Day 10 - The Pacific Rim

There are no two ways about it, getting up at 4am is a crime against nature. The ferry wasn't due to sail until 07:30, but check in time was two hours before, the same as an airport. By the time we'd finished our ablutions, it was coming up on 5am, and the darkness was leeching out of the sky. We dragged our suitcases out into the carpark of the hotel, and dead on time, at 05:10, an old yellow school bus pulled up with some more tired people in it. We loaded our suitcases, loaded ourselves, and set off towards the ferry terminal, the day brightening rapidly, a lovely blue sky overhead.

The bus dropped us off at the ferry terminal where our ferry, the MV Northern Expedition, was already waiting, its great bow door lifted up to reveal the cavernous vehicle deck. We checked in, waited only half an hour, then were allowed to board. We took a lift to the 4th floor and the Purser's Office where we picked up the keys to our inside berth cabin, surely the best $85 I've spent on this holiday. We were able to dump all our baggage and go for an exploratory walk around this huge ferry.

The Northern Expedition was commissioned by BC Ferries and joined the group in 2009 in time for the summer season. At an average speed of 19 knots, the Northern Expedition covers the 272 nautical miles from Port Hardy to Prince Rupert in about 15 hours. The vessel accommodates 600 passengers and 130 vehicles. There are two restaurants, cinema facilities, lounges and seating areas, and 55 "staterooms" or cabins, of which we'd got one.

We were eating breakfast (scrambled eggs, Canadian bacon, hash browns and toast, with a slice of orange on the side so we didn't get scurvy) when the ferry slipped its moorings five minutes early, and began to steam (diesel?) its way out of Port Hardy. We finished breakfast and made our way to Deck 7 to watch the port town vanish slowly into the distance. The sky was blue, the air crystal clear and fresh, the scenery, as ever, glorious and pine-covered. We watched together for a while, saw a lone killer whale blowing and waving its dorsal fin in a last goodbye from Port Hardy, then Sandra went back to the cabin to catch up on some of the 14 hours sleep she requires every day.

I remained on deck, at the back (aft) of Deck 7, on my own for the most part. A lot of people seemed to have retired somewhere to doze, though there were a few people in the seating area below me on Deck 6. I found a plastic chair of my own and sat watching the scenery change.

After about an hour I got up and walked to the starboard side of the craft. The Canadian mainland had appeared, huge and expansive, stretching out into the impossible distance. On the port side the tip of Vancouver Island slid away, and there was a sight I'd longed to behold. Just a line really, a straight line between sea and sky. Nothing remarkable in itself, you might think. This was my first sight of the Pacific Ocean, the largest ocean on the planet. At that latitude there's nothing else until you get to Russia. On the one side of me I had the second largest country on the planet, on the other I had the largest ocean. It was an emotional moment.

I watched for a long time, frankly awed at the spectacle around me. I've never seen anything like it, a landscape of such size and grandieur. On the plains of Alberta you are aware of great distance until the ground is taken away from you; here the ground keeps throwing up another mountain, and another, and another. It sounds odd, but the distance never stops. You might almost believe the world is flat.

In the end, physically tired and emotionally battered, I went back down to the cabin and caught up on some sleep myself.

A couple of hours later we were both up on Deck 7 again. We had turned into the Inside Passage itself now, threading our way between the Canadian mainland and the islands that dot the coast here. The landscape was ever changing; now close, a wall of fir trees, now distant, with rolling hills, and now with snow-capped mountains. Small lighthouses are dotted around the dangerous areas, and occasionally - very occasionally - we came across small townships. Lumber towns for the most part - the British Columbian forests provide 25% of North America's lumber needs, and the industry generates about $10 billion annually, more than all of the province's other industries combined.

The weather was so good that they announced a bbq on Deck 6, so we had a lunch of hotdog (Sandra) and smokey (me) in the two chairs we'd now commandeered in the aft area of Deck 7. After lunch we sat and read for ages in the sunshine, then I got talking to an interesting Chinese-born American who was on holiday from Seattle with his wife ("You're English? How come you're wearing a Canadian hat?" "To keep the sun off my head.").

Sunburn becoming a problem, we retreated to our cabin for a little while, then returned to aft Deck 7 to watch the ferry enter Granville Channel, the narrowest part of the Inside Passage. It was 6:30pm, we'd been on the go for eleven hours and were now four hours from Prince Rupert. We went back to the restaurant for something to eat, and then I had a shower and a shave in the well-appointed cabin, not because I had to, but because I could (well okay, I did have to).

By the last hour of the journey the scenery had again battered us into submission. The sun was just setting, turning the landscape green and gold, as the ferry turned into Prince Rupert harbour and docked. We caught a taxi to our hotel ("How much?" "Eight bucks." "Hell, I'm not going to haggle with that."), and got to our room not 25 minutes ago, at 11:15pm (I'd typed most of this blog up on the ferry).

Now it's time for a beer and a relax I think. We're staying in Prince Rupert tonight and tomorrow night, so I reckon a day of mooching and laundry is in the offing.