Sub-title: Hot summer day-----Hot forest fires.
The day started well enough.
We left Tyhee Lake around 9:15 and traveled down Route 16/Yellowhead
Highway, which is a well-paved, two-lane road.
The countryside was mostly hills and pastures, lots of farms and hayfields. Dan commented that it looked a little like
Wisconsin.
Just before Houston, BC, we encountered a detour. All cars and trucks (and RV’s) were routed to
the right, onto a gravel and dust road.
The flagger said to “Go to 54 KM and there will be a pilot car
there. Be sure that you have plenty of
fuel”. Great! That sounded ominous.
And yes, we traveled 54 kilometers down that unpaved road.
We did manage to time things right for the pilot car; we were the last vehicle
allowed through in that group of perhaps 25.
After continuing a short way on the same road, we turned onto an even
narrower, one-lane road that was all dust.
At times we could barely see the car ahead of us, the dust was so
thick. We banged along on a very rough
path, sometimes washboard, rattling everything in the RV.
Eventually we came out on a somewhat smoother gravel road
that took us along the north shore of Francois Lake. And a bit further on, after the pilot car
dropped to the side, the road became packed dirt and we could manage to go about
35 mph or so. In all, the detour covered
about 90 to 100 miles, taking us back to
Route 16, about 70 miles along. By then
it was past noon, a long and rough morning’s drive.
The reason for the detour was the big forest fire that is occurring
in this area. We could see quite a bit
of smoke and haze along the way, and the manager of tonight’s campground said
that they were getting quite worried in Houston about the fire moving directly
toward the town.
Well, much later than we had expected, we pulled into Bee
Lazy RV Park, south of Prince George, along Highway 97. It is a somewhat dated park, but basically
clean and satisfactory for one night. One
attractive feature is their RV wash, so we spend about 20 minutes (and 5 “loonies”)
there, getting the dust and dirt off the Navion. It is still pretty dirty and will undoubtedly
stay that way until we get home, but it did take much of today’s dust off.
It was in the upper 80’s today, but still there are signs of
autumn approaching, with many leaves turning color or dropping off the trees.
(The latter may be due in part to the dry conditions here. There is a campfire
ban in effect in all parks, public and private.) The next two days will be fairly short days
of driving, with reservations at Whistler for the early part of next week.
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