Hyder, Alaska - September 7th to 8th, 2022
Hyder, Alaska is rather isolated. The only way to get to Hyder by road is by crossing over from Stewart, British Columbia. Most people only spend the day in Hyder. The main attraction is seeing bears at the Fish Creek Wildlife Observation Site. A few daring people continue up the rough road to the Salmon Glacier Viewpoint, which is actually back in Canada. We camped in Meziadin Lake Provincial Park and just visited Hyder during the day.
The drive from Kinaskan Lake Provincial Park to Meziadin Lake Provincial Park along the Cassiar Highway was pretty uneventful. We started out in the fog and rain, so we don’t know what scenery we missed. We didn’t have many wildlife sightings this stretch either. Keith caught a glimpse of two ptarmigan along the side of the road. What we originally thought was a raven sitting in the middle of the road ahead of us turned out to be some type of grouse. Of course, by the time we realized it wasn’t a raven, Ann didn’t have time to get its picture before it flew into the brush on the other side of the road.
Other than a couple of rest area stops, the only real stop along the way we made was at the Bell 2 Lodge for a mid-morning snack. The lodge looked rather nice and modern. There were cabins, an RV park, and several helicopters parked next door. The signs indicated the helicopters were for heli-skiing. We bought a couple of chai lattes and a few homemade cookies. Unfortunately, the little cafe did not have any seating indoors and the tables outside were all wet, so we ate our goodies inside our Red Tail Lodge (our camper van). A sign indicated you could buy wifi access, by the hundred megabytes. It was tempting since we hadn’t had cell service in over five days, but we passed. We’ll be driving into Stewart tomorrow where we should have cell service.
Just before the campground, we stopped in Meziadin Junction to top off our gas tank and dump our gray water. It cost $10 to dump, even if you buy gas. There is no dump station at Meziadin Lake Provincial Park. We also filled up on fresh water at Meziadin Junction, but found out later that the campground had potable water.
By the time we reached the campground in Meziadin Lake Provincial Park, the sun came out. Our site was right on the lake shore, another beautiful spot. There were these cute, fuzzy caterpillars with multiple white spikes of hair sticking out at both ends. And they were everywhere. We also learned that there are three grizzly bears that call the surrounding area home. As we walked around the campground, we saw a lot of bear scat.
Our plans for the next day were to check out Stewart, British Columbia and Hyder, Alaska. There was a fog over the lake when we were getting ready in the morning. Then Keith spotted a bear swimming over to the island, about 100 yards from our campsite. Ann rushed out with her camera. After taking some pictures, she went back inside when the bear disappeared into the brush and trees on the island. Then Keith spotted the bear again on the island. Ann stopped brushing her teeth and rushed outside again, with toothpaste still in her mouth. The bear circled around the shore of the island, looking for berries. When it disappeared again around the back side of the island, Ann was able to go inside and finish brushing her teeth. But she was outside again taking pictures when the bear swam back from the island. It came ashore just past the boat dock, still about 100 yards from our campsite. What a great way to start the morning. We were planning to visit the Fish Creek Wildlife Observation Site outside of Hyder in hopes of seeing bear feeding on the fish. So we asked ourselves, why are we going to Hyder when we can view bears right here?
It takes about an hour to drive from Meziadin Lake to Stewart. It is a gorgeous drive through a narrow valley surrounded by beautiful mountains. Along the way is the Bear Glacier which is visible from the highway, at least if fog and clouds are not hiding it. On our way to Stewart, we could see the lower half of Bear Glacier, but the top half was hidden by clouds.
In Stewart, we parked at the Visitor Center. Finally, we had cell service! As we waited for a couple hundred emails to download, we entered our ArriveCan info for our entry back into Canada after visiting Hyder. Hyder is just across the border from Stewart. It is isolated from the rest of Alaska. The road from Stewart is the only way into Hyder, other than flying. The United States doesn’t even have a customs officer at the border. However, there is a Canadian border agent that checks vehicles going back into Stewart.
Stewart is a small town. The downtown area is just a couple of blocks long with shops and restaurants. However, about half of the shops were closed and/or for sale. We don’t know what Stewart was like before, but we’re guessing it didn’t fare very well through the loss of tourism during COVID.
While we waited for our cell phones and laptop to update, we strolled along the Estuary Boardwalk just behind the visitor center. From there we could see a freight ship docked at the Stewart ocean port. There were wide open views from the boardwalk of the surrounding mountains.
After that, we drove over to Hyder. Hyder looked like a ghost town, even compared to Stewart. It was run down. Most of the buildings were boarded up, collapsing, closed and/or for sale. There were only a handful of buildings, including homes, that we would dare step inside. This looked like more than a couple of years of decline.
The Fish Creek Wildlife Observation Site is just a few miles past the town of Hyder, on the only road there is. The site is run by the U.S. Forest Service. They charge $5 per person to enter the boardwalk along the creek. You need to purchase a ticket online, back in Stewart or Hyder, when you still have a cell signal.
We knew the salmon run, what attracts the bears, usually ends by mid-September, so we were concerned we might be too late in the season to see bears. We found out that the salmon run was running late this year, although a little lighter than usual. As we walked along the boardwalk, we could see a lot of salmon just trying to hang on to the last amount of their strength, with some of them giving up the fight. Gulls were feeding on the dead fish. However, there were no bears at this time. We’ll try again later in the day.
In the meantime, we decided to drive up to Salmon Glacier. We knew it was a rough, dirt road to get there, but we had most of the day to do it. It was only 20 miles away. The road was rougher than we imagined. There were so many long sections of deep potholes that covered the road from side to side. A couple of potholes were so deep that they placed small trees in them to warn people to avoid them. There were rock slide areas, with some rocks and trees laying in the road. And we probably were on the road on a good day. The road was still wet enough from recent rains that it was not dusty, but not too wet so it was not slippery. After crossing through a soft, rock slide area, we began doubting ourselves if this was a good idea to take our van on this road. We almost turned around. But just when we were about to, the road improved a little bit, teasing us to continue.
The spectacular scenery also kept egging us on. Unfortunately, Keith couldn’t spend much time looking at it because he had to concentrate on his path through the maze of potholes. However, Ann took plenty of pictures and video for him to see later.
There was a viewpoint of the toe of the glacier. A turquoise pool of water was below us. We debated about turning around. We can see the glacier. We’ve come this far, so we might as well go to the top. We continued on.
It took us an hour and a half to drive the 20 miles, but we reached the glacier viewpoint. Surprisingly, there were pit toilets, litter bins, and picnic tables at the viewpoint. That means someone has to drive that road on a regular basis to maintain those! There were also about half a dozen vehicles parked there when we arrived. It was quite a variety of vehicles from a jeep, a truck camper, a van, a class C RV (rental, of course), and one of those earth cruiser type RV’s. Although they all made it, including ourselves, we would only recommend making this drive in a 4 wheel drive, high clearance vehicle. It was rough.
The view was stunning. The clouds would hide it periodically, but then part briefly for a view. Ann had her camera ready to take pictures during those brief moments. The viewpoint is located right where the glacier makes a 90 degree turn. So, the view we had earlier of the toe of the glacier was only a small fraction of the glacier that is visible from the final viewpoint. From our high perch above, we could see the cracks in the glacier showing off the blue ice. Jagged ice falls were at the inside and outside corners of the turn. Like we had seen at previous glaciers, there is a graceful flow to the glacier overall, but the finer details reveal a rough terrain of sharp edges.
On our drive back down, a marmot ran across the road in front of us. Ann finally saw a marmot in Alaska, although it was only for a quick moment and, technically, we were not in Alaska, but had crossed back into Canada. It felt like we were still in Alaska because there is no border patrol on the road to the glacier. Ann thinks she captured the marmot on the GoPro that she had running at the time.
The drive down meant that Ann was sitting on the downslope side of the road. This made her a little nervous whenever Keith would hug the right side of the road to avoid potholes because she had a good view of how steep the drop off was. However, this also gave her a view of the glacier from the road as we rode alongside it for several miles. We made it down from the glacier in an hour and twenty minutes, not much faster than on the way up. The difference in time is probably due to not stopping for pictures on the way back down.
We stopped again at the Fish Creek Wildlife Observation Site. Our tickets were good for the whole day. This time there was a grizzly bear in the lagoon. We watched the bear for a little while. Ann got some nice pictures and video of the bear catching and eating a fish before it disappeared into the woods.
Crossing back into Canada, we stopped again in Stewart. The Harbour Lights Grocery Store provided us with some needed supplies. Then Ann took advantage of the cell service and chatted on the phone with her brother while drinking a bottle of Stewart’s Root Beer. Yes, we know Stewart’s soda started in Mansfield, Ohio in 1924, not in Stewart, British Columbia, but we couldn’t resist drinking a Stewart’s in Stewart.
We thought about having dinner in Stewart, but there were only two restaurants left in Stewart. The King’s Table only had take out, no dine in. And you had to call a phone number to get reservations for dinner at the Mexican restaurant (we’re assuming so they know they have to open up the restaurant). We decided just to head back to the campground and cook our own dinner. On the way back, we stopped once again at Bear Glacier. This time it was not hidden at all by clouds.
Our time in Hyder turned out better than we expected. We thought we would be too late for the salmon run, but we lucked out and saw one grizzly. We also weren’t sure if we would try to drive up to Salmon Glacier. Although it was a rather sketchy drive that we would never attempt to do again, we appreciated the wonderful views of the glacier. And Meziadin Lake Provincial Park was icing on the cake. The park was a beautiful setting and provided us with another bear sighting.
Check out our related video: Hyder, Alaska
(Ann)