Trains and Grizzly Bears, A Canadian Roadtrip - Rocky Mountaineer Day 9

Tuesday, September 10 - Jasper to Quesnel, BC

Time to get back on the train for the ride back to Vancouver.  As usual it was an early start for the train so we were up at 5:00 AM and down in the hotel lobby for our bus transfer to the train station just after 6:00.  It had rained most of the night, but besides everything being wet, we stayed dry as we boarded the buses.

It was a short ride to the train station where we boarded the train, found our seats and were on our way.  As usual, the car attendants were all smiles and full of energy as we got underway.  We were at the first seating for breakfast so it wasn’t long before we got our hot towels to freshen up and were called downstairs to eat. We had a great breakfast and as been the case with every meal, we met some very nice people and had a great conversation while we ate.

After breakfast we went out on the outside platform and watched the scenery go by while we took some pictures.  This is the routine for the whole day on the train; spend some time outside, relax in our seat, have our breakfast and lunch, and during the whole time being served drinks and snacks whenever we wanted them.  Not a bad life.

The train we took from Vancouver to Banff was quite large and had 25 cars.  The train from Jasper to Vancouver was considerably smaller and only had eight cars.  I guess the route from Vancouver to Banff is much more popular and maybe it was more crowded because it started on Labor day, which is celebrated in Canada just like the US.

When it was time for lunch, we ended up sitting across from a couple we had met earlier on the trip and had another great conversation.  They were very nice and we really liked them.

The country we passed through today was very remote and an area where a lot of logging was done.  All day we had been seeing lumber mills and pulp and paper plants, as well as passing freight trains loaded with finished lumber.  as we neared Quesnel, our destination for the night, there were a lot of the mills and plants grouped together as it was an important industry for Quesnel.  We were told though, that the lumber mills were dying due to the foreign competition and high cost of doing business.

It was after 7:00 when we pulled into Quesnel; it had been a long day.  Quesnel was a small town so there was no luxury hotel for us tonight, but the hotel we stayed at was comfortable and clean and that’s all you really need.  After all the delicious, but rich food we have been having on the train and in the hotels.  Val and I were craving some vegetables so instead of going out to dinner, we walked across the street to a market and bought a fresh vegetable plate and some fruit and had that for dinner.

After getting up at 5:00 this morning, we were both pretty tired so after eating and relaxing a while, we called it a night and went to bed.  We have another early morning tomorrow as we travel on to the ski resort town of Whistler, BC.