The Cassiar Highway, B.C.

Day 33 of our journey began with a detour to Whitehorse to address my three leaking tires. I had concluded that three bad tires on the same side of the vehicle at the same time could only be the result of vandalism. This turned out to be wrong. Two of the three tires had been previously repaired and those patches had failed. The third one picked up a nail. The tire folks explained that right-side tires always take more abuse because that is the side of the road where debris collects. Although I was advised to replace the tires, I decided to repair them one more time in the hope of making it back to the Land of Cheaper Tires. One hundred dollars and half a day later we were back on the road headed south.

If the Alaska Highway often felt quiet and isolated, the Cassiar Highway felt even more so. It was a narrow track through endless forest past lake after lake. We couldn’t help but feel that we had the entire area to ourselves.

Because we’d gotten a late start due to the aforementioned tire repairs, and because this was to be a long day of driving, I had resisted the urge to stop and take photographs along the way – until now. As we came upon Good Hope Lake, I couldn’t not stop.

We ended up pulling over for the night at Jade City, about a half an hour past Good Hope Lake. We had crossed the 6,000 mile threshold at some point on this day.

Jade City was not much more than a wide spot along the road but this particular wide spot was situated in the middle of what turned out to be the prettiest section of the Cassiar Highway. Our parking spot was this gravel lot, made available for free to passing RV’ers by the primary business establishment in Jade City. It was dark by the time we stopped. Mom grabbed this shot the following morning.

It probably comes as no surprise that the main establishment in Jade City is a store that sells jade products. The owners operate a number of jade mines in the mountains and ship jade all over the world – much of it to Asia.

My parents hit the road right away but Darla, Lewis, and I spent some time looking around. Darla picked out a jade necklace.

It turned out to be a beautiful day – sunny and warm. We would end up stopping several times for Otter Pop breaks, an activity that had been unappealing prior to this point in our trip.

The Cassiar Highway still had a small number of gravel stretches at various points along the road. None of them created any difficulties beyond a temporary reduction in speed. Mom grabbed this shot along one of these stretches. They’re clearing brush to make it harder for wildlife to jump out in front of passing vehicles without warning. Darla, Lewis, and I passed these same workers an hour or so later and I was struck by the fact that the woman holding the SLOW sign hadn’t bothered to close the doors on her car, which was getting caked with dust.

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