Terrace was the last bigger town I will see until Whitehorse. I stocked up on supplies and headed north on the Nisga'a Highway, which turned out to be a spectacular ride. It was hilly and forested until I reached the lava beds which were formed about 250 years ago when a small cinder cone erupted. About 2000 of the local Nisga'a died in the eruption and their villages were destroyed. There are now four villages in the area.
I thought Hawaiian was hard to pronounce! The valley where the Nisga'a live is surrounded by spectacular white-capped mountains. I ended up sharing a campsite with Clay, Lisa, Ronny, and Cathy who I had met the previous night in Terrace. They had a mosquito net tent set up over the picnic table which was really nice since the bugs are starting to get kinda bad. It takes a lot, though, for mosquitos to really bug me. Hiking southern and central Oregon during snow melt was bad. Everything so far pales in comparison.
The road from the Nisga'a highway to the Cassiar Highway is called the Cranberry Connector and is a 30 mile long dirt wilderness road that comes out at Cranberry Junction, which some might think would have at least a building on it since it is marked on the map, but no, it's a junction, and that's it.
Unfortunately, my iPhone battery was dead so I can't show you photos of the ride, but let me tell ya, wilderness road doesn't do it justice. There were lots of potholes, washboard, rocks, insanely rough gravel, and churned up mud. As I was weaving my way along the road trying to find the least rough bits, I thought, 'well, you wanted to go somewhere really quiet!' A fisherman stopped and gave me a cold soda, pepperoni, and cheese. There was some road construction and the foreman told me that the road was much better now. Im thimking, there must have been potholes that swallowed a few cars so they finally decided to work on fixing the really bad bits. IIt was a cool, misty day which was good because there was no dust... just mud. Both Sam and I were pretty dang filthy when we got out to the main road but we made it intact with no flats!
A few miles down from the junction on the blessedly smooth pavement, was Bonus lake forest campground next to a pretty lake with a floating dock and lily pads. I was pretty pooped and slept like a rock.
Yesterday, I rode up to Meziadin Lake campground on a really hot, beautiful day. It was probably around 90 degrees! I had a great lakeside camp and a nice afternoon wading in the lake and just resting. I'm tired and need a day off!
My neighbors at the lake were traveling by motorcycle and had bought a bottle of wine to share with another motorcyclist and me. We sprayed ourselves with bug spray and had a great time drinking and chatting at twilight, which around here is around 11:30 at night.
-- Post From My iPhone
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