As usual, the scenery on the way to Prince Rupert is spectacular. The Skeena River runs along side the road all the way. It is teaming with King (Chinook) Salmon at this time of year so we saw lots of fishermen on the river. Don was getting pretty jealous.
The drive from Terrace to Prince Rupert was to be about 1-1/2 hours. However, we were stopped by flagmen for road construction with waits of 15-20 minutes each, four times…both ways. It took about 2-1/2 hours each way, so we had plenty of time to just sit and enjoy the scenery…or snooze, which I did, especially on the way back.
The closer we got to Prince Rupert, the more the fog moved in, typical of coastal areas.
When we didn’t have the river to look at, we had lakes. All are so beautiful. Obviously there is a lot of rain in this area. Everything is so lush and green. There are lots of ferns on the side of the road and moss on rocks.
Shortly before reaching Prince Rupert, is Port Edward. It is a very small community, but it’s claim to fame is an old historic salmon cannery, which operated in the area for many, many years until sometime in the 1940’s. It has been out of operation for a long time and is now a National Historical Site.
There are a lot of buildings at the site in various conditions. The waterfront weather is very hard on old buildings but they are trying to keep most of them in usable condition, not for canning, but for other purposes, such as offices and for display on tours.
The tide was out when we were there, so all these buildings were temporarily out of the water.
We took a 1-1/2 hour tour with our tour guide, ‘Spider’. He reminded us of Christopher Lloyd, from the movie, “Back to the Future.” He was tall, with a very long, oddly synchronized gait and a very dry sense of humor.
Spider had worked as a commercial fisherman for 35 years and was very knowledgeable of the history and workings of the cannery.
This area was one where they repaired nets and made floats. Some of the other areas we saw were where they did the actual butchering and canning of the fish. The descriptions of all of that were pretty gross. I can't imagine the smell.
I’m sure that if you worked there, you would have to be very hungry in order to ever eat fish again. The process was rather primitive by today’s standards, and I could almost smell the rotting fish.
However, the tour was very interesting and we were glad we took it.
We did go on to Prince Rupert and I was disappointed to find there really wasn’t much there to see. We walked through about three or four shops, had lunch on the waterfront…and that was about it. Not much else to see or do.
So much for my Great Expectations.
There were lots of boats, mostly fishing boats in the harbor. This is just a few of them.
It turned out that the Cannery tour was the main attraction. So we headed back, suffering through all the flagmen and constructions delays…again...
…and of course, the scenery…what a tough job that is!
The next day it was time to go to Hazelton where we would meet up with the tour group. It was only about an hour and a half drive.
Again, we were following the river most of the way.
We always know when we have arrived at Hazelton, when we suddenly see the “Big Scary Bridge.”
It doesn’t look too bad from a distance. (But look how far it is down to the water!)
The real fun comes next…
This is when you are in your big ‘ol motorhome at one end of the bridge, and realize it is one lane, you’ve got to take your turn in order to cross and not only is there no other way around and there is no place to turn around if you chicken out!! Like it or not, you have to cross the ‘Scary Bridge!’
Then as you cross, you realize it’s a steel grate bridge and that you can see all the way down through it, nearly 300 feet down to the water. (Oh, there are those dog-gone power lines again!)
The Hazelton Mountains surround this area.
There are only a few of our group here right now. A lot more of them will roll in in the next day or so. This is actually the nicest RV Park we will see in the entire trip.
This river runs along the edge of the RV park and is the view from our motorhome.
As people arrive, we are checking them in, give them some brief instructions and issue them their yellow vests, name tags and the radios that we will all use as we drive down the road together.
As we drive around the area, we are also seeing the first hint of fall color in the leaves, which promises more color as we head north. This will be a great trip on so many levels and we are so looking forward to it!
No comments:
Post a Comment