Next Town in British Columbia

Sometimes I completely forget that I was born on an island. Walking around the City, I often get overwhelmed by all shops, restaurants, and busy pedestrians walking by me and smiling when I wave hello to them with my tiny hand. I never really see the water unless we're really making an effort to find it.

In our Flatiron neighborhood back home, within a 10 minute walk, you can get to just about every kind of store or restaurant you can imagine (except for In-N-Out Burger). The density of people and places is just amazing. But at the same time, sometimes I feel like I'm trapped in a concrete jungle and want to venture out to the boonies (aka, Brooklyn/Jersey).

However, crossing a bridge or tunnel never really gets you that far from the world we know and love. So we decided to take advantage of being out on the Northwest Coast this past weekend. We had no real plans on Saturday, so we were deciding between exploring the island town of Prince Rupert (population of 13,000) or drive to the closest town on the mainland, Terrace.

As exciting as the downtown Prince Rupert scene is with their 1 movie theater, McDonalds and new Walmart, I voted to drive out to the next town. But for those of you LCD readers who live in the Northeast, getting from one town to the next isn't the same as it would be going from Hoboken to Jersey City.

No no no. We were in the real boonies. Being 18 months old, I still don't have a great sense of time or distance, but my father tells me that the 150 km (93 mile) drive takes about 1.5 hours. Yes, you heard me right. Almost 100 miles to the next closest town!


Not only does the drive take 90 minutes, but there are no gas stations at all until you reach Terrace. Also, along most of the drive, there's absolutely no cell phone service. And I'm not talking "1 bar, I'm in an elevator" kind of no service. I'm talking "this phone is useless" kind of no service. So yeah, not a place you want to run out of gas or have a flat tire.

And to be honest, even when you get to Terrace after making such an effort, it's not all that impressive. While, they do have a Staples, Tim Hortons, and a Taco Bell, we found that the cosmopolitan Terrace wasn't going to be confused for Paris or Hong Kong anytime soon. Though, I did get to enjoy some nice kiddie rides at the "shopping mall" (if you can call 7 stores connected by an interior walkway a mall). And did I mention that they close at 6PM?
However, what made our day amazing wasn't the destination, but the journey itself. Taking a closer look on the map, you can see that the route is right along the river through a range of mountainous terrain.

> Along those 93 miles of highway, was some of the most stunning natural scenery you can imagine. As my mom would say, it was just like the background in the Twilight movies!