Day 20 – Tuesday, July 14 (Dease to Prince George)

Dease to Prince George

The temperature was 11 C (52F) when I got up and by the time a stopped for the night it was 22 C (72F).

I noticed that it had gotten dark at night and I had left the area of 24 hour daylight.

I had a sound sleep and and I got up refreshed. It had rained during the night but my tent was dry because the campsite owner had allowed me to pitch my tent under the canopy. I started to cook some oatmeal while I packed the tent and bedding in the car. After packing, I finished the oatmeal and left the campsite. I topped up the car with with gas and left for Prince George.

It rained, on an off all day, for short periods of time while I drove south. It would rain for a few minutes and then I would enter an area that was totally dry and then, a little later, it would rain again.

As I drove further south, the scenery was spectacular. The densely forested mountains and valleys were impressive.

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One of the main differences is that the trees were significantly taller in the areas that hadn’t been burned down by a forest fire. Many of the trees were more than 10 m (32 ft) tall, some being much taller.

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There were also a lot of wildflowers and berries of various colours alongside the road that complimented the green of the trees and the shrubs.

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I kept taking pictures even though they couldn’t adequately represent the scenery. It is truly amazing that the eye is naturally capable of focusing everything that it sees and it has a wide peripheral vison. A camera is not as sophisticated but it can give the viewer an idea of the picture that it is portraying.

Unfortunately, I didn’t see any wild animals along the road except for the odd rabbit or squirrel.

When I got close to the west coast of BC, I took Highway 16 south-east towards Prince George where the traffic became busier and the towns got larger and closer together and some of the forest gave way to grain and livestock farms.

When I got to Prince George, I checked into a hotel for the night. Tomorrow, I should be able to drive the 8 hrs to Surrey, where I will be visiting with my nephew Tim, his wife Shannon and their two boys, Warren and Kevin.