Tuesday, 8/8 – Swift River, YT to Iskut, BC

It was raining as we woke up. We waited until the rain let up to pack up.

Rather than try to cook breakfast, we went to the campground restaurant and had home-baked cinnamon buns, bacon and coffee.

The place has potential, but it is run down. A new owner and an infusion of cash would make a difference. Since there is no cell service, top notch Wi-Fi would be essential.

It was chilly and misty as we headed out. The mist turned to light rain, but then it cleared up by the time we got to the intersection of the Alcan and Cassiar highways.

I wanted to make sure there were sites available at our next stop, the Red Goat Lodge in Iskut, BC. Since there was no cell service in the area, I rode 5 miles east and called 3 times, but got a busy signal each time. We pressed ahead without confirmation.

The Cassiar is quite different from the Alcan. First, it is in better condition overall. We had one bad rough patch involving loose gravel on an uphill hairpin turn, but there were only a couple of small construction zones. Also, there are no wide shoulders, so the road seems more intimate. For the first 50 miles or so, there wasn’t even a center line. It felt like a true back country road.

We stopped to make our lunch at Jade City.

Several artists have workshops and the store sells their works. Beth picked out a pair of earrings for her birthday.

We got gas and beer at Dease Lake. The gas pumps and store were quite busy.

We made it to Iskut and intended to top off our tanks, but the one operational gas pump was not working. We had plenty of gas to make it to the next available gas, so we went up the road a couple of miles to the Red Goat Lodge.

We picked this site on the water, but it was too windy.

We moved to a more sheltered site.

The views of the lake are magnificent.

Beth noticed some child had left this doll behind and the bugs had invaded its hair. I’m guessing there is a very unhappy child somewhere.

We topped off the evening with dinner, shower, and tea.