A Pleasant Town Off the Beaten Path

A pleasant town off the beaten path, Prince Rupert is such a town, considered a small city by many, one road in and the same out, unless you venture by sea or plane. Cruise ships stop here periodically and ferries scurry back and forth between the town and Queen Charlotte Islands and other destinations. It is the most populous northern Canada town along the Pacific coast, around 13,000 folk. This is a town with some history, including a 1949 earthquake measuring 8.1, and it has a bonefide downtown. The community is located on rolling hills, resulting in some beautiful sights of well established homes on hillsides overlooking the downtown area just a couple of blocks from the open salt water. The look reminded me a bit of parts of Point Loma on the western edge of San Diego. The town is known for many things, but part of the tourism focus is on Totem poles. Yes, Totem poles.

(Pause and reminisce)

As a young child of maybe five or six years old, I remember owning a small totem, maybe 12 inches high. At that time I lived with my family north of Spokane Washington. The totem was one of my favorite possessions for a number of years. This foot-long carved wood keepsake was brightly colored, uniquely figured with birds, people's faces, and bear claws. The wings swiveled on its back, and as a typical young boy, I also used it at times as a make-believe bird or plane. This "treasure" was about all I knew of totems until I came across totem poles in our journeys in the North Country, my first real exposure to these curious creations was up in Fairbank at the Alaska Native Museum. But my ignorance was finally dispelled when we visited a world class museum found in the heart of Prince Rupert, a gem by this wayfaring group of three. Known in the native tongue as Na Exbiisa Lagigyet, or in English, the Museum of Northern British Columbia its collections of native artifacts of the north west coastal is unequaled. I learned of native tribes' cultures, the role and nature of gifts, of class distinctions, and totems. Carved wood hats spoke of status and accomplishments, but Totems were initially the purview of tribal kings - the ultimate class symbol- and as time went on the carving of totems also extended to the more wealthy class. Totems could take up to two years to harvest a special tree, haul and transport, carve and decorate. The mounting of a totem was a significant community event. These totems spoke of stories of the hunt, the encounters with wild animals, and the interconnection of land and sea, wildlife and humans and in rare occasions used as a public shaming for someone who stepped out of the established cultural traditions of class and status. Here are a couple pictures I took of the totems mounted in Prince Rupert, the first being in a most usual spot.

Totems, to my surprise, were of immense interest since they told stories, memorialized events, and sent messages. But, don't forget the art form, the use of symmetry, form and color - truly an unique expression of art. Here are a couple other pictures I took of Prince Rupert and of the Inverness Cannery a few miles south of town.

A panoramic shot of their little private craft harbor...

The VW bug afterlife! I want one...

There is also a small arts studio open to the public. Only local craft is sold here, and it is fairly priced. I neglected to take pictures of the wares, but the yellow building house these fine pieces of art including wood carving and oils.

The Skeena River flows into the fiord that leads out to the open ocean just south of Prince Rupert. We witnessed locals Salmon fishing along the river during the early evening, some folk took their boats out, camped along the side of the river, although they lived but a few miles from their idyllic site.

And as we trek inland and find a place to stay for a night of sleep, we are surprised by this set of mountains that reminded us of the Grant Tetons in western Wyoming.

Heading In or Heading Out?

The Denver area is our home base,specifically Lakewood. It is not unusual for folk to consider the center of their world to be where they call home, where they have lived and loved and made their living. There are the familiar sights, stores, neighborhoods, churches, friends, and not least of all family. Living in this metro area we have two special daughters, a grand-daughter, and a son-in-law who are cherished in every way. Our travels, as recorded in the last blog, heads us "in" toward our beloved Colorado, and yet, this upcoming Tuesday we are heading "out" for another significant leg of our grand adventure to visit more interesting places and to spend time with other relatives, immediate and extended. More on that later for I have some catching up to do in this travelog, aptly named Travels with Louise and Floyd.

Having jumped around a little bit in previous blogs, let's start just south of Jade, B.C. heading south on the "Miami Freeway." You will recall that every mile post is actually in kilometers while in Canada. When you travel this expanses there is a need for patience since the spots of civilization are far and few between. There are no in-between gas stops or food stops.

Just south of Jade is Hope Lake with its interesting water coloration.

Remember the young lady in Jade I mentioned. She grew up in Kitwanga, a place up to this point in my life, I never knew existed. This community, located at the juncture of our trek back to the west coast and Prince Rupert, is a slow-paced, beautiful community of a few hundred folk. Nestled in a fertile valley, I particularly liked a bit of large folk art painted on the side of someone's loafing shed on the edge of this little town. I thought I would share this with you, and we can imagine together who painted it and when. For me, it added to the beauty of the unnamed person's property.

My next entry will be about Prince Rupert, the fiord, the cannery, the totems, the arts community and the VW bug's afterlife. PR is a delightful town, anunsung gem among many we have seen, an historic town on the edge of Pacific coast Canada, a community of folk who's future is uncertain economically. Enjoy with me the scenery on the way to Prince Rupert...

Suffering along the road, the night before we drive into Prince Rupert.

See you next time!

May 30th Family Farm

I learned how to post pictures along the way in this blog's creation, so periodically I want to take the liberty and post pictures to go with the story. For now, I will post them separately, but reference the date of the post so if you wish to look back, you can.

No Fooling Here

More of a classic shot, this Silver Salmon is the same one shown in a previous picture - 28 inches long and what a beaut! Caught on a mis-matched antique rod I bought in Glen Elum, Washington with a 12 lb. line and a simple enclosed casting real.

"Like a Miami Freeway"

Some weeks ago and several blog entries back, I whetted your proverbial "whistle" with a picture of the three of us standing in front of one of the most spectacular sites I have ever witnessed, the Salmon Glacier. I promised, after a hiatus that "I will wax eloquent" and speak about some of the other places we experienced along the way back home to Denver, Colorado, where we are residing until the beginning of November. Recollecting the sights, smells and personal impressions of our grand adventure surprisingly runs easy for me since what we experienced was so out of the ordinary from previous travels of years past in "the lower 48," a phrase spoken often by Alaskans. To see, for myself, brown bears running through a river outside of Hyder, Alaska - a momma bear showing her cub how to trap the fish and not just run after it, or, experiencing an emotional high all day long as we traveled higher and higher up the mountain, climbing to enormous heights on steep hillsides thousands of feet above deeply gorged green verdant valleys below, to then be surprised and delighted around another high mountain turn in the road by the grandeur of the splayed Salmon Glacier and several other nameless glaciers spilling and cascading off steep valleys, slopes and ravines. Oh, then was the warning signs outside of Stewart Alaska speaking to year-round danger of avalanches as we passed the snow-shoot just on the other side of the river valley a hundred yards away. There was Jade, Kitwanga, Prince Rupert, among many other towns, the l-o-n-g road east inland across British Columbia, colliding at towering Mt. Robson at 12,972 feet, then jogging to Jasper the quaint tourist village just north of the Columbia Ice Field, further east to the metropolis of Edmonton, Alberta, then the delightful travel-back-in-time Ukrainian Village, the plains of Saskatchewan, and last-but-not-least a certain little-known national park in the Badlands of North Dakota named after our 26th President. There is still a lot to share with you all.

To accomplish all that is promised, I will whittle away at this travelog account over the next week (or so) starting with the statement made by a young lady who described the road ahead when we stopped at Jade, British Columbia. When inquiring of her about the road south, she promptly said, "It's like a Miami Freeway!" What an interesting statement out in the middle of nowhere.

There are two main highways (and only two) that run north and south through northern British Columbia, Highway 97 and 37. Since we traveled up 97 we thought we would travel down on the recently completed and paved 37, staying as close to the Pacific as man's labor of road building would allow. You see, emotionally, we didn't want to leave Valdez, the Prince William Sound and the salt air (or at least I didn't), so, we thought let's not say goodbye to the ocean yet and travel south and then west to Stewart BC, Hyder AK and then eventually to Prince Rupert BC! We turned off the Alaskan Highway 1, just shy of Watson Lake, a bustling diry frontier town stretched along the highway, heading south not really knowing what we would face for several hundred miles and with no idea where we would stay for the evening. Once again in the Lord's hand, we ventured down the road which turned and twisted side-to-side and up and down. The highway in many spots was more like one and a half lanes in width and most of the way the first hundred miles there were no sides to the road and no guardrails of any sort. So, reverting to my old country driving technique on dirt roads, one drives in the middle except when you come up on a blind hill or blind turn in the road. All was well except the unsettled voice within. We trusted in the knowledge that others made the trek and what the Mile Post guidebook told us. This road of British Columbia is more remote than it sister highway, having been completed on back in the later 70s as a dirt road and just paved in its entirety. Our first stop, beyond finding roadside parking for a night of rest, was the "town" of Jade, more like a dot on the map, a jade store and a couple of houses. Jade BC and the surrounding region boast over 80% of the world's green jade production. I understand from talking with the locals that virtually all the jade is exported to China for cutting and the making of jewelry and then it is imported back into Canada and the USA. Purportedly, there is only one jade cutter in all of British Columbia housed out of Vancouver and the quality of the cut products do not compare to that of China. We learned about the various grades of Jade through and example set for display only, and then we purchased a gift for a daughter who has been dutifully handling our mail in our absence, and a fine piece it is. It was that lady who sold me that piece of necklace jewelry that spoke of the road conditions south. She, having grown up with dirt roads and roads that were not connected, the paved road she described ahead of us was wondrous and wide to her eyes, and yes, it did get better the farther south we ventured, somewhere along the road a bonafide center line appeared along with sides to the road. So, we experienced a "Miami Freeway" in Northern British Columbia, having seen about as many bears as we saw other fellow travelers, minus transport trucks heading north.

Diverging off of the normal pattern of reporting, I want to share with you a tidbit to save some money along the way. We stopped at a grocery store in Deese Lake about 2 PM, filling with much needed gasoline and a few groceries. It was raining, the parking lot muddy and we were hungry, but not for the normal prices they would charge for food. There was a small deli in the story selling among other things hot chicken and french fries. The deli was soon to close having served what lunch hour they had, and we picked up good fried chicken and all the remaining french fries for just over $4.00! Apparently, timing is everything, and to eat outside the normal time frames can save you dollars, or at least so you can put those dollars into the gas tank, which was the arch enemy of our pocketbook the whole way. Well, no doubt, both of us need a break, so I will depart with a couple of pictures, one of mountains we saw from the road as we departed from Alaska and the other of a glacier we passed below its toes as we ventured toward the coastal inlet of Hyder.

Notice the car in the picture to gain a perspective of the size of the glacier.