Sunday, December 19 – On the Road Again – Golden to Hope, BC

True to his word, Ryan called us this morning just after 10:00. Ray, still concerned that the car wouldn’t start, set out on his 1 km journey to the garage. About an hour later, he arrived back with the Audi in good working order. We loaded up and set off on our way just after midday. If you haven’t travelled east to west in Canada, or vice versa, I don’t think you can say you are Canadian!!! The journey we have made over the past few days has been through the typical scenery that we learned about Canada in geography lessons in the 1960s. Canada is a beautiful country. The scenery in the Rocky Mountains and other mountain ranges in the west of Alberta and the east of BC is absolutely stunning and a match to the Andes, the Himalayas, and the Alps. We are still in it. We are spending the night in Hope, before driving the last 150 km into Vancouver tomorrow. Alanna is so excited…..so are we!!

The last part of the journey although beautiful, was snowy and once again through the mountains. Up over mountain passes in the gentle snow, and down through the valleys, then up again and finally down to Hope. The journey from Kamloops was made in dusk. It is taking a little to get used to the diminishing daylight hours. Darkness descends around 4 p.m. and daylight does not really start until after 8:00 a.m. We saw several accidents, which made us really cautious. Also Ryan, and another couple we met in Golden warned us about certain parts of the road so we were double cautious.

You know you are in the wilderness when there are Avalanche Warnings posted along the highway….and Avalanche Courses offered in Golden. In fact this morning, we heard them “blasting” to unsettle the snow this morning in Golden. So, I have a new addition to my bucket list. Spending a month in the Rocky’s either in winter or summer or both! It is so beautiful and walking, hiking, biking, etc. would be wonderful…..except for the bears. Mmmmm, we would have to learn how to cope with them. We didn’t see any on the journey this time, and no mountain goats, or sheep…and no moose! Actually, we really didn’t see any wild life except the deer. They are so gracious and elegant.

So our journey is almost over…not quite…and we will complete the final stage tomorrow….stay tuned…