Train Whistles, The Canyon, Hells' Gate, Wildfires and Hope - Day 28

Last night was by far the most sleepless nights I've had on the trip. On the way into town, there was lots of industrial businesses - logging, sawmills, wood chips all loaded on train cars. It should have been a warning of what was yet to come. Kind of puzzling that there would be miles of train cars all hooked up with no where to go - or so I thought. Apparently, this is the busiest rail corridor in North America with 1 Million rail cars a month passing through. Who knew?

Once again, visions of the My Cousin Vinny movie when all of a sudden after 1AM there's a rumble, things begin to shake, and then the train whistles start. Not going to be a good night. Needless to say I got about 1-2 hours sleep. Woke up tired sleepy and began the day.

We headed out of Vanderhoof with Hope, BC as a goal. It's near the border - perfect position for a border crossing on Friday through Vancouver and into Seattle.

Once we left Iskut, road traffic picked up and the road conditions improved significantly. Vanderhoof is a busy town. Al the conveniences you could want and looks like plenty of employment - during summer months at least. On the road to Vanderhoof, we passed many lakes region vacation towns all by lakes and all looked busy. Plenty of farms and ranches as well. A big change from the past few weeks of riding  both headed north and as we head east and south, before we head west and south. Not such a big selection of roads and routes up here.

The highlight of the trip today was the Fraser Canyon. The mountains in the canyon aren't steep and all rock, they're dirt and gradually slope. Reminded me of the Diablo Canyon northeast of San Francisco. Very similar with one difference - the Fraser river. The river is long and wide and runs swiftly for the whole length we rode it. Our ride took us south on RTE 1 along the mountain slopes and cliffs edges most of the afternoon and almost all the way to Hope.

There are several tunnels through the mountains for cars and trucks and on the opposite side of the river you can see railroad cutouts in the mountains for the railroad to pass as well. The scenery is just beautiful and the trains are probably as long as allowed and look to be at least a mile long. The train kept pace with my bike at 40mph.

At one point the river narrows at a choke point called Hells Gate. There's a tram that takes you across for free, but wasn't running when I passed.

Another site along the mountains as we got farther south, were not just that the snow-capped peaks re-appeared, but there were several burning wildfires visible from the road. A helicopter flew overhead probably to assess the danger as it wasn't equipped to carry or drop water.

Landed in Hope around 8PM MT and after a quick shower and blog entry, hit the hay.

Over 9,000 miles total so far. I'll try to get some pics and stats up after we hit the states again and have better internet service and better computers.

Until then...........