other ones have been torn down or damaged.  I had to face off one black one-horn bull that was off the side of the road, but no battle ensued.

I was the only one parked at this bridge.  I walked briefly on it but then saw another vehicle coming my way on the bridge.  It was a silver 2007 Caravan whose driver had the same intent: to get out and photograph the site.  The driver was 60-year-old Mary who was driving that used Caravan from Anchorage down the AlCan, across Canada east to her home in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.  She had spent time in Bethel, Alaska as a surgical nurse and driving the Alcan was on her bucket list.  Like me, she was doing it herself and enjoying it. She bought the van in Anchorage for $5000.  So far all she's had to do on it is replace the #2 sparkplug.  At night she sleeps in her van.

Turns out Mary is not only a nurse, but a talented poet.  "I write campfire songs at night!" she admitted to me, and showed me her handwritten notes.  She had collected all the brochures from the Alcan and had so much enthusiasm for her journey that it got me motivated as well.  "Make sure you stop in the hot springs and Watson Lake!" All the brochures she had neatly organized in a plastic bin in the passenger seat, ready to share with her family back home.  She took photos and videos of the trip. I really enjoyed talking to this woman, but we had to cut our chat short because more people were driving by and stopping as well and there wasn't too much room for more than four cars.

The highway today was in good shape.  It's two lanes at times with a median in the middle, but one lane in either direction except uphill when there is a passing lane in the more remote sections.  There are several slo-mos at construction sights but nothing that requires traffic to be stopped.  Sections of the road's frostheaves are getting repaired.

I wasn't on the road for long when on the CBC.ca station I learned that Adam West, the original actor for Batman in the 1960s, has died of leukemia at age 88.  I was a first grader when I was in love with Batman, always nervous about what villain would harm my hero, always forgetting that Batman had his indispensable utility belt that got him out of any trouble.

Fort St John was the only other significant town on my drive.  Since It's only 47 miles north of Dawson Creek, I didn't bother to stop, although I should have gassed up.  I was just under a half a tank when I passed the Bucking Horse RV park and restauran reminding drivers that the next service station is 178 km away in Fort Nelson.  I decided I needed to get in line and gas up.  That cost me $52.44!

A group of Harley-Davidson riders were finishing a meal in the restaurant.  I overheard one of the guides speaking to the eight others in German.  That caught my attention, so I asked one of the leather-clad men if the entire group was German.  I was speaking to Nick, a retired homicide detective now living in West Palm Beach ("and loving it!" he stressed).  Nick now works for Motorcycles across the World, a touring company he leads guides with.  The company then contracts local suppliers with the gear and lodging.  In this case, it was Eaglerider Motocycles, and the sag support was already waiting for everyone to saddle up and continue north.  Nick had first ridden the entire AlCan in 1995 when it was mostly gravel and "hellish," but since then he's ridden many sections of the route as a guide.  We had to bid farewell when the group had to continue north.  Now the sky was looking dark again, and the cold wind picked up, just like it did yesterday. I'm glad I was in a van and not on a bike.

Once north of Fort St John, the road meandered up and down gentle slopes, past cliff rocks and crossing creeks, but generally lined on both sides by a mixed forest of aspen, lodgepole pine, spruce.  There are swaths of burned or dead trees, too, and in other sections it's clear that the trees are young and were planted to replace logged ones.  Nick's riders were in front of me for 30 miles, riding at a steady speed until the rain kicked in and everyone pulled over to secure their gear before continuing on to Fort Nelson.

There were many dirt road going off from the Alcan, on either side of the road.  Most of these roads are service roads for gas companies and their compressor sites.  Once the rain clouds returned in the afternoon, there once again wasn't much to see besides the road in front of me.  I made Fort Nelson my stop for the night, rented a spot at the Blue Bell RV Park ($20/site), right next door to a Motel6 advertising rooms for $74.99.  I was the first one in the RV park and grabbed site #3 as the owners told me that has the strongest wifi reception.  They were correct.  I had a nice sit-down meal at the town's Boston Pizza, a Canadian chain based out of Calgary, Alberta.  I had a chicken schwarma pizza, a tasty gourmet pizza.  There were no left overs! I'd stop at the Boston Pizza again because it also has pasta, salads and sandwiches for sale.  My server was Tamara, a Fort Nelson resident for 23 years. Originally from Edmonton, she moved here as a child when her father got a job drilling oil nearby, but since the 2008 recession the oil jobs never returned.

I planned my stay in town well.  By the time I got done with my shower, two more vehicles came in for the night.  After my meal a few more had pulled in, and after my five-mile walk with the dogs across the Simpson trail (also known as the Demonstration Forest Trail), the sites were filling up. The park wasn't very scenic, but the showers were hot and the place was quiet.  In fact, the entire town was quiet.  Fort Nelson may not be a scenic tourist town, but it has everything a traveler needs, from cheap to resort-style hotel rooms, a Subway sandwich shop and an A&W Rootbeer store and several bars. Every town in Canada seems to have a Super8 chain!

Sunset for Fort Nelson was 10:19pm, but by 10:48 there was still light, with a steady 49F.  Rain is forecasted on and off the next five days.

I drove 377.8 miles today, and a grand total of 2863.1  About 150 miles of that are in-and-around miles.  Tomorrow I need to make sure I get my tires checked for proper air pressure.  The front left tire looks low and my low pressure light came on north of St John.