You can start the trail a number of places. We started at a trailhead in the campground just a few spaces away from our site. The woods here are full of old cottonwoods covered with moss that anyone with much imagination might make into faces.
But this is a very special place and if you look hard at the bark at eye level in the trees along the trail you’ll actually find faces carved in the trees. In fact, there are said to be over 50 of them hidden along the trail. We found over half of them and it turned out we were going backwards on the trail so we feel pretty good about it.
Here's the sign that appears at the beginning of the trail (which of course we found when we were all done).
Most of the carvings are smaller than your hand. There are a few that are large including 2 large owls, a face in a snag and a large head carved by a German carver.
Here are the carvings we saw in the order we saw them.
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In addition to all those lovely carvings there were patches of wild flowers too. Including lupine that was just starting to open. There was paint brush too but my photos of it didn't come out.
And there was a great deal Mountain Ash coming into bloom too.
There are also great views of the Skeena River. This is a view looking west from the island.
And this is from the tip of the island looking south.
And finally at the end of our hike this is looking east.
The next morning we set out to drive the last ninety miles to catch the ferry in Prince Rupert. First we stopped and used the dump station next to the Terrace Visitor's Center. This lovely carved eagle is mounted on the side of the building there.
Here's our route today from Terrace to Prince Rupert and then on to Ketchikan via the ferry.
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This section of the Yellowhead Highway is considered a scenic highway and I wouldn’t argue with that. I had thought that the drive through the Hazelton Mountains had been wonderful. But this drive is even better. The Skeena River follows a broad low valley through the heart of the coastal mountains which were still snow-covered. The only problem? Almost no turn outs for photos. So I took photos of the waterfalls and mountain views from the car through the windows.
You can see from this why I couldn’t let these views escape.
There are lots of wonderful waterfalls cascading down the steep mountain faces too.
I loved the look this mountain with it's great bowl full of snow.
It was amazing how the gorgeous views just kept coming. Imagine what this might look like if it weren't raining and the sky was clear?
There was one wonderful turnout just before Prince Rupert dedicated to the Skeena River. I took this panorama shot there.
We rolled into Prince Rupert with enough time to shop for dinner at the deli at the Safeway and have lunch at Roosevelt Park in the upper section of town and still check-in at the ferry at 2:45.
The ferries are very different than the ones you see in the Puget Sound area. Here in Prince Rupert we loaded onto our ferry, the Taku, through the back (like normal) but there’s no way to drive out the front. Instead in all the Alaskan ports they off-load you out the side doors.
Loading is quite the complicated process because the Taku stops at 5 ports on it’s way up the Inside Passage. So they not only have to fit all the cars, RVs, and big trucks on the ferry, they have to fit them on in such a way that they can get off easily when they reach their appropriate ports. AND they have to keep the weight balanced on the ship. They make you check in 3 hours ahead of time when you have a vehicle, mostly so they can figure out how to load everyone but also because you have to go through US Customs first. We got through customs without a problem and got to wait until 5:30 to be loaded. Meanwhile I walked to the front of the line and took a picture of the Taku.
Climbing up the stairs from the car deck I noticed this brass plate identifying the vessel.
Once we were up on the passenger deck we saw a group of people paddling a dragon boat go by. Turns out the local First Nation folks take the tourists out for a paddle for a fee.
At long last the ferry left dock and we slowly made our way south (yes south) out of the port of Prince Rupert.
Once we cleared the port they turned west and finally turned northward up the Inland Passage. As the evening progressed the weather cleared more and more. Here’s a view of the way things looked about 2 hours out (at 7 pm Alaska time).
This is a panorama shot at about the same time of day.
Dusk crept up very slowly coloring the sky with tinges of pink.
Sunset began at about 9:30 and lasted until nearly 11 pm. The sun would set behind a mountain and then we’d move northward and it would be out again and then set and we’d go north and it would set again. The sun is getting ready to set just to the left in this shot.
And here I managed to get little bit of the sun in with it's track across the water.
Here the sun is setting for the first time. Imagine that as we go north it peeks out from behind the mountain and starts to sink again.
At 10:45, just before we came into port I went out on deck one more time and caught the moon shining on the water to the east.
And the last bits of twilight to the west.
We arrived in Ketchikan at 11:00 pm Alaska Time (12:00 our time) and were the first vehicle off the ferry. I just had to make a wide turn to get up the ramp on the front right exit. The we motored up the road a little bit and spent the night in the WalMart parking lot.
In Part IV, we'll take you around Ketchikan for 3 great days of adventures.