Day 31 Prince George to Prince Rupert 18th May 2015
by Chris
Woke up to a delicious breakfast cooked by Julie our B and B host a really nice person and a strong advocate for Prince George which gets a bad rap in certain tourism quarters. She dropped us off at the station and we again got hugs.
Back to the Skeena. We greet our travelling companions from the day before with a couple of newcomers.The “dude’ railway guard looks a bit rough and is in a laconic mood as we get ready to go.
We set up our space with Mel’s mandatory water heater gizmo and start off about 45 minutes late.
Later in the day we decide to go to the dome car and see what is like-turns out it is great and for the rest of the trip there are about seven people there at any one time which is great for dashing from side to side to see the best sights.
Whilst there we start talking to the others and one woman turns out to be from Sydney.She also turns out to have gone to the same school as my sister (Joady) and knows her-freaky!!!
Another woman we got into conversation with was Cathy who had lived in a place called Usk and now lived in Terrace which was a stop for the train.
Cathy told me about the water propelled ferry that operated from Usk which is unique in how it is propelled. It apparently works by putting down a type of centre-board that the water pushes against and then meets resistance from the cables guiding the ferry which turn propels it forward.At least I think that is how it works 🙂 See the below.
Cathy who had been in special education spoke of the unwillingness of the the government to commit proper resources to support schools and also about the prevalence of FAS (Foetal Alcohol Syndrome) amongst the First Nation people.Again an unfortunate similarity with the situation facing Australia’s Indigenous population.
Also in the Dome was one of the young Swiss backpackers who was asleep for the whole trip-train dude stole his camera whilst he was asleep and took his photo returning his camera without him knowing-hilarious.
Well after Cathy got off we decided to return to our seats from the Dome.The train dude wanders past and says “Surprised you came down now the best part of the trip is coming up !”.We bolt back upstairs and sure enough the light,the river and the mountains were just stunning.As the train repeated the stunt from the previous night of being ten minutes from Prince Rupert but sitting for an hour we had plenty of time to enjoy the scenery!
Finally arrive in Rupert(as us locals call it) about an hour and half late no taxis-however they duly turned up after a while.
Arrived at the Eagle’s Bluff B and B.Mel’s comment on arriving in the room was “I think the site pictures must have been photo shopped’!” It was kind of a little dated but we found out that the location by the harbour and Mary the owner made up for it.
Anyway now the hunt was on for dinner with the first two places having closed kitchens we kept going into town until we stumbled into Rhodos a Greek restaurant that offered curry on the menu-whilst this was a mild surprise it was topped by the restaurant opposite.Here was Zorba’s offering Greek Cuisine and Sri Lankan and East Indian Curries-something about this town?
Anyway fed and watered staggered back and collapsed-this travelling lark takes it out of you!
