Stewart & Hyder

Well, we’re still at Meziadin Lake Provincial Park. It’s Saturday evening, and we’ve had probably the nicest, warmest day in a couple of months. While we haven’t had unlimited sunshine, we’ve enjoyed temperatures in the 70’s today. The weather man is predicting a 60% chance of showers tomorrow, so we have really relished this day.

Yesterday, we traveled to Stewart, BC and its neighboring town, Hyder, AK. It’s about a 40 mile drive from Meziadin Lake through a couple of glacier-formed canyons, surrounded by tall mountains and glaciers; an incredibly scenic journey. We stopped at Bear Glacier which almost came down to the highway, and also took pictures of a number of spectacular waterfalls that, as far as we know, are unnamed.

Stewart is a town of about 700 people at the head of the Portland Canal which is ice-free the year around. About 3 miles past Stewart, we crossed the US/Canada border once again and found ourselves in Hyder, AK. Hyder is just barely a town, with most buildings either vacant, for sale, or both. There is a US Forest Service station, and of course, a Post Office, but not much else except for a tiny general store. However, about four miles past Hyder on a typical Forest Service road, which means it’s mostly pot holes, is Fish Creek Bear Viewing Area. It is run by the Forest Service, which means that there’s a fee for viewing, unless you’re old enough to have a “Golden Age Passport”. Of course, Tom qualifies!!

Fish Creek is a salmon spawning stream which draws many bears when the salmon are running. The Forest Service has built a walkway and viewing platform so that people can observe and photograph the bears without endangering themselves.
Many people spend hours at a time waiting for a bear or two to decide it’s dinner time. We got there about 1 PM, and there were about 50 folks sitting around with their expensive digital cameras with long lenses just waiting for a bear to appear. There had been one seen at 6:45 AM, and all these folks were just sure that another one would appear at any moment. After about an hour of these moments, we decided that seeing a bear was not such a big deal, so we left, passed back through Hyder, stopped at Canadian Customs once more, answered the same questions again, and then proceeded back into Stewart for lunch.

We returned to camp and decided against dinner, since we’d had a large late lunch. Then about 8 PM, we had an ice cream craving, so we opened the freezer and each had a Dove Bar. Motorhome travel is sure great! Late last night we were awakened by a bright glow in the sky. It was the full moon; the first time we’ve seen the moon in a long time.


After a big breakfast this morning, we took a drive to a nearby fish ladder to watch the salmon, but the ladder itself was all fenced in, so all we really saw was the fish diversion dam and the top of the ladder. Local (First Nation) natives have camps set up by the river and were dip-netting the salmon, which they are allowed to do in BC as well as in Alaska.

The rest of the day was spent resting, reading, sunning, and for the guys, a kayak trip around part of the lake. We’re planning on spending one more day at Meziadin Lake, unless it’s raining on Sunday morning. If it is, we’ll head down the road a hundred miles or so to the Yellowhead Highway which begins at Prince Rupert, and is a major cross-Canada route. We’ll work our way back to Prince George in a few days, then head south toward Vancouver.

We should have periodic internet connections from here on, so we expect to keep you up-to-date more regularly.

‘Till the next time, take care.