Date: Sun, 11 Aug 1996 21:57:34 -0400
From: Eddiehintz@aol.com
Subject: Trip Report: Stewart BC/Hyder AK
Hey now,
Yesterday, 8 August, we finally made it to Alaska!
Sort of. We split from the 
main group at Boya Lake, and headed for Stewart with
Jack Stafford and Bob Hoover. It was a long haul down the Cassiar
highway, but scenic as always. Lots of forest, and lakes everywhere.
We finally saw a fair amount of snow on the peaks, which was bordered
by mist, above 
and below. The whole thing looked like something out
of the movies. It was the sort of thing that Samantha really loves,
so maybe someday she & I can come back and do it together...
We shot off the Cassiar and headed for Stewart, and pulled into
town after taking a look
at
the Forest Service campsite (Clements lake). The
site was rather spartan, so we thought we'd check around town for
other options, and we wanted a seafood dinner anyway-Bob had been
talking about it for several days at that point... ;-)
We gassed up in Stewart,
and found out that there's no customs station between Hyder AK and
Stewart BC, and rejoiced. After our bad experience first entering
into Canada, we had figured we'd better cross the border in Jack's
bus, so I was very happy to go into AK in my own bus. We got into
Hyder, and had a very good Halibut & Chips dinner, for a
reasonable price-about $7 American. But we
paid
in Canadian-the primary currency of Hyder AK! While
Hyder, pop. 95, is officially in AK, there are no American banks, so
the primary currency is Canadian. However, there's no sales or
property tax, and you can buy things like pepper spray (illegal in
Canada) since it's Alaska. Kind of weird. All the kids in Hyder
attend school 
in Stewart, the power is from BC Hydro, and it has a
Canadian Area Code. Kind of odd place. After dinner, my dad & I
went to go look at the bears. There's a US Forest Service bear
observation area just 5 minutes outside of Hyder, manned by US
personnel and everything-sure was nice to see those uniforms again.
There's this creek that the Salmon swim up to spawn, it's only a foot
or 2 deep at that point, and the bears just walk in, scoop up a
Salmon, and chow down. It was really neat to watch the bears from
such close quarters (about 10 feet at the closest point), and the
bears didn't really care, as they had lots of fish to eat. There were
3 Forest Service guys around with pepper spray in case the bears got
too aggressive, but the fellow I talked to said they'd only used the
stuff 4 or so times this year. It was fun to watch the bears in a
natural setting, knowing that they wouldn't be a threat. There was
one smaller black bear that kept getting chased away by this big
Grizzly, it was really fun to watch. The black would sidle down to
the creek and start looking for fish, the Grizzly would tolerate it
for a while, then the Grizzly would start chasing the black, which
would of course run like hell. They went almost a quarter of a mile
down the road at one point... While we watched bears, Bob & Jack
had some bear troubles of their own-the RCMP(Royal Canadian Mounted
Police). Seems that the mounties were waiting on the AK border for
us, and they followed Bob & Jack for a while. Typical police
intimidation, it was much like a small town in the deep south. When
Bob & Jack inquired at the local campgrounds, they were suddenly
all full-never mind the empty spaces visible. The guy came running
out when they pulled up saying "too late! too late!", Bob said "Too
late for what, sir?" and he said "We're all sold out, you'll have to
leave." So Jack headed back for the Forest Service site, while Bob
waited for us to come back. And the cops did the usual
drive-by-steely-eyed-intimidating-I'm-gonna-bust-you-hippie-scum
glare, and then parked on a side street where they could watch Bob.
Pretty lousy. Last time I checked there were no laws-Canadian or
otherwise-against being a tourist.
We headed out to the campsite out of town, and Jorge joined up
with us there, and the bunch of us camped there. The mounties drove
by to check it out later that evening, but they left us alone. I
guess the local kids heard all the talk about hippies invading town,
'cause they came out around midnight and partied for a little
bit-undoubtably hoping the hippies would come sell them dope or
something. They left after it became obvious that we were only going
to sleep. So I have to say that all the talk about how nice Canadians
are is false, from my experience. They're just like everyone else,
most of them nice-but with a few idiots and jerks here and there.
Same as it ever was...
So now it's down to Bob Hoover and us. Jorge and Jack have
remained behind, as they will catch the BC Ferry in a few days, and
the rest of the group-Tobin, Neil, and Pete-are a day behind Jorge
and Jack. Bob & I have picked up the pace as I will pick up
Samantha at the Seattle airport on Monday. Indra and I are both
looking forward to the reunion with Sam. Me more than Indra I
think...
Southward Ho!!! ;-)
Peace,
Eddie
Back to the Main Trip
page
Yesterday, 8 August, we finally made it to Alaska!
Sort of. We split from the 
main group at Boya Lake, and headed for Stewart with
Jack Stafford and Bob Hoover. It was a long haul down the Cassiar
highway, but scenic as always. Lots of forest, and lakes everywhere.
We finally saw a fair amount of snow on the peaks, which was bordered
by mist, above 
and below. The whole thing looked like something out
of the movies. It was the sort of thing that Samantha really loves,
so maybe someday she & I can come back and do it together...
