BC Tour — On to Prince George

I was going to take back my tour when we left 100 Mile House. I had decided to stop pleasing Bob, and be honest with him. After all, it was my tour. I knew I couldn’t keep up the pace we’ve been on. I wasn’t as strong at this point as when we started. I was not going further than Williams Lake today. Bob can do as he likes after I that.

We’re back in rolling hills today. It’s 57 miles to Williams Lake, so won’t be worn out when I get there. We came to a present-day version of a roadhouse, AKA travel center, near 150 Mile House. It catered to truckers and travelers, and was quite nice. There were two or three food vendors, conveniences, and other services. Almost a self-contained village. Of course they had gasoline and diesel but we didn’t need any of that.

We took our food outside and sat on a bench. After we finished eating, I sat there looking at the scenery. I knew Bob was itching to get going again, but I didn’t let on that I noticed. Eventually he said we needed to get going. He wanted to “get some miles in.” (He had to catch a ferry on the 17th but we would have easily made it there on my original schedule.) I told him I was in no hurry, because I was going to camp at Williams Lake, which was several miles away. So he left on his own, and a while later I went on too.

Williams Lake is a lumbering town, with a compact downtown, much like Crosby, MN was back in the day. I camped at Williams Lake Stampede Campground (there are lots of stampedes and dirt track racing at BC towns). I went downtown to buy a camera after I set up camp. The rain had crept into the camera that I started off with. I also picked up groceries, and came back to eat. Then I took a shower in their nice facility, and went for a ride around the town and over the Fraser River bridge.

A couple who were also bicycle touring were the only other people there. They were riding “South and West.” I told them about my plans and experiences. They were just following their noses though. The campground caretaker came around to see if we needed anything.

Later on a young woman with her two year old stopped by. She and her husband were interested in cycling. I showed her what was involved in living on the road, and how it had been going for me. My afternoon there is a good example of the magic connection you have with people when touring by bicycle. Most of them feel comfortable approaching you, and they ask all kinds of questions.

I had Mandarin oranges, oatmeal and carrot-raisin muffins for breakfast, and started out for Quesnel the next morning. The highway follows the Fraser River at this point, so it was uphill all the way. It turned out to be hard, but not to hard. I still needed more recovery before I was able to resume the pace I had originally planned.

Along the way I saw a sulfur train snaking around the bends of the the Fraser River. I was high on the shoulder of a hill beside the river, and I caught it out the corner of my eye. The sulfur was in open boxcars, and it looked like a bright yellow stripe moving through the trees. I can still see it in my mind’s eye.

I stopped at Robert’s Roost, which is a very nice campground on Dragon Lake. Quesnel is on the Fraser River and was the commercial center of the Caraboo Gold Rush, complete with a sternwheeler landing. Only 18 wheelers and small planes land at Quesnel today. There were loons and goslings on the lake, and several people fishing from boats.

I went into town to eat breakfast in the morning. I’m sure I had Canadian bacon, probably with eggs and home fries. Bacon and eggs is the real deal up here. The best way to eat while touring is to have breakfast in camp, ride a couple of hours, and then have breakfast at a restaurant. After that, lunch on the road and something you’ve cooked in the evening. There are just enough towns in BC to make that work sometimes.

I also stocked up with groceries for tonight and tomorrow. I could camp almost anywhere between Quesnel and Prince George, but didn’t think there would be any stores along the way. I turned out that I only went about 25 miles. I was still feeling a bit burned out. I only wanted to ride far enough today to have an easy ride to Prince George tomorrow.

I stopped at a general store/second-hand shop that offered free camping. They had nice grass, but a horrible outhouse. There was a sign for ice cream and I went in for a cone. When I told the owner I was from Spokane, he asked if there wasn’t a little town called Spangle nearby. He told a fellow named Jack Rose comes up to BC from there for dirt track racing. Well, I knew a little about Jack too. He had a Stearman biplane and a P-51 fighter, and he flew one or the other to Henley Aerodrome on a regular basis. Small world. I had no idea he was into dirt track racing though.

I arrived in Prince George early in the afternoon the next day. It’s the biggest city in Northern BC. Riding alone felt strange for the first couple of days, but this last ride felt like my normal pace and routine.

The fellow from India who ran the campground told me a rider from Spokane had camped there the day before. He said the rider was about 35 years old, and made it there in eight days. I wonder who that was? 😀 Now he can tell the next rider that comes along that some guy about 65 years old made it in nine days. 🙂

Saturday in Prince George is busy. As soon as I got set up in camp I went downtown and got a new tire and chain. I had started out with two new, highly-recommended touring tires, plus a spare. But they did not answer (that’s how Captain Jack Aubrey would put it). They had Kelvar instead of steel cables in the beads, which stretched as I rode.

The front tire was OK because the load on it was less than on the rear one, but the rear tire was coming out of its rim. I already had my third tire on the rear wheel, and I didn’t think it would last much longer. I needed a new chain too, because it rained so often. That produced a slurry of road grit that ground at the links much of the time.

I ate a baked potato with a bowl of chili at Wendy’s rather than cooking in the rain that evening. I’m planning to go to Vanderhoof next. I hope it isn’t still raining tomorrow, at least not in the morning. Getting packed up and ready to go is no fun in the rain.