Days 70,71,72 Aug 13-15,

1. The scenes begin to get pastoral in Central B.C. Lots of hay and only hay!

2. An avalanche along the Hyder/Stewart road is still there in August!

3.That quick storm that came through when we were setting up in Houston.

4. On the lee side of the mountains it is very dry through the valleys in Lower British Columbia.

Days 70,71,72 Aug 13-15, Houston, Quesnel to Cache Creek British Columbia.

Saturday- Moving from the tall timber to the dry lee side of the mountains. What a severe change of habitat in those 800 miles . We couldn’t have moved from Hyder without a few more time to stop an admire the scenery. Mostly it was mountains but one huge avalanche near Bear River on the road out. (Hyder access is a side road from the main highway). I found tht on this first stretch of road south, 4 things stood out os we drove.

1. We began to run out pf the tall trees (Sitka Spruce for one) as much logging had been done n the 1980’s and since.
2. Evergreen trees along the way were now interspersed with deciduous and especially quaking aspen. (All second growth)
3. We saw cattle and hay for the first time since the Matanuska Valley AK. (None in the Yukon Northern .BC.)
4. There were a few milk cows.

All that being said we are still in mountainous land that stretches for miles, has multiple mountain ranges that shall for the most part be nameless, and HEY! we saw more bear as we moved through the morning. KItwanga village was a stop that proved to be most informative. This is one of the centers of the PIne Matsutake mushroom picking industry, That species produces $35-45 milloin for the BC Provincial income each year. The Matsutake is a similar mushroom to the same one on Japan and is shipped there as well as to the USA. AKitwanga is a small town (300 pop) but important to the Provincial economy. PIckers follow the mushroom growth from California to BC. Three buyers were in town to buy the mushrooms and ship them.

A stop in Smithers for gas and a look at the World’s Largest Fly Rod (fully 80 feet high) and we were on our way to Quesnel for the night. The Shady Rest RV had the largest floral gardens of any we had seen on the trio,The owner , Val , had a greenhouse on the premises that housed tomatoes and her dahlias are magnificent. There were seven “formal” English style gardens there, We had a great time there watching the hummingbirds at the hibiscus. She had more than 20 hanging baskets as well.

Sunday- it was off to Houston (BC , not TX) and into the “Hay “ country. There was hay everywhere, rolled bales,and stacked bales, Some of the stacks were a pyramidical stye made of crossed bales about 8 feet high. Other ones were square stacks about 15 feet high> I had never seen them stacked like that. , There were more cattle and of course the ubiquitous logging mills for logs, lumber, chips, . One train was parked along side the road that had about 20 open cars full of wood chips ..heading for some processing plant. (16 years ago we used to burn all that waste.) but we saw no smokestacks these days. Ruth settled for an A and W root beer in Prince George (pop 50,000) where the forest industry really is king. Tourism is big as well, as it is a hub for a number of through highways. Here at Prince George the Fraser and Nechaco Rivers merge, the Fraser we will pick up again near Cache Creek along with the Thompson River. Ranching and mining also are important. A 72 mile canoe circuit tale sone around lakes to the beginning . Great fishing area as well . Often it is called the “Lakes District”. The town of Vandenhoof means ”of the farm” and it is well named. We arrived at Robert’s Roost RV off the main street and on a small lake there at Houston. We began to see more birds and Bald Eagle, Red Necked grebes were amoung them. We arrived just as a frontal rain poured down. We wisely waited in the car until it subsided in about 10 minutes.

Monday- We are doing about 200-220 miles per day and this allows us some “down time” after we arrive . Maybe an hour or 1 1/2 hours before supper. We still eat most all meals in the trailer. This morning I was in the shower and the inevitable happened. No water. Ruth had finished but I was just turning the water on.. I put on my clothes and checked all the lines and faucet. By the time I finished the water was working fine. Seems the Park is on a private water system and a “glitch “ happens every once in a while, so I shrugged off the shower and went on with the day. Our computer was not sending or receiving e mail so we had contacted the Apple guys, and he called in the AM and we “fixed” it. Only it didn’t allow our mail to go out now, We stopped at a McDonald’s to send a request for more help and the second time we stopped to do that we DID get our mail to work. It s working now quite well. The first Mcdonald’s we stopped at had Wi Fi , but no food (they were remodeling the store) , so we went our way to a visitor center in 100 Mile. That’s the name of the town. Now we are in the fishing, lodges, businesses and tourism area. This section has many lakes and the outdoor activities are all very busy at this time.

The Canadian National RR moved everyone out (burned some places) when they put the line through here to the north. Many of the towns have those “mile” names like 100 Mile, 106 mile, 70 mile, etc. The numbering started at Cache Creek as best as I can ascertain. We pulled into the Brookside RV Park at about 3:30 and got set up in site 66. It is a park that is surrounded by a cliff on one side and a small “brook” on the other. Very picturesque. We settled in and got caught up on some e mail and took a walk around the Park and up on the cliff on the north edge.

A note about driving, Some had wondered how we could drive that 10,000 miles (we passed that yesterday,) with all those hills and mountains to climb. On the Toyota Tundra there is a “Super” gear. It is labeled “S” and it has 6 (six) gears in it’s box. Usually I place it in “Tow Haul” on the shift lever and then drop the gear shift (hand shift) to “DS”. This allows me to use only the end of the handle of the gearshift to thumb up or down to the gear I want from 1-6. I can use the cruise control at the same time, but on hills the cruise will force it into a very high regular gear, so I take the cruise off just as I hit the upgrade. Got IT?

Three days to the USA border at Washington. HOpe and the Fraser River canyons tomorrow and Princeton on Wed