Published: 28.06.2019
After staying in what is probably the smallest hotel room west of the Mississippi, we set off for our next destination after a modest but acceptable breakfast: Wells Grey Provincial Park in Clearwater.
The weather had turned - it was already raining in the morning and the temperature dropped to 12 degrees. Great sausages!
After about an hour's drive, we reached the park and thus the first of the waterfalls on today's program. The path from the parking lot to the waterfall 'Spahat Falls' was short. This time the information on the hiking trail sign coincided with reality. Hardly had we seen the waterfall next to the roaring noise, it was gone again. The mist hanging deep over the mountains pressed into the waterfall, so that only the noise of the waterfall indicated its presence.
The water masses plunge here from a height of about 75 meters. An impressive sight that proved fatal to a 21-year-old last year. She ventured too far out onto a cliff for an Instagram photo and fell to her death.
The next stop on our waterfall tour was the Dawson Fall, this time by car. It is less spectacular as it falls from a height of only 20 meters. However, its width is something special: it measures almost 100 meters. And you can get very close to the shore before the water masses rush down with a roaring noise.
The last stop on our waterfall tour today is the Helmcken Fall. With a height of 141 meters, it is considered the tallest waterfall in British Columbia and the fourth tallest in Canada.
The good thing about the suboptimal weather is that we never have more than 10 people at the lookout point.
After changing into hiking clothes, we leave Wells Grey Provincial Park and head towards Valemount, our destination for today.
It is worth mentioning that we saw the second bear today. The black bear was "grazing" (or whatever you call it with a bear?) in the bushes above the road. Unfortunately, we couldn't take any pictures of it because it was moving behind bushes and trees and we couldn't persuade either of us to get out of the car. Before we knew it, the bear had completely disappeared into the thicket... According to the always proclaimed Canadian motto: Be Bear Aware! ...
And don't get closer than about 100 meters... So, believe it or not...
After about 2 hours, we reached the 1,000-person community of Valemount and check in.
For several days now, we have noticed on our journey through the countryside, especially when we are wondering how people can live here, how they earn their money here, that all the "houses" (more like dilapidated shacks) that are not part of a regular community look like hoarder houses. Every house has at least! 3 to 5 old rusty car bodies on the property, none of which really look like they could still be driven. And if there is a barn, it looks like the Ludolfs', but unsorted... If you don't have a barn, you have a fixed tarpaulin that is makeshiftly spanned as a roof so that the junk, sorry, the treasures, don't get wet behind the house... For us, it is absolutely unimaginable to live in such chaos and so far away from civilization...
But that should not bother us any further, we will now sleep into a new day with probably similarly rainy weather as today... But - let's wait and see, hope dies last...