Homeward Bound

This morning we woke up to the constant drizzle of rain, but I was still enthused about wanting to head back and see the bears one more time. I drove out to the viewing platorm, but there were no bears there, and people were waiting for something to happen. I waited for half an hour in the rain, getting ready to leave, when a grizzly appeared.

I watched him fish. This one was a tad lazier, taking easy pickings of existing carcases rather than fishing, but he did go chasing along the stream bed a few times. As I followed him on the boardwalk, he finally seemed to take notice of the people above him, and climbed up onto the stream bank out of curiosity. It happened quite quick, and when he did, he was less than 10m away from me. I took some magnificent photos of him, struck by awe and too mesmerized by the moment to feel fear. It's only when he turned away that the spell broke, and I and the people around me broke the tension by staring at each other in amazement and finally breathing a sigh of relief.

I headed back to he motel; Carole and I packed up, and we began our drive, heading back along the branch highway. We continued along the Cassiar highway to its terminus, where it joined the Yellowhead. At this point, our journey finally seemed to be coming to a close; this highway would take us all the way back to Edmonton. We had a brief stop in Smithers, and at this point
decided that if we made it to Prince George tonight, we could be back in Edmonton tomorrow night. So we decided to press on, arriving in Prince George at 9:30.