The Highway between Prince George and Chetwynd is very good. Fresh road lines that you can actually see and no road work to speak of. We had a relatively good drive. Weather has been great! We fueled up the truck in Bear Lake which is between Prince George and the Mackenzie turn off. When we got to Chetwynd we stopped at good old Tim Horton's for a stretch and a cup of coffee. It is Tim Horton's "Camp" week, so the restaurant had four paramedics serving up the brew. I can't imagine how many paramedics this town has, but hopefully not one was needed while they were at Tim's! As we drove into Chetwynd we noticed that there were a number of wood carvings. Well there actually were "many". There are more carvings in this small town then there are in Hope, which claims to be the "chainsaw capital of the world". After being here, I beg to differ! I took this photo of what I thought looked like a giant mosquito but Chris told me later that it is a "preying mantas". The reason I thought that it was a mosquito is because the northern part of BC is noted for having very large mosquito's!!! I have been bitten by one and it certainly was the biggest one that I have ever seen before!!
As we continued north we drove through Pine Pass which is in the Rocky Mountain range driving to an altitude of about 1100 meters. My lungs were okay as we didn't stop and get out of the truck at all. Once we cleared the Rockies, the terrain changed from pine and spruce trees to rolling hills with multiple shades of green valleys. We had entered the beautiful Peace River country. We arrived in Dawson Creek at around 4:00. We pulled into "Mile 0" Campground and I sent Chris a text to let her know that we had arrived and would be set up shortly. There are a number of units here which belong to seasonal workers who stay month to month but saying that, it is a nice clean spacious campground and very quiet. There is a laundry/shower facility and pretty decent free wifi. There is also a Pioneer Village on the grounds here as well, and a nice walking trail. Chris and Rod arrived within about half an hour after setting things up. Their cute little dog, Georgia went crazy when she saw us. She barked and yipped for about 10 minutes. She was probably very happy to see someone from home! Here is a nice photo of Chris and I.
Dawson Creek is located in Peace River Country and has a population of almost 11,000. Although Fort St John is larger, Dawson Creek is known as the "Capital of Peace River". The town is named after after the creek that runs through the town. The creek was named after George Mercer Dawson who led a team of surveyors through the area in 1879. In 1912 the Canadian government issued homestead grants to settlers, so Dawson Creek became a small farming community. Not too sure what the crops were in the early 1900's but today canola, wheat and oats are grown in the area. Rod says the fields of canola in the summer are beautiful and stretch far and wide. In 1933 when the Northern Alberta Railway was extended, Dawson Creek became a regional centre. Between 1942 and 1950 the city grew rapidly with the construction of the Alaska Highway. In 1951 Dawson Creek had about 3500 residents. In the 1960's the growth of the town slowed. In the 1970's the Provincial government moved its offices from Pouce Coupe into the City. A mall was constructed and Northern Lights College opened a campus. Since the 1970's the industrial development went to Fort St John and Grande Prairie. Since then the population of Dawson Creek and the economy have not significantly increased. The economy of Dawson Creek is agriculture, retail (although there are no big box stores here and no Reitmans or Winners!), tourism, oil and gas.
This photo is of the world famous "Mile 0" sign which is the start of the Alaska Highway. Surprisingly enough it is not even on the Alaska Highway (which is Highway 97). It is in the downtown area which is where the original highway went. I had to take a photo of it anyway as it is a well known landmark.
Rod had to work in the morning (on Thursday) so Chris took us to Pouce Coupe. I love the name of this tiny little town and honestly was curious about it. There are many tales of how the town got its name, but the most authentic seems to be named after an "Indian Chief Pooscapee" of the Beaver Tribe. The first white man to settle on the Pouce Coupe prairie was one Hector Tremblay who was a French Canadian on his way to the Yukon for none other then the gold rush in 1898. He was so impressed with the Peace River Country that he decided to stay in an area where the Dawson Creek runs into the Pouce Coupe River. There is not much to this town but they do have a lovely museum. We decided to tour it as Chris said that it has a great display of artifacts. Unfortunately I could not take the musty smell so waited outside while Chris and Ray went in.
We spent about an hour in Pouce Coupe before heading back to Dawson Creek, which is really only about 10 minutes away. We went Chris's favourite coffee joint that kind of reminded her and us of Wendell's in fort Langley. It has a very catchy name...."Faking Insanity". They sell a variety of teas, Kicking Horse coffee, sandwiches and soup. They also sell some pottery, wool and a huge selection of used, and in very good condition, books. From here we went to the art gallery which is in a retired grain elevator. Lots of great local pottery, hand made jewellery and old photographs which told the story of the area. Just outside the art gallery is another famous landmark which commemorates the "World Famous" Alaska Highway. There are three flags at the top of the structure. Canadian, British Columbia and the United States Flag. You may wonder why a USA flag? Well the original Alaska Highway was actually built by the United States government and only took 9 months to construct? Where is our government going wrong? It took approximately 5 years to build the Port Mann Bridge and about two years to construct the Coquihalla Highway. 9 months, way back,,,, when the machinery and manpower was not available,,,,and the weather was so extreme. The recruitment poster for the highway construction projects read:
"Men hired for this job will be required to work and live under the most extreme conditions imaginable. Temperatures will range from 90 degrees above zero to 70 degrees below zero. Men will have to fight swamps, rivers, ice and cold. Mosquitoes, flies and gates will not only be annoying but will cause bodily harm. If you are not prepared to work under these and similar conditions,
do not apply."
We hooked up with Rod about 2:00 when he finished his work. On the outskirts of town far over on a bluff you can see a number of wind turbines quietly turning. Rod asked if we wanted to get up close to them. Of course Ray was delighted and has a huge interest in how we can produce electricity in different ways then we are currently doing. It was about an hour drive up to Bear Mountain Wind Park. It was very beautiful drive passing the Bear Mountain cross country ski and hiking trails. The road up was well maintained. There are 34 for these massive turbines. Not all were turning as it was not really windy. Bear Mountain Wind Park is BC's first commercial wind facility. It was started by Peace Energy and is owned by AltaGas Ltd. The 34 turbines are among the largest in the world today and each 3 million watt turbine produces enough energy to power 1000 homes. The turbines were manufactured in Germany. The steel towers which are 256 feet tall and weigh 236 tones each, were made in Saskatchewan. Each blades is 135 feet in length with a full diameter of 270 feet. So you can imagine how huge they are when you are standing at the bottom looking up!
We ended our night having a great dinner and drinks at Browns Social House. Best Caesar salad yet! Then we all came back to our campsite and sat outside. We were going to start up the fire pit, but it never got dark enough!!! Chris and Rod went back to their house around 10:30.
Friday morning Ray and I went to wander through the Walter Wright Pioneer Village. This is attached to our camp ground so we thought we would take a wander through it. Again I could not go into the buildings due to the musty smells.
As you can see, the village has a well kept boardwalk. Can you imagine how slippery that would be in the snow, or even the rain we get on the coast??? Yikes!!
I leaned into the Telephone and Telegraph office to take a photo of this telephone operators board for Shannon. Thought you might get a big kick out of how the operators equipment was in the early years!
And this???? Well some of you younger people may not recognize this, but it is a manual typewriter. In the 1970's when I started high school, we had to learn how to type on these before we were "allowed" to progress to an electric typewriter. My how things have change with the invention of iPads and Tablets!!
Not sure what this old bird is doing?? Oh,,,,, I was sitting outside of one of the old churches near the rose garden which was dead!! No roses!
So the highlight of our time in Dawson Creek for Ray has been our trip today. We drove from Dawson Creek back to Chetwynd and then to Hudson Hope so we could tour the W.A.C. Bennett Dam. A very large area was flooded to create Williston Lake which is about 270 kms long and 150 kms wide, making it the largest man made lake in Canada. The dam took 7 years to construct (1961 - 1968). It cost $750 million to build and was the largest project of its kind in the province of BC. . Today it would probably be triple that!! The dam has the capacity to generate more than 13 billion kWh annually. The dame is 610 feet in height and 6,785 feet long. They had to blast through bedrock when constructing the dam. We took a tour down 500 feet into the tunnels of the dam where we were able to view the turbines at work. It was very eerie being down that far underground and honestly,,,,I don't think that I could work down there. As you can see from Chris and Rod's garb, we had to wear hardhats and very colourful vests.
There is a great new Visitor centre with a gift shop, cafe and "hands on exhibits" which are great for the local school kids.
The above and below photos were taken outside the visitor centre. You can see the dam on the left side of the photos.
We were able to drive across the top of the dam (but not allowed to "stop" until we got to the other side). This drive was about a km long and the lake one one side and the hydroelectric power house on the other was an amazing view! This particular view was taken from a viewpoint looking back on the dam. You can see the layers in the rock.
After leaving the W.A.C. Bennett dam we continued on north to Fort St John. On the way there we stopped at another viewpoint (even though Ray was tired of looking at the beautiful Peace River) for one more shot of the Peace River. This particular spot is where the controversial Site C dam is proposed to be built.
The Peace River valley is truly a beautiful place with its rolling hills and valleys stretching as far as the eye can see. The river winds lazily through the valley, causing one to imagine what it must have been like in the late 1800's during the gold rush when men from far and wide would make the trek for that search for gold.
We continued on into Fort St John. Ray made a comment that the area reminded him of the drive from the Halliburton area towards Newmarket Ontario. And yes he is correct. The same rolling hills and fields after fields of crops of whatever is grown in the particular area. No mountains to speak of. Or at leave none that we of the Lower Mainland see on a daily basis. Just south of Fort St John we took the "old Alaska Highway". We were headed to the Kiskatinaw wooden bridge. It is in the Kiskatinaw Provincial Park on the old highway. It is a quiet road which allowed us to park the truck at one end of the bridge and walk across it. What is unique about this bridge is not that it is made of wood, but that it is also build on a curve. A wooden curved bridge. How unique. It smelled like railway ties. Like creosol. That is because approximately 500,000 board feet of creosoted BC fir was used in its construction. There were many timber bridges built, this is the only one still in use. It is a three span, 100 feet long timber truss structure. It is an odd feeling when walking across it,,,,,because it leans to one side... because of the curve!!
We have had an excellent two full days here in Dawson Creek. Tomorrow we continue our journey,,,,Heading towards Whitehorse. We will stop in Liard Hot Springs and may not have wifi. So until we do......
Take Care,,,,
Lori and Ray
No comments:
Post a Comment