Pink Mountain, British Columbia, is just a "stop along the way" for most people heading to Alaska from the U.S. Don't accept that. Blessed with about 100 full-time residents, many of its occupants are workers at local gas pipeline projects. But the most permanent residents have been here for years. This is what Pink Mountain looks like to the casual traveler passing through:
But there's much more than meets the eye. Just for starters, there is a great swing next to the propane fill station that we love to sit on to watch "Roadhouse TV" -- all the people stopping at the Pink Mountain Campsites roadhouse for gas or other services:
Just behind the roadhouse is a small farm which is the residence for a few horses, a pony or two, and some VERY friendly goats. There is a former barnhouse (now apparently used for storage) that tells the story of a history of farm animals:
Kathy herself preferred consorting with the outgoing goat (s/he might have been looking for food or treats, but nevertheless was very friendly):
Our campsite is further up the hill on the other side of the roadhouse. We have a few relics of bygone days at Pink Mountain:
Today, our goal was the drive west to Halfway River and see the (as our campground host stated it) "pretty sights" it had to offer. The highway sign told us we had a 23 km drive to the river:
We really weren't prepared for the views we had. We knew about the forests, and the local pipeline projects. But, once we climbed the ridge and descended into the Halfway River Valley, we first spotted a compound for the Halfway First Nations community:
A little further on, and down into the river bottom of the Halfway River Valley, we came upon a large ranch that had clearly been here for years. Cedar Creek Road (otherwise known as Mile 141 Road) took us through an approach to one of the older ranches --
-- which had been started with older log cabins and modest homes:
The ranches in this valley are large and appear prosperous.
We never would have imagined, from the rough, industrial-looking stops along the BC section of the Alaska Highway, that such a tight-knit community of bucolic farms and ranches would lie just behind the hills, in the valleys of the Northern Rockies. We were amazed and pleased that we had the time to discover these hidden areas.
We encountered a large population of calfs, which told us that there had to be a LOT of cows in the area:
We crossed Halfway River and climbed the hills to the west, getting panoramic views of Halfway River:
We had seen signs for Cypress Creek Cemetery, and finally found it, 23 km down the road:
The cemetery may have been used for hundreds of years; but only the most recent graves were marked with stones, indicating burials as recently as 2017. We paid our respects and moved on along the river.
It wasn't long before we reached Roberts Creek, a tributary of Halfway River:
We crossed Roberts Creek and drove along a small creek feeding it in turn. At one point, a beaver's work (chiseled trees) revealed that the beaver had widened the small creek into a picturesque Northern Rock Mountains pond, which we marvelled at:
As we were about to leave the pond, a woman drove by who appeared to be a 70-year old local rancher. She told us that she was a neighbor of the rancher who owned this pond and the land around it. We exchanged personal information. She related how much she likes to visit this pond to take photographs of the ducks, geese and swans that stop here on their seasonal migrations. We gave her the personal information she needed to pass on to the landowner rancher so that he would know that we are no threat.
She said that she and her husband had ranched this land for 50 years. We thought about what life must be like for local ranchers and farmers, and it became clear that it bore no relation to the superficial impressions that tourists get when they drive by on their trek from Fort St. John to Fort Nelson and beyond. We felt repaid for our investment of the time to investigate a little further afield along this popular route to the Great North.
Then we continued along Cedar Creek Road until we reached a stream crossing that we decided would be our turnaround point:
We ate a scrumptious lunch, checked out the creek and the gorgeous hillside fields around the creek crossings. Jumping into the Jeep, we started our return drive. In this direction, driving north on the west side of Halfway River, we found impressive vistas of the ranch fields in this valley:
We decided to make a stop on Halfway River just on the east side of the river after crossing back across the bridge. The river was impressive to the south:
We found numerous interesting pebbles and smooth, rounded stones that attested to the glacial and riverine history of this valley. Kathy even found an old piece of wood that boasted colors of red and black. It was wet and would have to be dried out before we preserve it with polyurethane; while its colors might dull with the drying, it was very colorful as we found it, and we hoped the colors would be preserved by the polyurethane:
We found a rocky shoreline with a wide variety of rocks of many geological origins. We surmised that they were worn down into moraine by ancient claciers, and then smoothed by rushing rivers in this valley before being deposited or revealed along the shoreline of the Halfway River. Kathy picked one likely flat stone to try to skip across the river:
Our trip was only about 100 km, which took us about 3-4 hours. We returned to our campsite at Pink Mountain in time for the very predictable late afternoon showers and thunderstorms (no thunderstorms today, however). Baxter got his afternoon walk in the campground, and we retired to happy hour and our blogging to reveal to you the amazing things we discovered in the valleys west of the Alaska Highway, here in the Northern Rock Mountains of British Columbia.
