BLOG 8 - Stewart-Cassiar HWY to Hyder / Alaska

Now heading north on Highway 37. The landscape is best described as 'unspectacular' at first, the highway is now paved throughout. Only sometimes construction sites with longer waiting times for the 'pilot car' that you have to follow in the convoy offer a bit of variety. At Meziadin Junction we are able to get a place on a nice government campground - this year it's not so sure, there are a lot of motorhomes and caravans on the road, actually too many for us.

The next morning we take the turnoff to HWY 37 A which will lead us to Stewart and Hyder/Alaska. On the way we can take our first bear photos and also pass Bear Glacier. Stewart at the end of the 145 km long natural Portland Canal from the Pacific does not offer the visitor much apart from a gas station, a few shops and a campsite, but is a good starting point to neighboring Hyder, which belongs to Alaska and thus to the USA. However, with some peculiarities - there is no USA border station, but a Canadian one. Hyder does not follow Alaska Time, but like Stewart Pacific Time - with the exception of the post office (!) - this is the only US office in Hyder and therefore follows Alaska Time. Hyder used to be a popular shopping destination for Canadians as alcohol in particular was much cheaper. Today almost all shops are closed and barricaded. Hyder now has only about 30 permanent residents. One of them is Carolyn, who runs the 'Boundary Gallery' as a souvenir shop. It also plays an important role for us - after the border we see a notice board that the access cards for the 'Fish Creek Bear Viewpoint' are only available online. With the help of the postmaster and a local, we come to Carolyn, who, as a form of civil protest, applies for and prints out the access cards online for visitors - for a modest fee of $1. All the locals are pissed off at the central authority, which introduced this ticket regulation at short notice this spring -- it is not even mentioned in any travel guides. The 'Fish Creek Bear Viewpoint' confirms - unfortunately for us - the old rule of the northerners - 'No Fish - No Bear', not a little fish can be seen in the clear water, and of course no bear either. A ranger explains to us that the salmon are at least two weeks overdue this year. At the moment only 1 to 2 'contract bears' come by a day, we don't want to put up with the several hours wait to maybe see a bear and drive the 30 km further to the view point for the Salmon Glacier - a gravel road. On the ascent you can only see the eastern arm of the glacier at first, if you get your way up through potholes and mud passages you can enjoy seeing the main stream and both the east and west arms of the Salmon Glacier. It is unusual for Alpine people to stand at just 1,200 m above sea level and look down on a glacier. The re-entry into Canada runs without real problems, but the Canadian officer plays the 'full program' of border crossing and the online tool ArriveCAN also has to be filled - fortunately the border station has a WiFi spot for this. The whole thing seems a bit bureaucratic insofar as every car coming from Hyder must have been in Canada beforehand, since there is no road from Hyder to Alaska.