Haha, I realized I have been spelling British Columbia incorrectly in the past - I picked up the “Colombia” error from a sign I read in that very province… oh well! Again, I dont’ have much time to write this post so it will be copied directly from my journal.
Location: Northern British Columbia, _____ (Forgot the name) Regional Park Campground Activity: Sat down after 560 miles of driving
I can’t seem to get any cash from the ATMs in Northern B.C. This means that in effect, I have to “steal” a night at the regional park at which I’m staying. Located about 40 miles West of Fort Nelson, the camp is almost empty except for a nice elderly couple from Tennessee and their RV.
It was freezing this morning when I woke up at Salmon Valley Campground. I had to put my change of clothes in the sleeping bag with me to warm them up enough to wear.
97 is a long road, Karen (my GPS) had me take 29 for about 90 miles before making me get back on 97. Fortunately, though, it gains a new name where I re-joined it: the “Alaska Highway”, and rightfully so; almost every vehicle I saw was either full of people going-to or coming-from Alaska. They were tourists or truckers.
When it turns into the Alaska Highway, it also becomes very straight and rather uneventful. The trees remind me of Planet Earth and the episode with the “Boreal Forest”, because thats what it is. Its impressive to see something from a documentary in real life.
Even though the scenery and driving was pretty “boring”, I saw some interesting wildlife: two foxes, two black bears, and one deer. The bears were less scary than this one Canadian woman who I made angry by taking too long to full up at the pump, however.
About 10 miles from the campground I stopped at tonight I found some hilarious hitchiker scrawlings on the inside of a porta-potty (pictures coming as soon as I can upload them).
This post is going to be very rushed and won’t be as well-edited as my last few. I only have 20 minutes on the computer here in the Whitehorse library in Yukon.
Location: British Colombia, 30 Miles North of Prince George, Salmon Valley Campground Activity: Finished setting up camp
Today was a very long day. I left Yusuf’s couch at around 6 AM and immediately got on the road.
Somewhere around Bellingham, WA I either made a wrong turn or my GPS had a nice surprise in store for me. I left I-5 and took a series of small highways and roads for about 30 miles until I reached the Canadian Border. The farmland in that part of the country was amazingly pretty (this phrase is going to get so overused on this trip I think). Little farm houses with perfectly trimmed lawns and gardens presided over small fields of crops such as corn, apples, mint, and some other veggie I couldn’t recognize.
The Canadian border crept up on me fast, so fast in fact, that I had to get out of my car while waiting in line to rummage through the trunk for my passport and birth certificate. I think because I did that, however, the Canadian border partrol got suspicious. The man in the booth gave me a little ticket and told me to pull over and go inside to “Counter B”. Patrolman Steve at Counter B asked me a few questions then had me wait on a bench for about 15 minutes before he let me into his country.
The mountains of Southern British Colombia run the gamut between green and lucious and brown and arid. ALl of them are worth admiring though. My favorite part of the South was following a wide and angry river for 100 miles through the dry side of the Cascade range.
Central BC is a different animal from the South. It’s a vast expanse of gently rolling hills through sparse forest. The highway system and the towns that skirt its shoulders are new to me. Canadians use the metric system, but on 97 the towns were named after how far they were in miles from the beginning of the road.
I stopped in at “Mile 150 House” and explored a really cool antique shop staffed by one woman. There were probably 20 customers in the store, but only one employee - poor lady. The store sold all sorts of interesting wares: wagon wheels, wagons, boots, books, carpentry tools, and swords. I wonder how often they sell one of their covered wagons…
Prince George is called B.C.’s “Northern Captial”. It’s a little city of 81,000 people who don’t drive their cars very much. At the first Staples I’d seen since entering this country I picked up an xD card reader. Afterwards, I spent about 15 minutes looking for a place with wifi and about 2 hours updating the blog and uploading the pictures onto my laptop. Unfortunately I can’t put the pictures online until Flickr fixes their “Pro” registration problems (it wouldn’t let me sign up).
After “Second Cup” (the coffee shop), I jumped back on the road, this time towards Whitehorse and the Yukon Territory!
Before I get started recalling the events from yesterday’s exploration of Seattle, let me preface by explaining that I didn’t get a chance at the end of the day to sit back and go over what happened. I was hanging out with Chris Bush and Yusuf Simonson last night and it was too late by the time we got home for me to spend an hour writing down my memories.
Also, I’m working on getting my photos uploaded to the internet right now. If I finish before its too late here, I’ll get them online tonight. Luckily the sun doesn’t go down in Prince George, BC until 10 PM.
Location (of Activites): Washington, I-5 and Seattle Activity: Sitting at “Second Cup” in Prince George, British Columbia.
For my first night in a tent in over a year I think I slept rather well. I only woke up a couple of times, and one of them was when Mom called me at 3:00 AM to make sure I was actually getting some sleep instead of more miles under my belt. When 6:00 AM rolled around, I was awakened by chirping birds.
I packed up my tent, sleeping bag, etc. and got on the road much earlier than I had planned, I think the time zone difference is still affecting my rhythm.
Once again, I-5 was a really nice drive - the major difference between this leg and yesterday’s was that there was actually some serious traffic problems. By the time I got near Tacoma (let alone Seattle) we were moving at a slow crawl. Even with the headache of having so many people in the way and slowing me down from reaching my goal, there were some really amazing sights to see:
Puget Sound
Mount Saint Helens
Mount Saint Helens!
Mount Saint Helens!!!!
After I got into Seattle, I realized I had about 6 hours to kill before Yusuf and Chris got off of work so I went downtown, created this blog, and then found some stuff to do:
Pike Market - I know, I know, its probably the single most obvious place a tourist would visit, but I am a tourist! Besides the awesome stuff that vendors had for sale you could see some really interesting street performers (and even take videos of them - just make sure you tip them!).
The Original Starbucks - Many of you probably know that I have been a Starbucks addict the past two years or so. Caitlin tipped me off as to where I could find the original store (across the street from the Pike market) and I had to check it out. Inside, the store was slammed with customers and outside there was a really great acapella quartet singing some old-timey gospel music.
Experience Music Project - Founded [partially] by Paul Allen (one of the guys who founded a little-known company called Microsoft), the “EMP” is probably the wierdest looking building I’ve ever seen. If you’ve ever seen a documentary on architecture, you’ve probably seen a picture of this building - its crazy! Inside they have a bunch of amazing memorabilia from all sorts of musicians.
Science Fiction Museum - I was actually kind of disappointed with the way the Science Fiction Museum turned out. The gift shop didn’t even have Stargate SG-1 DVDs…
At around 7 in the evening I got a call from Yusuf saying he was leaving Microsoft and heading back home; he gave me his address and I rushed over there from the Sci Fi Museum. He and Chris were there when I arrived, and we quickly decided to head back downtown for some sushi and bar-hopping on “Capitol Hill”.
Time: July 13, 2008, 7:15 PM Pacific Time Location: Washington, Battle Ground State Park, Campsite 39 Activity: Finished setting up camp for the first (really the second) night on the road.
I wish it would have been easier to write in this journal during my drive, there was so much to talk about. Alas, handwriting and automobile navigating are two mutually exclusive and extremely incompatible activities.
I landed in SFO at 1:30 AM PST tired and weak. The guy with Thrifty rentals was nice, but he couldn’t get me the Kia Rio I was hoping for (great mileage) so he “upgraded” me to a Ford Fusion. Hey, at least it has cruise control!
After meeting two nice people on my flight from Vegas who sat next to me I was convinced against spending the night in my car in San Fran or Oakland; so I decided to get a head start driving.
Probably 100 miles down the road, in what seemed like the middle of nowhere, I noticed I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore so I pulled off the interstate onto some country roads. I went a few miles, came upon an empty parking lot, ratcheted the driver’s seat back, and passed out.
I woke up a couple of hours later to find I had been sleeping next to a vineyard - how cool! My stomach was growling like crazy and a few exits down I-5 I decided to stop in at a tiny diner called The Berry Patch. As I polished off a delicious omelet with some kielbasa I got to listen to some grizzled old farmers talk about how great their pecan crops were faring this year.
From I-5, high in the Californian Cascades I saw an awesome-looking stratovolcano called Mount Shasta. I wonder if its still active.
Oregon is a beautiful state, Eugene is certainly a city where I would feel comfortable living.
I-5 through California and Oregon turned out to be a very pretty drive. I had originally planned to take 101, but decided against it to try and make better time. I’d still like to see the Pacific from that famous highway, so I’ll try and take it on the way back.
I chose to stop for the day at Battle Ground State Park in Washington (not far North of the Oregon border). This park is gorgeous. I’m surrounded by 6′ wide, 150′ tall Redwoods and the forest floor is carpeted with prehistoric-looking ferns and ivy. Everything is so green!
Obviously I can’t get online to post my updates when I think of them. Instead, I plan to write my thoughts for the day down in a notebook and publish them here whenever possible. Here goes:
Location: Las Vegas, US Airlines Flight 179, Row 17, Seat C Activity: Waiting in the Plane
While sitting on the plane I realized this: isn’t tampering with the lavatory smoke detector a federal crime? Imagine serving your time in prison and being asked the standard “what you in fo?” question. Is it possible to tell the truth in this situation and still come off as a tough guy?
The airport at Las Vegas is disgusting. While sitting on the floor next to a water fountain (because the only power outlets I could find were in the most uncomfortable spots) I overheard two twenty-something women talking about how they found vomit on the floor of the restroom. I guess the city’s slogan, “whatever happens in Vegas stays in vegas”, must include the all-you-can-eat buffets.
Our pilot had to turn around and head back to the gate in mid taxi. Why? Because the baggage wasn’t well-balanced enough. I wonder if things like this will grow more common because more and more people are taking less and less luggage with them on trips (most airlines charge an extra fee now for more than one checked-item). Maybe?
A couple of months ago I was looking for something to do which would punctuate an end to the core of my academic career. So many people do the cliche “backpacking around Europe” schtick, I wanted something that was more of an adventure and less of a tour.
To preempt any suggestions as to where I got my inspiration for this trip: yes, I think I ended up making my decision to journey to Alaska after watching Into the Wild. There are a few very important differences between what I’m doing and what Christopher McCandless did, however:
He hitchhiked; I’m Driving (from San Francisco to Fairbanks).
He burnt all his money; my trip is possible thanks to two very generous graduation gifts from my parents.
He never made contact with the people back home; I plan on keeping in touch as much as possible with you guys.
I’m not going to cross the river.
I’m not going to eat the “potatoes”.
Even though my trip isn’t nearly as hardcore as his, I still think this is going to be a heck of a lot of fun. I plan on camping most nights, driving around 450 miles per day (on average), and getting to Fairbanks and back within 17 days of starting on July 12.
