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| Killing Time in Paradise | Short Cuts | ||||
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By: George Reiswig - 7/2002
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| With the 'Mog down waiting for parts, we needed alternate transportation.... |
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| ... and River Safaris' jet boat provided us that opportunity. |
Today, we took a jet boat trip up the Mud River to see some sights. Angela's idea of how to kill some time, and a good one. This was an unexpected experience for me, since I used to be a professional river guide who loathed motors on rivers, preferring oars that I had sole control over. But Clyde at River Safaris helped make our trip upriver a great one. For one thing, this guy must have the eyes of an eagle. I pride myself on being able to spot wildlife before others. But at one point, Clyde slowed the boat, and when I looked at him I could tell he was looking at a section of riverbank to our right. I followed his gaze, but didn't see anything. When he told us to look just to the right of the fallen log leaning into the water, sure enough, there was a big black bear looking back at us, barely (bearly) moving. I'd been "looking at the wrong scale," expecting to see something larger against the backdrop of trees. But even this 300-pounder looked small compared to the huge trees around it.
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| One of the natives. |
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| Cariboo Mountains. |
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| Columbia Mountains. |
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| Lightning Falls and its glacial source. |
The rest of the river trip was just as pleasant, and we got a lot of good photographs. It turns out that the cornice that I thought was spawning Lightning Falls is actually the edge of a glacier that looms out over this huge peak. We got close enough that we could see the crevasses in the blue ice, shot through and limned by the sunlight overhead. It was a great trip, and an excellent deal for all four of us. Even Krista enjoyed herself, although she didn't like the life jacket. Then it was back to the hotel lobby to wait for the tow truck. Charlie did his usual excellent job of helping out with Krista, carrying loads, and generally keeping us sane and on-track. He's a great addition to the team, and I'm grateful to have him along. The semi driver, Darrell from Ron's Towing in Prince George (locally called "Prince" or "PG") had had a hard day, and ended up heading down to Blue River later than he thought he would by about four hours. He showed up at 9:30 PM, ready to get loaded and rolling. I asked if I could buy him coffee, and he said that he hadn't even eaten since breakfast. I didn't feel like we were in enough of a hurry to make him skip another meal, so he drove off to dinner.
When he came back, he and I headed over to the Mosquito Flight School Garage and Breedery to pick up the Unimog. We both wore mosquito net jackets with hoods, but the lights glinting off the netting made it difficult to see what we were doing. As a result, we kept pulling the hoods off for a bit to eyeball this or that. When we did, we were unable to inhale without mosquitoes getting in. A couple of times, we coughed and sputtered as our windpipes spasmed from a bit too much insect matter collecting therein. Darrell said that he'd lived in the area all his life, and he'd never seen mosquitoes so bad. They were trying to bite our eyelids, ears, everywhere.
But we did get Grog chained down, and pulled out at around 10:30. Darrell and I talked the whole way, mostly him talking about moose and bear and his experience with them. We saw at least one accident that had just happened. A guy near a truck parked by the side of the road flagging down vehicles with a flashlight explained that his truck had hit a moose, and the moose had bounded off into the woods. We were a little confused, because we thought that the truck he was standing near was his, and it didn't appear damaged. Then he said that he didn't need a ride after all, because "these folks" (thumbing in the direction of the truck parked on the shoulder) were going to give him one. Why he flagged our truck down is still a mystery.
The second incident occurred only a short time later, when a vehicle in front of us suddenly showed brake lights, and smoke began to glow red in their light. I assumed that he'd braked hard to avoid hitting something. Darrell wondered if he had a blowout. We slowed to offer help, but the fellow had pulled off the road and didn't indicate that anything was wrong. We continued on slowly, and he followed after a short time. He may have been grateful to have a semi leading the way, trying to clear the corridor of whatever critter he had nearly hit.
Needless to say, the entire four-hour ride was spent with me talking to Darrell to try to help keep him alert, while simultaneously keeping my eyes glued to the brush on either side of the road, peering intently for the slightest glimmer of an eye reflecting our headlights. Those of you who know me realize that the former (talking at length) is unusual for me. Unusual, too, is having my eyes open at that time of the day. The look in the poor chap's face following his encounter earlier with a moose kept going through my brain, and Darrell's stories of moose bounding up the hoods of tractors and coming through the windshield contributed to my decaffeinated alertness.
| Related Links |
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North by Northwest Expedition: - Introduction - Sponsor List - Reviews - Photo Galleries Before Departure Shakedown Cruise Lower British Columbia More Lower British Columbia Busted in BC BC with Coast Mountain Crawlers Upper British Columbia Almost Alaska |
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