Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Canada Driving to Prince Rupert question

I'll be taking my truck and travel trailer from Bellingham to Prince Rupert along with my buddy who's taking his RV and our boat. We're getting on the ferry in PR to Ketchikan then onto the inter island ferry to POW. We're doing this in March or April. My question is how are the roads/terrain and anything else I should know. I'll fill up in B-ham and bring 20 gallons in cans hoping to make Prince George before buying many litres of petrol (hopefully). I'd like to relax on the ferry out of Bellingham instead of driving but it's $2600 to get on in B-ham versus $292 in Prince Rupert so driving it'll be. We're leaving the vehicles at my place on POW and flying home.

Thanks in advance and a Happy New Year to my favorite neighbors.

From what I remember, from Terrace on is a pretty snakey road, but I don't recall any of it being bad.

I'll take snaky over hilly considering I'll be loaded to the gills. Thanks for the response.

I've not been west of terrace, but the remainder is cake.

You'll be fine, snow not withstanding.

Aces;
Good evening to you sir, I hope the year/week has been treating you all well so far.

It's been years since we went up to Prince Rupert, but my recollection of the road matches Scott's for sure.

Nowadays there's the drivebc website which gives pretty much live updates on road conditions.

Linky thing.

http://images.drivebc.ca/bchighwaycam/pub/html/www/index-Northern.html

There will still likely be a fair bit of snow over the passes in late March/early April, but usually they keep on top of the roads as much as possible. Again it doesn't hurt to check the highway conditions before heading up over a pass.

Oh, if it's an issue with your vehicle, we're required to have on either snow rated - snow flake symbol - tires or M & S tires until March 31st.

If you've never been up across the Chilcotin and Cariboo country before you're in for a treat as we think it's really pretty country - more open than a lot of our province - more like Montana around Ennis I'd say.

Fuel prices are stupid here, but do vary a fair bit, so if you are so inclined a link to a fuel price site.

https://www.gasbuddy.com/GasPrices/BC

Anyway sir, that's what I can think of off the top of my head tonight. By all means if I can be of assistance please feel free to give me a shout and I'll do my best to help out.

Good luck on your journey and all the best to you this year.

Dwayne

There are a couple of long hills on either side of Houston but they aren't too steep. West of Terrace (where I live) has some narrow spots but you'll be fine with reasonable care. If it snows you'll need to take it easy so give yourself some extra time.

Gentleman, Thank you all for your input. I look forward to the trip and seeing what I imagine is beautiful country. I always find Canada to be clean and full of nice people.

Thanks again.

AcesNeights: Six of us wanted to go fishing in SE Alaska a few years back - 4 of us flew to our destination and two of us (including me!) were designated drivers from Seattle to the Prince Rupert ferry with our "fishing gear" in tow.
What a wonderful trip that was!
We rented a house for a week there in Alaska and fished every day having good luck on King Salmon from two rented boats.
We also did crabbing and bought fresh shrimp off of the deck of shrimp boats in the harbor.
The ferry trip north out of Prince Rupert was amazing!
Be sure and take your cameras and binoculars.
What a fun adventure for the six of us retired gentleman fishers.
I would LOVE to do it again.
Be sure and pay close attention to the amazing number of sawmills, lumbermills and plywood plants in British Columbia!
All of the lumber industries that were put out of business by the liberals in Washington state (and other states!) were replaced by the capitalists in Canada.
Sad that.
We saw 20 or 30 Bears on the drive to Prince Rupert from Seattle.
My travel mate had a new "hottie" girlfriend back in Seattle and he mistakenly assumed that phone calls from Canada to Seattle would be "inexpensive" if not free on his Verizon account.
NOT!
He ran up a $220.00 bill calling her on the up trip and the back trip alone.
Verizon got free again once in Alaska we later found out.
The border people were VERY thorough and swabbed our hands for drugs and explosives - carry NO contraband!
Be prepared to unload EVERYTHING from your vehicles for the border agents - we saw that going up and coming home.
The roads were pretty smooth but narrow and at times windy (sp?).
Yes fuel in Canada when we went was expensive not sure how it compares now?
Canadian folks were very friendly and we stopped at two great restaurants of which I will try to remember (research) their names/whereabouts.
Have fun and drive careful with good up to date insurance.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy
P.S.: I assume you will have reservations for the vehicles on the Alaskan ferry - DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT miss your reserved time!

It has already been well covered, but winter notwithstanding is a beautiful drive. To break it up a bit, Smithers is about halfway between Prince George and Prince Rupert. Beautiful little town. Be sure to eat at Chatters bistro.

On the way through Houston, stop and check out the grizzly bear mount in the museum there. As I recall it's basically across the road from the A&W. One of two soaker bears taken between Houston and Smithers a few years ago.

Lots to see you on the way, take your time, take an extra day and enjoy the drive.

Thanks again gentleman. Your input is appreciated and I look forward to seeing some new country.

That grizzly at Houston is a real 1000+ lb interior grizzly, it was weighed by the game warden's who shot it. Eating cattle on a regular basis and access to salmon in the fall is good for growth apparently........

It's not the old Hamm's bear is it? If time permits I'll make it a "to do".

Google the Hungry Hill bears. Thats one of the big hills between Houston and Smithers mentioned earlier.

Two brothers, the other is at the airport in Smithers.

Are studded tires legal in BC

Yes, between October 1 and April 30.

Maybe that's what my wife means when she says I'm a bear to live with. 😄 I eat a lot of cattle and salmon...

I will be making a very similar route, but in June.

I'll be driving from Banff, AB to Prince Rupert, and taking that same ferry to Ketchikan.

I expect to spend two nights on the road between those locations. Any recommendations on where we should stop?

I dont expect to have a BUNCH of time, but would like to do a little sightseeing along the way.

recommendations on stopover destinations?

thanks all,

shane

I would look at staying around Houston or Smithers on a trip like that. It is beautiful country, around Houston you start to get back into the mountains. Terrace is great too but by then you are less than 2 hours from Prince Rupert. I would avoid Prince George and some of the places in the interior, Vanderhoof is pretty good. Not sure what to recommend on the other side of Prince George.

gerrygoat;
Good morning to you sir, my goodness it's frosty down here - for the sunny south anyway - so I hope you're enjoying being warmer than us and keeping well.

I'm going off of a faulty memory here as the last time we camped in Prince George was in the early '90's, but from what I hear I do believe there are better spots to stop overnight along the way.

If one's vehicle is a tad thirsty then I would suggest that Ace's practice of having a few 5 gallon cans of fuel along would make me feel better as it's a bit of a stretch sometimes between fuel ups.

For the folks who've not traveled here across the medicine line a whole lot, cell service can be spotty between towns still, but our Garmin GPS works everywhere we've driven in BC for the last 3 years since we bought it.

Lastly while there are exceptions, in general our diesel fuel is very good up here - based on taking our Cummins powered pickup down the Oregon coast a few years back, I would stack our low sulfur pump diesel against anything we found in Washington or Oregon.

Gasoline is a bit of a matter of what your motor likes, but a few of ours don't like the Husky lower octane gas - maybe it's the 10% ethanol - but for instance my wife's Forester detests it in summer as did a '99 F150.

Anyway sir, again that's all I can think of right now until the coffee kicks in and the house heats up.... -14° C right now here and we're not used to that!

All the best to you all this year gerrrygoat.

Dwayne