Dease Lake, British Columbia, Canada

Good morning, my friends. We traveled some new road yesterday via the Cassiar Highway. Some of you might know it better as British Columbia Hwy 37. We caught one last glimpse of the Teslin River as we drove away.

About a half hour down the road, we stopped at a rest area to use their facilities. We found this map showing where we were headed. We would be stopping in Dease Lake by day's end. We got a chuckle out of "Smithers" to the south there. It's one of Smitty's nicknames.

From the rest area, it was pretty much a U-turn to get onto the Cassiar. Let's make a right turn here, okay?

And then it was just about 2 kilometers before we left the Yukon and entered British Columbia. (Kinda hard to see the “British Columbia” among all those stickers.) The Alcan actually dipped down into British Columbia for a few miles on Friday, but now we're here to stay...until we reach the border, of course.

The mountains ahead are the Cassiar Mountains.

To the east, we could see the Horseranch Range.

Here's what our Milepost tells us about the Horseranch mountains. Just FYI, we were reading the Milepost in reverse. It was written for northbound travelers, and we were southbound.

The next wide spot in the road was this one:

Here's what our Milepost tells us about Jade City:

It was a good place to stop and snoop around. This table was outside the store with big hunks of rocks that purported to be jade. There was also a man to the right who was working with some tools and creating cut jade pieces. I'll admit I thought jade came from the Far East. When one considers there was a land bridge between the Asian and North American continents at one time, then it makes sense that some of the mineral wealth would be shared between the two.

As you might guess, everything in the store was outrageously expensive. There were some jade thimbles, and I would dearly have loved to purchase one. They were inside a locked glass case. On top of the case were baskets filled with tiny jade bears. They were smaller than an olive. They were priced at $65 each. With those sitting out in the open and the thimbles locked in a glass case, I didn't even bother asking the price. I knew it would be more than I wanted to spend for what amounted to a souvenir. Nevertheless, it was worth snooping around the store to see these quilted wall-hangings. I knew you'd want to see them too.

Moving on, we admired the sharp peak of this mountain.

Soon, we passed Vines Lake. It was named for a bush pilot, Lionel Vines.

This is the Dease River. We thought we might see some moose here, but no.

And this is Dease Lake. We thought we might be able to see the ghost town of Laketon here, but nothing was visible. After arriving at the RV park, I mentioned Laketon, and was told there's essentially nothing left, although at one time up to 5,000 people were living there.

Here's what the Milepost tells us about Laketon:

And here's what I know about the town of Dease Lake, our current location.

It rained a little after we got set up at the campground. When the sun came out again, we walked down to the lake. It's a pretty area. Looking to the right, it looked like this:

Looking to the left, it looked like this:

On the wildlife front, it was a day of missed opportunities. We saw a red fox. A car was coming in the opposite direction as he sat in the oncoming lane. He skedaddled off to the side and into the brush before I could get his picture. Here's one I found in the public domain.

(Image credit: PEI-00282 - Red Fox" by archer10 (Dennis) is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.)

Also, a black bear ran across the road in front of us. Mike saw a black bear earlier on our trip. This was the first one I've seen. Again, he was too quick for me, and I missed the shot. Here's one I found in the public domain.

(Image credit: Black bear" by -JvL- is licensed under CC BY 2.0.)

Lastly, something completely new to both of us. He was in a ditch right beside the road on my side of the truck. Mike couldn't see him from the driver's seat. He was about Smitty's size.  After doing some internet sleuthing, I've identified him as a Pacific Fisher. He's in the same family with weasels. Again...no way I could capture him with my own camera, but I found this image in the public domain.

(Image credit: DSC06784" by washuugenius is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.)

Okay, and like I said...we're in a death march toward home over the next several days. We'll just keep driving, driving, driving until we get there. We'll be getting under way again soon. There's still plenty to see along the way. We'll be driving the Cassiar today and tomorrow. It's designated a scenic highway on our map, and so I'm hoping we'll see lots more beautiful scenery along the way. If we're very lucky, we'll continue seeing more wildlife. Eyes open, my friends. You won't want to miss anything.