Day 11 of the Great Adventure: Kamloops to Smithers

Day 11... Randi had originally written a brilliant and hilarious post for this day but the spotty wifi at our hotel Smithers, BC managed to not save the draft.  So now you get my version of things, I don't write with as many exclamation points and I was largely focused on driving, so I hope you'll enjoy in spite of all this.  If you check the map, this was our longest distance after the lower 48.  We had intended to go from Kamloops to Prince George for the night and then to Smithers, but we could not find a vacancy there so we combined two days into one and would arrive in Alaska a day early.

 

This was the bus that parked us in for a little while Friday morning, it was full of filthy tourists from other countries, the nerve.  Thankfully, I had made friends with the bus driver, who was awesomely 

 Canadian (we made it, eh?),  and he moved the bus when we were ready to leave.

 

As we left for an 891 kilometer day, we needed caffeinated sustenance, so we stopped at Starbucks, eh.  Well, chai tastes different in Kamloops, but we soldiered on (#firstworldproblems).   

The boys got their treasures from Lala for the day (Charlie seemed particularly fascinated with his bag) and we hit the road.

A view of Kamloops, neither of us are particularly gifted photogs so we'll spare you 20 pictures that all look vaguely like trees and houses, but Kamloops really was a pretty place.  Like most of BC it has a river running through it and plenty of greenery.

I'm going to let you focus on this picture for a moment.  This picture was perhaps our favorite moment of the trip.  Randi had a mishap with her contact cleaner thingy the night before so she spent the day in glasses.  Randi can't see in her glasses.  Like, she can make out shapes and colors, but she can't really see.  You'll notice the furrowed brow, the pursed lips, the pure effort to see... anything.  This occurred at the Husky gas station on the way out of town.  It was our first fill up in Canada and we were feeling the pain of $1.33/L (roughly $5.32/gallon) so Randi thought she would snap a picture to document this financial travesty.  The thing is, we had just taken the daily 'family selfie' and she hadn't switched the camera back to the rear camera.  In her hurried rush to snap the picture, she managed to not realize that the front-facing camera was on and snapped this gem for our mutual laughter.  It took us a few minutes to stop laughing before we could safely depart.

The intended target of the unintentional selfie.  This was the cheapest gas we saw in the Canadian portion of our trip.

Family selfie, ready to roll.

 

Kamloops Lake, gorgeous, full of water.

We found the Jet Puff Marshmallow farm!

That was one tasty Ritz cracker (no racist undertones intended).

The above picture and many to follow are more of Kamloops Lake and the beautiful landscape surrounding it.  This type of scenery was pretty common throughout British Columbia.  It really is a beautiful place.

There was a scenic lookout point from which we took many pictures that looked pretty much identical.  Hopefully there is not too much repetition above.

"It's a long train, mommy!"

There are no words... I don't know.

Those Old Dutch Popcorn Twists are basically buttery salty Kix consistency corn snacks, and they are delicious.  We bought several bags on our journey and they rarely lasted more than about 30 minutes after being opened.  The Diet Coke tasted the same, but one side of the label was in French.  This was mildly disappointing as we had hoped there was a Canadian analog to Mexican Coke Lite.  It's the same as 'American' Diet Coke.

After a rather long, tiring, though beautiful day, we made it to Smithers, BC.  It was a cute town with lovely mountain views all around, but we were exhausted and the kids were cranky and we took no real pictures of things.  So we checked in to the Aspen Inn, unloaded a few things, and hit up the restaurant for some dinner.  We arrived around 8:30 pm so we just made it before the kitchen closed.  The food was decent, but this was our introduction to the 'hot Caesar salad' that is apparently somewhat common in Western Canada.  Think a normal Caesar salad... but covered in hot bell peppers and cheese.  Yeah, it's just like you're imagining.  Also, gas was now around $1.43/L as we were farther from the big cities and no longer on a major trade route.  All in all, like every day of the trip, it was a success and we saw new things.  Tomorrow, we head to Dease Lake and begin North on the Cassiar Highway.