We left Meziadin Lake Campground this morning and finished up the last 100 miles of the Cassiar Highway (Hwy 37).
So, here is the 2019 Milepost description of the Cassiar:
"The Cassiar Highway was completed in 1972, and is asphalt-surfaced with the exception of a few short gravel breaks. The highway is generally narrower than most 2-lane highways, with little or no shoulder. It has easy curves and some long straight stretches. Although not particularly hilly, there are a few 8 percent grades and 2 switchback turns. There are no passing lanes, beyond one in the first few miles of the highway, The centerline and edge line markings may be missing along some northern sections of the highway. Drive with your headlights on at all times. Also watch for logging and freight trucks on the highway."
It is true that the shoulders are limited, non-existent, or soft, but we didn't find the road to be as narrow as we expected. Yes, the northern section has no markings, but there was also not much traffic up there, and we didn't find it to be an issue.
With that said, I wouldn't drive it at night. Not only would the road be hard to see, but the brush is pretty close to the road and you wouldn't have much warning from crossing wildlife. Also, we saw at least one location where a tree recently fell across the road, and it looked like someone may have had to slam on the brakes and run off the road to avoid hitting it.
There are a lot of logging trucks from the southern end all the way to Stewart, and we're always cautious of those. But from Meziadin Junction to the Yellowhead Highway, the road was wide, had markings, and was quite good.
We were expecting the Cassiar to be much worse than it was. It was entirely paved, they were in the midst of re-paving some sections, and they were striping or re-striping sections. Because the road was better than expected, it also had a bit more traffic than we expected and, maybe as a result, not much wildlife.
We only saw one skittish bear and one porcupine on the whole 450 miles from the Alaska Highway to the Yellowhead Highway, so the wildlife wasn't as good as we'd hoped, but the side trip to Stewart/Hyder made up for that.
The last 100 miles today was nice and the scenery was good, but not as good as the prior sections. Again, the road was really good. And I suspect, in the next couple of years or so, the Cassiar will be an excellent, fully marked road for its entire length.
Based on our one trip down the Cassiar, I would say this. It's worth doing at least once to visit Stewart, Hyder, and Salmon Glacier. Boya Lake is a nice stop and Kinaskan Provincial Park is between Tā Ch’ilā Provincial Park (Boya Lake) to the north and Meziadin Lake Provincial Park to the south. We didn't stop at Kinaskan, but we heard good things.
For the adventurous looking to get off the pavement and go where most people don't, the side trip to Telegraph Creek from Dease Lake may be worthwhile. Here's a brief description:
"Probably the most remote town in BC accessible by road, Telegraph Creek is reached via a rough Forest Service road that runs southwest from Dease Lake, passing through the Stikine River Provincial Park and skirting the Grand Canyon of the Stikine River. The road to Telegraph Creek is beautiful but rough, with 112 km (69 miles) of gravel, steep gradients (up to 20%), narrow passages along canyon walls with no guardrails, and sharp-angled switchbacks. The road should be driven with caution and awareness, but is suitable for most vehicles."
I wouldn't take our RV on the Telegraph Creek Road, but we would make the journey by Jeep. Our friends, Esther & Steve, took a jet boat trip on the Stikine River from there on a prior trip, and they enjoyed that.
Some people love the Cassiar and some don't care for it. I'm certainly glad we did it, but having done it once, I would probably return via the Alaska Highway if there is a "next time".
From going pretty much due south on the Cassiar, we headed pretty much due east on the Yellowhead Highway (Hwy 16). We drove a little over a hundred miles to the town of Houston on the Yellowhead. After a total of 206 miles for the day, we pulled into the Shady Rest RV Park.
We stopped here way back on May 6 and appreciated the full hook-ups and the free high speed Wi-Fi, so we decided it would be a good opportunity to upload all our recent photos and do some research on the last big portion of this trip - Jasper and Banff National Parks.
They have some pull-through sites, but we parked in the same back-in site we had before, Site 24.
The owners are really nice folks, the price is reasonable, and the free Wi-Fi is the best we've had in any campground on this four and a half month journey, so we highly recommend this park. In fact, I told Linda "It wouldn't take much to convince me to stay here another night". And, ultimately, we decided to do just that.
We really enjoyed our 4 days of travel on the Cassiar in August 2016.
About Telegraph Rd, we did park our RV at Dease and planed to drive to Telegraph, but after about 30 minutes (about 17 miles) of the drive and seeing nothing but a dirt/gravel road with only tree trunks on both sides of the road we gave up and turned around.
Using the satellite view of the road on Google Maps, it appears that you don't get to the good views until the last 10 miles or so of the road. The rest of the drive is viewing tree trunks.
Posted by: Al & Sharon | Friday, September 13, 2019 at 08:38 AM