Boy, do we have some catching up to do! We've been basically without internet for the past two weeks. We continued through the mountains of no
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hern British Columbia, which gave way to farmland in Alberta.
The clouds ahead were strange looking and Barb commented that it looked like it could hail.
Fortunately it didn’t, but we did get slush, which did an excellent job of cleaning off our windshield.
There were a lot of natural gas well heads in the mountains and some continuing into th
e plains.
The towns were all booming and “now hiring” signs were everywhere.
(We later found this was true throughout Alberta) We stayed at a nice park run by the Rotary in Fort St John, where we enjoyed this sunset.
We saw the woman who had checked us in with several of our neighbors’ rigs in the background on the news that night.
It was a good story about this summer’s tourist crowds.
You probably didn’t think a trailer park making the news would be GOOD news, did you??
We finally made it to the beginning of the Alaska Highway in Dawson Creek.
Sur
e wish we could alter our photo so that it says we were exiting rather than entering the highway.
Oh well, we are glad that we ran the highway “backward”.
We watched a really interesting movie about the building of the highway that went into more history and current information than anything else we’ve seen.
Fresh BC cherries were for sale just outside the visitor center.
They were a bit pricey, but are nearly as big as plums and delicious.
We had another Rotary experience
in Grande Prairie when we took a bus tour of the area.
Our guide was a last minute fill-in and it wasn’t the best tour, but we could see where it could be really interesting.
Grande Prairie is a rapidly growing and prosperous town.
Their top industries are agriculture, forestry, oil/gas and tourism.
The smell of fresh cut wood was everywhere in town.
We went by this community college building and were able to see the detail of how they laid the bricks to get the smooth curves.
They are off-kilter and some stick out more than others but it leads to the smooth look.
Our guide said they had to keep doing sections over again since it went against everything
th
e bricklayers had ever been taught.
Grande Cache was a larger town than we expected.
The main industry seems to be a coal plant just outside town.
It is mostly surface mining, although some has been underground.
We could see the coal seams running through several of the mountains.
The local power plant is at the mine and most of the rest of the coal is shipped to China.
We wandered onto the mine property until we came to the security hut.
We stayed in a beautiful municipal campground and had a great campfire since we figured we couldn’t really hurt the air quality near a coal mine!
Firewood was free but Dennis had to (aka got to) play lumberjack to get the pieces down to a manageable size.
rt
hern British Columbia, which gave way to farmland in Alberta. The clouds ahead were strange looking and Barb commented that it looked like it could hail. Fortunately it didn’t, but we did get slush, which did an excellent job of cleaning off our windshield. There were a lot of natural gas well heads in the mountains and some continuing into th
e plains. The towns were all booming and “now hiring” signs were everywhere. (We later found this was true throughout Alberta) We stayed at a nice park run by the Rotary in Fort St John, where we enjoyed this sunset. We saw the woman who had checked us in with several of our neighbors’ rigs in the background on the news that night. It was a good story about this summer’s tourist crowds. You probably didn’t think a trailer park making the news would be GOOD news, did you?? We finally made it to the beginning of the Alaska Highway in Dawson Creek. Sur
e wish we could alter our photo so that it says we were exiting rather than entering the highway. Oh well, we are glad that we ran the highway “backward”. We watched a really interesting movie about the building of the highway that went into more history and current information than anything else we’ve seen. Fresh BC cherries were for sale just outside the visitor center. They were a bit pricey, but are nearly as big as plums and delicious. We had another Rotary experience
in Grande Prairie when we took a bus tour of the area. Our guide was a last minute fill-in and it wasn’t the best tour, but we could see where it could be really interesting. Grande Prairie is a rapidly growing and prosperous town. Their top industries are agriculture, forestry, oil/gas and tourism. The smell of fresh cut wood was everywhere in town. We went by this community college building and were able to see the detail of how they laid the bricks to get the smooth curves. They are off-kilter and some stick out more than others but it leads to the smooth look. Our guide said they had to keep doing sections over again since it went against everything 
th
e bricklayers had ever been taught. Grande Cache was a larger town than we expected. The main industry seems to be a coal plant just outside town. It is mostly surface mining, although some has been underground. We could see the coal seams running through several of the mountains. The local power plant is at the mine and most of the rest of the coal is shipped to China. 
We wandered onto the mine property until we came to the security hut. We stayed in a beautiful municipal campground and had a great campfire since we figured we couldn’t really hurt the air quality near a coal mine! Firewood was free but Dennis had to (aka got to) play lumberjack to get the pieces down to a manageable size.
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