Where the Prince wanted to stay

Copyright 2006 Lydia Hinshaw

LIARD HOT SPRINGS, B.C. -- Since I've traveled the Alaska Highway before, I like to think I have some familiarity with the experience.
I believe this is called hubris.
It has gotten me into plenty of trouble this week.
In June of 1999, in what I then thought of as the adventure of a lifetime, I rode the Alaska Highway on my bicycle with a tour group. We averaged 70 miles per day, traveling north to south, and a van carried our camping gear. The trip took three weeks.
This trip, it's April, and we're traveling south to north by car. I'm racing down memory lane in reverse. It is a completely different road and I know nothing about it.
Take Fort Nelson, B.C. I figured we'd stay in Fort Nelson our first night on the highway Monday, because it's about 300 miles up the road and because I'd stayed there on a day off from the bike tour. I didn't remember anything bad about it.
In fact, after five straight rainy June days on a bike with no access to a washing machine, Fort Nelson looked like paradise. Monday, after six hours of perfect weather in a late-model car, Fort Nelson looked like hell.
The place was suffering from incongruous twin plagues of blowing dust and standing water. Prince Charming opened the window of our thoroughly adequate and reasonably priced motel room and I immediately noticed grit on my computer keyboard.
Out on the dusty streets, we had to be careful not to walk too near the curb lest a passing pickup douse us with a snow-melt wake.
The promised free wireless Internet service at the motel wouldn't work and the owners didn't know how to fix it. We spent a long evening in front of the television with the windows closed. The dust had provoked a violent protest from Prince Charming's allergies.
I, of course, got all the credit for this fiasco. All I could do was promise that things would be better tomorrow.
An they were, through no fault of my own.
About 75 miles up the road Tuesday we approached Tetsa River Guest Ranch, a place that had played a significant role in making Fort Nelson seem so nice seven years ago. We stayed in some wonderful campgrounds and some average campgrounds, on that trip, but Tetsa River was in a class by itself.
To provide us with space for our 10 tents, the owners temporarily evicted their horses, who left behind plenty to remind us just who this turf belonged to. There was one toilet and one shower for 10 guests plus the host family of four.
What little tranquility might have been salvaged from a long, cold afternoon was destroyed by the family's two young sons, who kept roaring past our tents on ATVs. Nearby, their father worked on some project that required using multiple power saws at once.
It was too cold to stay outside and too noisy to sleep. It wasn't very pleasant inside out tents anyway, since each of us was traveling with four days' worth of sweaty clothes.
I've spent seven years telling the Prince horror stories about this place. He loved it the moment he saw it. I could tell that a few improvements have been made since 1999. The place now rents out rooms.
""This is neat, why didn't we stay here last night?" whined the Prince, who found the muddy driveway and the rickety cafe-gift shop full of "character." He liked it so much he bought a T-shirt.
The ownership had changed since my last visit, but the nice lady who was running the place confided that only one bathroom was functional.
All day Tuesday we traveled a road I didn't remember. The sun was out and the views were gorgeous. In 1999, All I can remember about this three-day section of the highway is being cold and miserable and wishing that the rain would for goodness sake stop already!
Tuesday evening I redeeemed myself by choosing the Liard Hot Springs Lodge. Several friends and I had checked in here in 1999 because we were wet and cold and couldn't face pitching wet tents after cycling just over 100 miles in the rain.
The place is remote, and has just 12 rooms. Tuesday afternoon we soaked in the hot spring which is within walking distance and, this time of year, is free. We didn't have to pick a restaurant, because the Lodge is the only one for miles.
Early Wednesday morning I went back for another long soak in the hot spring. The air temperature was in the high 20s and the Prince preferred to stay warm and dry, although he came along as my bodyguard.
I'm glad he's decided to keep me around a while longer.