Today we drove into British Columbia. We woke up to a beautiful day in Hinton. At last the rain has stopped, and we are scheduled to head into the wilderness of northern British Columbia. We went into Hinton to get gas, and then had to come back for the highway to Dawson Creek. The highway goes through Grand Cache and Grand Prairie, both in Alberta, and those are the only towns we will pass through all day.
The morning drive to Grand Cache is beautiful, with hardly any traffic at all either going or coming. We encounter a pair of small grizzlies on the side of the road which appear to be yearlings, we suspect. They're much bigger than cubs, but seem smaller than a full-grown grizzly should be.
Grand Cache, population around 3800, was about 84 miles up the road from Hinton. It's interesting to drive for a couple of hours without going through any towns. There was a feeling that we were leaving the civilized part of Canada and heading into the wild. And after stopping at the visitor's center in Grand Cache, we headed north to Grand Prairie, which was over 110 miles away. Oh, the folks at the visitor's center were very friendly and loaded us up with all sorts of information about attractions in the area.
As we headed toward Grand Prairie, we noted that there was a lot more traffic on the highway, much of which was truck traffic associated with a growing oil and gas exploration and production in the area. A huge coal mine was a short distance out of Grand Cache, and all the distance to Grand Prairie, we were hardly out of sight of another vehicle. Some wilderness! I felt like we were in Oklahoma or Texas again.
We reached Grand Prairie in the afternoon, and found Walmart and a whole lot of other things. Although I had never heard of Grand Prairie, Alberta, before, it's a vibrant, growing city of 55,000 people, and it has all the amenities that you would expect in such a town. So, not just Walmart, but all the other U.S. big box stores, fast food and hotel chains. It was not exactly wilderness, with malls and other upscale shopping. But we were headed for Dawson Creek, mile 0 of the Alaska Highway, and 80 miles away. That had to be wilderness, didn't it?
The first twenty miles out of Grand Prairie were on a four-lane divided highway, and there were a couple of small towns that we passed. Then it narrowed down to a two-lane, but there were still lots of oilfield service trucks coming and going. The oil sands activity in Alberta is really booming, and the whole economy seems to be benefitting from it. There were huge pastures and fields of crops, which we figured were winter wheat, but found out later that oats are also a major crop in the area. So there was agricultural equipment on the move, as well. I was beginning to look forward to reaching Dawson Creek to get out of the traffic, at least. Finally, it was in sight. And almost the first thing I noticed in Dawson Creek was their local Walmart. Right next to the Canadian Tire store. Canadian Tire is a major chain in Canada that sells a lot more than tires. Instead of being rustic and wild, Dawson Creek was modern and looked very flush with new buildings and offices supporting the oil and gas industry. The wilderness would have to wait.
We found the RV park before it got very late and did laundry. We met some folks in the laundry room from San Antonio and it was good to have conversations with folks from (close to) home.
The morning drive to Grand Cache is beautiful, with hardly any traffic at all either going or coming. We encounter a pair of small grizzlies on the side of the road which appear to be yearlings, we suspect. They're much bigger than cubs, but seem smaller than a full-grown grizzly should be.
We reached Grand Prairie in the afternoon, and found Walmart and a whole lot of other things. Although I had never heard of Grand Prairie, Alberta, before, it's a vibrant, growing city of 55,000 people, and it has all the amenities that you would expect in such a town. So, not just Walmart, but all the other U.S. big box stores, fast food and hotel chains. It was not exactly wilderness, with malls and other upscale shopping. But we were headed for Dawson Creek, mile 0 of the Alaska Highway, and 80 miles away. That had to be wilderness, didn't it?
The first twenty miles out of Grand Prairie were on a four-lane divided highway, and there were a couple of small towns that we passed. Then it narrowed down to a two-lane, but there were still lots of oilfield service trucks coming and going. The oil sands activity in Alberta is really booming, and the whole economy seems to be benefitting from it. There were huge pastures and fields of crops, which we figured were winter wheat, but found out later that oats are also a major crop in the area. So there was agricultural equipment on the move, as well. I was beginning to look forward to reaching Dawson Creek to get out of the traffic, at least. Finally, it was in sight. And almost the first thing I noticed in Dawson Creek was their local Walmart. Right next to the Canadian Tire store. Canadian Tire is a major chain in Canada that sells a lot more than tires. Instead of being rustic and wild, Dawson Creek was modern and looked very flush with new buildings and offices supporting the oil and gas industry. The wilderness would have to wait.
We found the RV park before it got very late and did laundry. We met some folks in the laundry room from San Antonio and it was good to have conversations with folks from (close to) home.
Amy here again...
ReplyDeleteHave you already made this joke?:
From AB to BC in CA...aren't you back where you started???
Couldn't resist making math jokes! Hope you've found the wilderness by now. See you in a few days! Love, Amy
Hey, are you in Alaska now?
ReplyDelete