Homer Bound:
An Account of My Solo Travels to Homer, Alaska in a 1966 VW
Westy Named Clara
September/October, 2009
Page 4 - An Uneventful Day in B.C. (Bigfoot Country?)
Awakening at my Sunset Mountain Road camp-spot, and pulling out my earplugs, I was greeted with sunlight streaming down from a bland sky, with the roar of big rigs on the nearby freeway as accompaniment. In the view from the rear window, I could discern the unnatural profile of the forest. Having hoped that I would wake up above the treeline to craggy mountains, especially after that drive up the hill, you can imagine my disappointment when I discovered that I was sitting on the edge of what looked suspiciously like a major logging road, and the angular shadows I had seen during the night were naught but the borders of clear cuts. Adding to this dismay was the sheer amount of trash deposited in the forest’s edge; not only was it right off the road (and continuing) where I was parked, but seen in early morning sunlight, from the perspective of a walking person, this horrible looking mess existed as a continuous band alongside many roads in Canada, just as in the U.S. – further proof that people everywhere are pigs, and that stupid and careless attitudes about the value of the natural world are prevalent everywhere, and that the interest in keeping what’s left of it looking somewhat decent are sorely lacking not only in the U.S., but also in supposedly more “advanced cultures”.
Although British Columbia, as well as many parts of the U.S., has been suffering under the attack of beetles that kill trees - in this case, pines, my ire at seeing so many recent clearcuts was softened just a bit. But only a little bit. Because unless you really understand everything, and have let both sides of the argument suffer the same intensity and level of scrutiny, it seems to make perfect sense to take this otherwise dead resource before it is ruined by time and weather, and put it to good use ... might as well make some money while you're at it, eh? Well, that may not be the best way, so go here if you care to read any more about it.
But this is a bus trip report, and so back to the trip report I now go, for I have digressed. Forgive me, if you will, and accompany me as I roll westward toward Merritt through the brisk morning air, descending from the heights through the logging-ravaged, garbage-strewn curves of Highway 97C. Again I must apologize, for this is supposedly a “Backroadbus” article, and there are an awful lot of major roads of the paved variety on this trip! I do make up for it a bit later on, but one of my great mistakes on this adventure was to minimize the adventure in it by taking more major routes than I had to. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, so it is now, armed with the experiences I just had, and the knowledge I just gained, that I can see what errors in planning occurred during my pre-trip decision-making. I could have jogged west and north from Osoyoos to Princeton on Hwy 3, and then north to Merritt, on a road that has dots all along it on my map, instead of this four-lane thing I was now being swept along on. Shame shame! Tsk tsk! Oh well, part of this trip was to get the bus to Homer, and only having gotten there successfully could I then look back and with impunity say “Oh, well I should have done that other route because I made it with no problems to speak of, and …” OH SHUT UP!
As I literally dropped into Merritt,
a fair-sized town nestled in a north-south aligned valley, I
could see that the highway system there was arranged so that I
could exit 97C onto the main trunk northward, which is what I
did. Oops. I should have looked at the map more carefully, but I
was better off for once due to this mistake. Now I’m stuck
on an even bigger freeway, and this is one with no option to
change direction (or mind) for miles. Therefore, I stopped for
breakfast overlooking a pastoral valley of farmland just north of
Merritt, and made up my mind to continue north until I reached a
little road on my map that looked like the right size and type
for a VW bus, and it happened to be going in the direction I
wanted to go. One of the more daunting things I was warned about
in this area was the sixty-mile-an-hour stop-and-go traffic with
signal lights every quarter-mile near Kamloops, and since this
sounded like the epitome of hell to me, I put forth my best
efforts to avoid it!The road I was looking for, named only 97C (a different 97C?) was indicated by a thin grey line winding west from Highway 5, through Logan Lake, and ending in Ashcroft, just a few miles south of Cache Creek. As I embarked on it, the sense of relief I felt was tangible, and I sensed my face relaxing quite a bit – I may have even been smiling! The color of the asphalt was that faded denim color, with a gravel shoulder sloping sharply to ditchwork. Despite the longitudinal cracks, gentle ruts, and erosion on the verge, the ride was pleasant, the sun at good angle, and at first it was just great to get off the freeway and onto more open country, with hills, rolling curves in the road, and occasional farm/ranch-type establishments. Fairly early on, I saw a small group of people looking at a bad section of beetle-killed trees, and I figured they must have been doing something related to that issue, like a survey of the infestation or perhaps an inspection to determine the efficacy of their attempts at mitigation. I was heartened to see them all suddenly respond to the sight of a split-screen bus zooming toward them, and it seemed that it made them happy, given the giant sunny smiles on their faces and the friendly waves. I zoomed on by, waving back, and feeling happy as well.
It was the impatient guy in a big loud diesel pickup – you know the kind –whose presence and demeanor on the road as he tailgated, then passed with a cloud of fumes that told me that I may not have been in the most bus/hippie-friendly area. The drive was nice enough, and there was barely any other traffic, yet I did start to feel a little more like an intruder, rather than the insipid feeling you get when you are merely a tourist, or visitor. Thinking little of it, but resolving to keep clear of the fast-moving locals, I came without further incident to Logan Lake, a small town that looked like it had a rich history of mining and ranching. There was an interesting display of older machinery at the side of the road, consisting of a rather humongous dump truck and an antique-looking steam shovel or something of that nature. Kinda cool, I thought as I drove past, too lazy to circle back for a better shot. Oh well. I continued out of town on the empty road, and immediately ran afoul of a long, steep hill, which had me in second gear for part of it! Naturally, as soon as I lost my momentum, and simultaneously found myself driving up a section of road with no shoulder, much less pullouts, another pickup-driving hothead came storming up behind me, hell-bent to get wherever he was going and like, RIGHT NOW, BUDDY! There he was, two, maybe three inches from my back bumper, steam shooting out his ears, probably trying to use his laser vision to ignite my oh-so-purty purple paisley rear curtains, when finally, a break in the line came, and he was passing and gone with a roar in an obnoxious cloud of un-burnt fuel. Poor guy. Probably lost all of nineteen seconds of his life during our brief, yet tumultuous relationship.
Still, my day was not going to be spoiled. After all, this is nothing new, and I was enjoying the countryside and the continuing fact that my toolbox had yet to be opened. In fact, it was somewhere in this part of the trip that I began calling it “Pandora’s Box”, since I figured that if I could keep it closed, all would be well, but once opened, all hell would break loose. Is this superstition? Who cares? I was also carrying the three parts of the pin that came out of my differential in my left pocket … not only as a good luck charm (hey, it worked, right?) but also as a conversation piece. People do react well to large chunks of metal being poured into their palms while hearing the story about where they came from.
Not long after topping that
hill, which wasn’t too long after driving through Logan
Lake, I saw a curious red dome off in the distance. As I got
closer, I could see that this edifice was massive, and I also
noted that the hills through which I traveled had taken on a
certain stepped look. Curiouser and curiouser! By this time I was
simply wondering what they were mining, as it was apparent that
this entire area was rich in something of note! As it turns out,
the operation I was approaching was the Highland Valley Copper
Mine, according to Wikipedia, and it is one of the world’s
largest open pit mines. Fascinating, but also appalling. Being a
copper user myself, I was aware of the value of the stuff, as
well as where it came from, but I still stared at one of its
sources with a mixture of keen interest and revulsion. I made a
firm resolution to let not a single scrap of wire or other
material fall to waste, as it is really a severe price that we
pay for the use of this useful metal … and I’m not
talking money, either.As I got nearer the operation’s centre, I began to see glimpses of the incomparable azure seas and white sands of the tropics, and realized I must be in some kind of time-space warp, and thought perhaps Rod Serling would be interested in my story. It became apparent, however, that this immense lake of luminous blue was some kind of settling pond, or perhaps a river that was dammed as the tailings of the mine were damned, and some amazing chemical was responsible for the alluring hue. I had scarcely the time to ruminate on this, however, because soon my attention was taken solely by navigating “The Hill.”
Some hill! The signs, if I remember them correctly, indicated an eleven-percent incline for six kilometres. That’s basically dropping 2300 feet in four miles! The artwork and language used left little to the imagination, or maybe they counted on imaginative interpretation to make themselves effective. Add to the excitement of participating in a controlled fall a healthy blast of wind now and then, from apparently random directions, and you have a recipe for attaining tired knuckles and a worn-out right knee. At any rate, I must have counted at least five scary-looking runaway truck ramps on the way down, and kept my rearward eyed peeled for any suspicious-looking trucks intent an using my bus as a speed bump! Can I say it any other way? That was one steep hill! (Good thing I wasn’t coming up it, too!)
As I neared the bottom, I got a
birds-eye view of the village of Ashcroft, which was set into the
bottom of a mined-out valley next to a good-sized river of bold
deep blue. I could see that this was surely an old mining town,
probably created in the search for gold, and that it had emerged
from the nineteenth century with much of its history and old-west
charm intact, despite the efforts of the here-and-now to
modernize and homogenize Everytown, Everywhere. I can’t say
that I’d want to live there, necessarily, in that part
natural, part man-made desert, but it was one of the more
character-imbued settlements that I had the chance to drive
through on the entire trip.
Immediately after driving through
Ashcroft, my little back road met up with Hwy. 97 again, and
things became a little more main stream. I fueled up in Cache
Creek, wondering at the relative cheapness and available octane
of the fuel. I don’t think I’ve ever seen 94 octane!
Perhaps I’d be able to bump up the timing a couple degrees
to take advantage of it! I considered this, and opted not to, as
it would require the opening of Pandora’s Box, likely in
more ways than one! I steered the bus out onto the road into the
full brunt of a brutal and unrelenting headwind, and settled into
that kind of long-term mental miasma required to pilot any
vehicle through many miles of semi-interesting terrain with
someone named Mariah capriciously yanking your steering one way
or another.It was not boring, but just a little too uneventful. At least this was the case until I glanced down at the oil temperature gauge to see that I was running a bit hot for some reason – at least out of the “normal” range for this engine/bus/trip! My mind ground slowly into motion in reaction to this, and my gaze happened to alight on the tachometer, which had been acting erratic of late, and was only to be trusted when it wasn’t twitching. Forty-two hundred rpm. OK, so it looks like it’s acting up again, I thunk, and gave it a good whack to tell it who’s boss. Nothing changed, and I then realized that the needle of the tach. wasn’t twitching. Hmm … AhA! Maybe I should shift, being that I’ve been cruising along here in this horrid headwind at fifty-five miles-per-hour plus in third gear for what, twenty minutes?
It is times like these that I thank myself for spending the cash to get the engine dynamically balanced! It is also times like these that prove that the cooling system is functioning properly … when I started driving properly, things behaved normally: Very shortly after I shifted into fourth gear, the oil temperature dropped from 230 to 190, and all was well. I may have used a bit more fuel during that last stretch, I thought ruefully. I also wondered how many miles-worth of wear-and-tear I may have just used up. It was the wind. I can tell you that the whole reason for relating this mistake to you was in effort to express to you the vigor of that headwind! I could scarcely hear the drive train at all over the roar of the gale against which I was pitting the bus, and that was my only excuse. It was a wind tunnel. Fun stuff!
Driving along this stretch of blustery bottomland, with farms splayed here and there between hillocks and buttes, with the time-worn knobs of an ancient mountain range beyond. I mean really worn, as in “to nubbins”. You’ve gotta have a certain respect for this kind of apparent geologic modesty. Where now are only the occasional rock outcroppings and gentle, mild-looking hills, there was either an awesome mountain range, or an ocean, or both. The result of the awesome forces of tectonic movement, seismic and volcanic activity, merciless and impatient water, and ferocious winds all contributed to my growing perception of the land masses as being more liquid than solid. I enjoyed passing a pasture that was rimmed on the far side by a sheer cliff of what looked to be eroded basaltic columns, but past that, there was little to catch my eye but the occasional crumbling log cabin, glimpses of bigger hills in the far-off distance, and one lone coyote playing chicken with traffic.
One friend I talked to on the phone later that day remarked that the way I was describing British Columbia, Canada so far was to imply that it was much like some of the States’ less exciting areas, and he was not too far off. It wasn’t so much that it was terribly drab and awful, but that it DID look an awful lot like your average farming and ranching lands in the lower 48. What was I doing here? Oh yes – passing through on my way to Homer, Alaska, where we will be starting a new life soon. In the meantime, I told myself to be patient, be courteous, and spend the effort necessary to find the attributes of each locale that make it beautiful to the people that call it home. So during the uneventful but not unpleasant drive up the Cariboo Highway I kept my thoughts positive, and made up neat stories in my mind about the people I saw in the other cars, on the side of the road in their fields, or at work, or walking from a motel room to a car.
I stopped for lunch at a formidably quaint rest stop replete with restored vintage buildings from some old town that used to thrive somewhere south of Williams Lake, but had no real urge to investigate further. I’m not sure if it was the power poles and lines that ruined it for me, or perhaps it was the asphalt walkways. Whatever it was, I did not get a feeling of history from it – I’d rather see ruins and wonder about ghosts than have it all spelled out for me on plaques set into manicured lawns.
In this manner I passed through
the relatively major towns of Williams Lake and Quesnel, and
finally into the metropolis known as Prince George. Delirious and
stupefied by this state of normalness I had succumbed to, I
somehow missed a semi-hidden and tricksy route designation sign
in Williams Lake, and almost ended up somewhere else, but after
getting a weird feeling, I doubled back and found the right road.
Was that just to keep my on my toes or what? On the way, I
learned nothing about the strangely-named towns of 70 Mile House,
100 Mile House, and 150 Mile House, but I did wonder a bit about
them, especially since there weren’t any miles to be had at
all in this country! They only had kilometres here! I suppose I
should have stopped to inquire the source of the names, but was
too anxious to get to the northern regions, as I was sure that
that was where the adventure was to start.In Prince George, but not quite, as the highway basically kept the city at arm’s length, denying me any real sense of the place, I stopped at a convenient-looking oil-change establishment to see if I could drain my oil and refresh my filter. I waited by the door just after another car started their turn in the garage, and was soon met by a reluctant and shamefaced bloke who tried to explain to me that they couldn’t perform an oil change for me because it was such an old vehicle and it would take too much time. I told him that what I was after was just as quick as a “normal” car … just a drain plug and a spin-on filter, (for this change, anyway) but he was convinced that there were demons lying in wait for him and his crew underneath my bus. They probably didn’t even have the right filter, he told me, so I came back with a hearty rejoinder that it was likely that they did, being one of the more common sizes, and besides, I had two of them with me! Not to be outdone, he countered by whining about the fact that closing time was approaching fast and that he couldn’t do it since all his other experienced guys were going home. I expressed that he need not worry overmuch about it, but the fact was that I could have been in one of the other two empty bays, and would just now be about done with the oil change, had we started it at the same time this inane conversation began. This whole scenario, the second time I’ve been participant in such, is probably a holdover from the early days of beetles with their plugless sump plates, the annoying strainer, the delicate acorn nuts that hold it all together, and the fear that the monkeys in the pit would strip these bolts, leaving the average driver somewhere down the highway at the end of a trail of oil, stranded with a blown engine, and the resulting blown cool would result in expensive lawsuits … whatever, does anyone want a $5 (Canadian) off coupon for an oil change in Prince George? Besides, I had an oil change pan with me, just in case, but I just didn’t want to use it if I could just find someone with the technology that would allow me to drain three quarts of oil! I figured I’d either take the time to deal with it on the road, or perhaps I’d find a garage I could hijack for cheap.
As I left the filing station just before leaving town, I called Michele to tell here that it looked like I had a few hours of daylight left, but I knew not whether I would have cell reception, and as the road on the map looked squiggly, I figured the scenery would improve, and that I would lose service. It’s always good to check in when you can, as those at home may not appreciate not knowing whether you are alive or not, or what the reason for not hearing from you might be!
As evening slowly fell, I saw that things were getting more like a wild place, and indeed, sometime during dusk, I saw a sign that indicated that should I take the next left, I would get to the “Wildlife Viewing”! so I took the next left onto a semi-rough dirt (packed mud) road, crossed the railroad tracks (defying the stop sign), and continued through the forest on this nice little road (in defiance of Bill’s admonition to take it easy), seeking some wildlife to view. After a couple corners, I came across some Canadians, who were filling up their truck with a jerry can, and it looked like they were friendly, so I pulled over and asked them if they had seen any wildlifes, indicating that I was following a sign that indicated I might see some. Apparently they too had been hoodwinked by the sign, and disappointed as well. “No, we haven’t seen any wildlifes either! But if you follow this road down to the end, you might see some, eh?” Being more of a commitment than I hoped for, I told them I’d turn back, and they then told me that there was a bear on the side of the highway about 10 km northward. Needless to say, I zipped back to the main road and headed north once again, hoping to see a bear.
As I drove through the steadily deepening darkness, I found myself wondering why I expected that bear to be yet by the side of a highway after such a span of time. The only answers I came up with were food, be it carrion (roadkill) or garbage flung out of the window of a passing ne’er do well’s auto. Maybe now, since we’re just driving along in the dark through the trees, would be a good time to bring up the litter barrels! Seems that the citizenry of Canada saw fit to put forth the effort and spend not just a few tax dollars on the installation of these litter barrels, which I thought were strangely-named. “Litter,” as I understand it, is what garbage, trash, refuse, or even a recyclable material becomes when you throw it into the bushes rather than disposing of it properly in a suitable receptacle. But they called these established trash cans “Litter Barrels”, perhaps to trick litterbugs into thinking that they would still be misbehaving, and therefore cool, if they littered into these cans. Regardless of the nomenclature, the intent was simple and elegant: Drivers would be hurtling along, chowing down on their road snacks, and come to a point where they were unable to discern any difference between what it is that they were eating and the wrapper it came in, (which, in many cases, may well have been more nutritious), and they feel the urge to expel the waste from their vehicle so as to keep it from rattling around being annoying, or, as in the case of beer cans and bottles, serving as subtle evidence that the occupants of the vehicle had been drinking. Then, as if by magic, a sign would appear by the side of the road, promising an upcoming “Litter Barrel”, showing which side of the road it was on, and giving indication as to just how long the driver would have to prepare for turning off the road into the well-situated and maintained pull-out area, wherein they would find the promised receptacle, which was almost always of high-quality materials, and of bear-proof construction, many of which operable without so much as opening the car door,. Then, having impugned the whole gracious system and passing the pull-out and trash receptacle, the hypothetical vehicle would speed by, and with out so much as a by-your-leave or a second thought, fling their trash out the window and roar off down the road. This is called “littering”, and is punishable by hefty fines, and Canada’s efforts to keep it from happening are commendable, but, as I stated before: People are pigs, regardless of nationality!
In about the same amount of time it
took me to type that last paragraph, and about seven or eight
times the amount of time it took you to skim over it, I came upon
the roadside bruin. Actually, I passed him up, having not noticed
his dark bulk in the shadows until I was almost upon him. I
circled back and parked by the roadside, and watched him gorging
on whatever was down there in the grass, and finally, as I
scooted a bit closer, he sensed my attention – disturbed by
the being who was focusing on him, whereas he took no notice of
cars and trucks hurtling by, not twenty feet from where he fed. I
was focusing on him, hoping to get a little bear footage, as I
never have acquired the moving image of a bear, and despite the
dim light, I was able to get something good enough to bring home,
and at least to say that I saw a bear, and there he is! I also
noted that he looked both directions before crossing the road,
which he did in a lumbering, bear-like manner, and disappeared
into the brush on the far side.Since it was now full dark, my next order of business was to find a suitable sleeping spot, preferably before I drove by any jaw-droppingly beautiful scenery. I drove for what seemed like an hour or so, and as the road began to get more hilly, and the curves more frequent and more acute, I reached Bijoux Falls, feeling rueful at the fact that it was dark and I could hear, but not see, these falls deemed “jewel” by the French. There were signs forbidding camping, and I felt I should respect that, despite the low-impact nature of my “camping”, so I headed out onto the road, hoping to find another spot – I don’t even need to finish that sentence, because before I knew it, I was turning into a big pull-out off the highway just across from Bijoux Falls! What luck! My luck held as I was able to reverse, in the dark, back up onto the flat spot. I had taken a small road that looked as though it might lead to some more interesting and private, away-from-the-road spots in which to camp (and awaken), but early on, I found this road to be very small, and very wet, with more large, deep puddles than road, and I simply did not want to have to perform any self-extrication routines to get out of what looked like slimpy mud! In short, I wimped out and went to bed.
Next: Homer Bound Trip Report: Page Five
Gene Cornelius
mizamook@geemail dot com
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