23/09 – 10 – Canada & USA – Sebastian Hirsch's Blog

In this post I share some highlights of a trip to Canada and the United States that I took in September and October 2023. I had just finished my Master’s thesis and was able to travel for about one and a half months. First, I flew to Vancouver and met my parents who were traveling the area in their camper truck at the time. We traveled through British Columbia for about two weeks before I flew from Vancouver to Reno, Nevada. I stayed with my friends Jan and Tom at their home there before taking another road trip to Oregon, joining my parents again who had in the meantime traveled south from Canada into the United States.

*After arriving in Vancouver, I went up to Kushiro Park near Simon Fraser University to take some pictures of the city*

*My truck and camper setup that I rented in Vancouver, ready to travel through BC for two weeks*

*My first night camping in Whistler, together with my parents in the their truck*

Having met my parents at a campground just outside of the Whistler ski resort, we spent a few days in Whistler. My dad and I spent a day mountain biking at Whistler Bike Park with two rented downhill bikes.

*Construction at the valley station of the lift in Whistler Village*

*My dad found the flow in Whistler Bike Park*

*The chairlifts in Whistler are long but very fast*

*View from the top of Whistler Blackcomb*

*View of the evening light at the campground in Whistler*

After having spent a few days in Whistler, we drove further along British Columbia Highway 99 through Pemberton to Lillooet. We stayed at a campground right at a river mouth, where the Seton River flows into the much larger Fraser River.

Before making our way north on 99, we take a short hike down to a train wreck site on Cheakamus River near Whistler Creekside. A train crashed in the 1950s and the box cars that fell off the tracks down into the canyon were never recovered, they are now a popular attraction to tourists and graffiti artists

*I follow my parents on the way from Pemberton to Duffey Lake*

*On the shore of the Fraser River near the campground in Lillooet, the water level is low*

*My mom and I visit the Fort Berens winery in Lillooet*

*The vineyard at the Fort Berens winery is located on level ground, contrary to vineyards in the area where I live, which are typically on south-facing hillsides*

Leaving Lillooet, we went further north on 99 and then on 97. We turned off 97 in 70 Mile House and found a nice provincial campground on Green Lake. We stayed there for two nights, visiting friends my parents had met earlier on their trip who happened to have a summer home in the area.

*View from the campground on Green Lake, somewhat windy and chilly weather but a nice and quiet place*

*The squirrels seem to like the area around Green Lake too*

We left Green Lake and returned to 97, heading further north to 100 Mile House. We stayed there at a campground in town before returning to Lillooet on gravel roads, staying one night out in the forest at a small lake, and crossing the Fraser River with the Big Bar Ferry the next day.

*Making our way from 100 Mile House to the Fraser River on unpaved logging roads*

*We have reached our destination for the day and are about to set up camp at the Riley Dam recreational site, not far from Big Bar Lake*

*Our camp spot on Riley Lake is nice and quiet, it is warm as long as the sun is out but gets below freezing at night*

*Crossing the Fraser River on the Big Bar Ferry the next day*

*The Steyr almost maxes out the ferry’s 10-ton payload*

*Following the Fraser River, we are almost back in Lillooet*

We stayed at the same campground in Lillooet once again before driving back to Vancouver on the Trans Canada Highway, staying one more night on the way somewhere around Hope.

We stop near Lytton where two train bridges cross the Fraser River. There are two separate railways following the river, one crosses the river from the east to the west side and the other one vice versa

*It doesn’t take long till a train arrives and my dad and I are able to take a couple of pictures of it*

*View of downtown Vancouver across English Bay from Vanier Park*

We spent a day going into the city of Vancouver, visiting the Museum of Vancouver and the Planetarium right next to it which I enjoyed. Both are located south of downtown next to Vanier Park. This concluded the Canada part of my trip, I subsequently flew to Reno in the US to visit my friends Jan and Tom.

After flying from Vancouver to Reno with a layover in Portland, I spent about a week with Jan and Tom at their house. Following that, I rented a small camping trailer similar to the one I had rented in Canada just before and was able to borrow Jan’s car for a week. I drove from Reno to Portland, Oregon with the rental trailer and Jan’s car as the tow vehicle, where I met my parents who had in the meantime traveled south along the Pacific coast from Canada into the US.

After making the roughly 500-mile trip from Reno to Portland in a single day, I met my parents at an RV park close to the shore of the Columbia River and not far from the city center of Portland. We spent a day going into downtown Portland. The city is home to many bridges across the Willamette River (which flows into the Columbia River not far after going through Portland) that are impressive to look at, in addition to other places such as the huge Powell’s City of Books store that we enjoyed visiting. However, there is a very high number of homeless people on the downtown streets which tarnishes the image of an otherwise beautiful city and hints to an unaddressed social problem.

*The Steel Bridge in Portland was built in 1912; it allows road, rail, pedestrian, bicycle and light rail traffic crossing the Willamette River*

*Portland Union station. It’s the city’s main railroad station, however it would be considered to be very small compared to any major European city’s main station*

Before leaving Portland, we visit the Oregon Rail Heritage Center and take a tour of the USS Blueback Submarine. The railroad museum is fascinating since it houses a number of impressive steam engines, such as the Southern Pacific 4449 “Daylight”. Having a look at the inside of the submarine I found interesting too, however I’m ok with leaving it again after being in it for an hour… From Portland we head east along the Columbia River towards Mt. Hood. We camp on a small state campground before driving around Mt. Hood the next day, traveling further south to Bend within the next two days. We chose Oregon Route 242 over McKenzie pass to cross the Cascades, it is located south of Mt. Washington and north of the Three Sisters.

*USS Blueback Submarine with the Marquam Bridge in the background, it allows Interstate 5 to cross the Willamette River*

*Southern Pacific 4449 “Daylight” in the Oregon Rail Heritage Center. It was built in 1941 and weighs almost 400 tons*

*Great view of the Columbia River from the Vista House at Crown Point in Corbett*

*Mt. Hood seen from a recreation area just south of it on Oregon Route 35*

*Our vehicles parked in front of Mt. Hood. Again, I’m very thankful that I was able to borrow Jan’s car for this trip…*

*Huge lava field on Oregon Route 242 that goes over McKenzie Pass. Astronauts used the lava fields in the area to practice walking on the moon in the 1960s during the Apollo program*

*View of the North and Middle Sister from Dee Wright Observatory on OR-242*

The remainder of our trip through Oregon consists of driving south from Bend into California, visiting Crater Lake National Park on the way there. We visit friends that my parents had made while traveling through Northern Canada a few months back at their home in Redding, CA. I drive back to Jan and Tom’s in Reno subsequently, my parents arriving in their truck a few days later.

*Crater Lake is truly impressive. Walking up to The Watchman Peak is for sure worth it, considering the view from there…*

*This little guy wanted to say hi at Crater Lake*

*Before crossing the state border into California we visit the Train Mountain Railroad, the world’s largest miniature hobbyist railroad*

*This is the train that took us around Train Mountain*

*View of Mt. Shasta on the way from the Oregon border to Redding*

Before flying back home, I spent roughly another two weeks at Jan and Tom’s. Among other things, we rented a Jeep and joined a group of 4x4s to drive out to the desert and to see the partial solar eclipse that occurred on October 14, 2023. Finally, I rented a car in Reno that I used to drive to San Francisco, from where I flew back to Zurich.

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