Summer Travel Map

Monday, June 15, 2009

More Hot Springs - Liard

June 15, 2009
Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park, BC

Today was an easy, or should I say short, drive from Racing River Crossing to Liard Hot Springs. We stopped at Muncho Lake for some photos, and had our first moose sighting along the way (no place to pull off for pictures, though). We saw more Stone Sheep along the road as well, and apparently entered buffalo country as we got closer to Liard Hot Springs, since there were two of them blocking the road outside the park entrance.

We're getting close to an area where a forest fire has been burning since about June 4th. We've met two groups of firefighters who are involved in the effort to contain the blaze. There have been periodic closures on the Alaska Highway just north of where we are now, but things have been open for the last few days. Yesterday, it got cloudy and started to rain (can't complain; we've had pretty good weather over the last week or so) and that's supposed to continue for a couple of days, so that will help the containment efforts. Like most fires in this neck of the woods, it was started by lightning and has burned over 50,000 acres. Since fires are a natural part of the wilderness, firefighting efforts focus on inhabitants and structures over putting out the fire itself.

Spring is apparently the time that the military ships people out of Alaska, since we've run across several families heading south in the process of relocating. Today, we even saw an SUV with Hawaii plates; yep, military people. You don't see many Hawaii plates in the US, much less in the BC wilderness.

These are some of the hottest springs in Canada (don't they all say that?) and our group's "water people" (Rod, Jean, Marlene, Geri) took the waters. Me, I spent the time fixing a few things around the coach and making a pot of pasta sauce. Geri made Chicken Parmesan and we ate well. Late in the evening, we saw a number of pickups and SUVs full of guys arrive just before gate closing time (10:00 PM) at the park. Being curious, Bob asked one group what was going on. "A gay pool party" was the reply. Actually, they're firefighters who just ended a 12-hour shift, taking advantage of the hot springs. The provincial government pulls forest fire crews from all over the area for situations like this. One of the groups we met was heading home to Kelowna (500-600 miles from here?) after a two-week deployment on this fire.

Tonight, we watched another movie. Since we're so far north, the combination of the low angle to the horizon and natural obstacles makes getting TV (and Internet) service "iffy" at best. We brought a selection of movies from home, and found that Bob is a huge collector of DVDs, with several hundred in board. In the last two weeks, we've watched "Gran Torino" (excellent Clint Eastwood movie), "Crank" (OK Jason Statham action flick), "Taken" (fabulous Liam Neeson new release), "Blade Runner" (weird older Harrison Ford sci-fi), and last night's "Slumdog Millionaire", which was "two thumbs up" in our coach. Since I've been to Mumbai, I had some context for the setting, which is always fun. Now, what made it Oscar material I'm not sure, but it was a good watch nonetheless.

Anyway, click here for a few pictures.

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