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Bella Coola Valley |
The
Bella Coola Valley in the heart of the
Great Bear Rainforest of British Columbia, is worthy of national park status for its natural beauty. It is a wide, non-claustrophobic valley, framed by mountains, glaciers, and waterfalls. It is accessed on the eastern end by a dirt highway with hairpin turns but no guard rails leading up "
The Hill" to Highway 20 and then to the
Chilcotin Plataeau and interior of British Columbia. At the western end is the charming and unassuming First Nations town of Bella Coola, which can be accessed only by boat from the Pacific Ocean via a long inlet, the
Bentinck Arm.
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Bentinck Arm near Bella Coola, BC |
We approached the valley and town on a
BC ferry from
Port Hardy on Vancouver Island. This ride was worth the journey just for the day-long view of coastal mountains, sea life, and sea scapes.
The boat was mostly wheelchair accessible. In order to change deck levels, we had to take the elevator. There was no problem going between the passenger deck (which has a cafeteria, gift shop, seats, and views), the sun deck on top, and the cabin deck (which I didn't explore, since ours was only a day trip). The entrance to the elevator on the vehicle deck, where we parked the car, however, had a very steep and narrow ramp which necessitated transferring from my power chair to a manual chair (luckily the ship had one) and making the journey to and up the elevator in a manual chair. I then waited on the passenger deck while they carried up my power chair for me to transfer back into. This only worked because I had a travel power chair, which disassembles into parts light enough to carry. Because of the complicated and arduous nature of this trip, I didn't take advantage of any of the breaks offered which opened up the vehicle deck to passenger access. Rather, I made sure to bring everything with me. I don't know whether or not other boats have this configuration. I have read that the ferry from Part Hardy to Prince Rupert offers wheelchair accessible cabins for this longer, overnight trip.
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Bella Coola townsite |
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Bella Coola harbor |
Bella Coola has numerous ramps leading to houses and businesses. The general and grocery stores are flat and accessible. There are a few all-inclusive luxury lodges in the valley. I don't know about accessibility, because the lodges were too expensive to explore. There are some campgrounds outside of town, although the presence of grizzly bears prohibited soft-sided camping arrangements (tents). Some campgrounds provide accessible outhouses, but some do not. Bella Coola has couple of cheaper motels, one of which (
Bella Coola Motel -- owned by the First Nations community) has one unit with a ramp. The inside is not accessible, however, so we took off the bathroom door to make the doorway wide enough (barely) to pass through with a narrow wheelchair, and I used the shower and commode chairs that I'd brought. The inside had a really nice "cabin" feel, with a full kitchen. The staff were extremely friendly and helpful. As with most of the lodging and tourist agencies along the way, the manager was very informal about paperwork and payment procedures.
Since we visited in October, the tours were mostly done for the year. One fjord tour might have worked with the wheelchair, but it was too windy to take out the boat on our scheduled day and then the tour was done for year. The drift boats were still operating, but they were fully booked for the week. One of them had seats with backs and thus looked possible with a bit of work and attitude.
After the decline of the forestry and the canning industries, the town and valley seem to be in the path of an oncoming wave of tourism, which is being met slowly and with many questions. The answers are made more complicated and challenging by the low salmon run experienced in the past couple of years. With few salmon, come few bears. Many bears have descended even lower into the valley, with its fruit orchards, crab pots, and small towns, in search of alternate food sources to fatten up before hibernation. For the tourist, this means fewer bears at the usual salmon-feeding locations. For the resident, this means more potential for conflict with bears. For the bear, this means less food, more potential for conflict with people, and a higher chance of death on both accounts.
We spent a few days watching bears. Because of the low salmon runs, there were only a few bears, but patience brought some good sightings.
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Belarko bear-viewing platform in Tweedsmuir Park |
The
Belarko bear-viewing platform in
Tweedsmuir Park is flat and accessible. Bears usually fished in and across the river from the platform, although some did walk right by the platform. Luckily, the platform was surrounded by electric wire and was always staffed by a local guide. The platform has no steps, and the guides even allowed disabled guests to drive from the parking lot to the platform, where they could load and pick up guests (quickly and quietly).
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Tweedsmuir Park Fisheries bear-viewing |
At the
Tweedsmuir Park Fisheries Pool, bears could be viewed in and around the pond. The Fisheries campground also boasts an accessible outhouse. Both wildlife-viewing areas are surrounded by gorgeous scenery.
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Of course this looked much worse in reality! |
We also spent a couple of days driving back roads, which opened up even more spectacular scenery of mountains, glaciers, and waterfalls. Brochures recommended a 4WD for these unpaved roads, though we soon discovered that it was really more than a recommendation, so we rented a serious high clearance 4WD truck from
Bella Coola Vehicle Rentals and were rewarded with amazing views, such as Odegard Falls, Purgatory Point, and Bentinck Inlet. Correctly guessing that there wouldn't be many outhouses or people in the back country, we brought along a commode chair, so we could go anywhere.
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Purgatory Glacier |
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Bentinck Arm |
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The Hll |
We left the valley on the eastern route, by going up "
The Hill" (unpaved) to Hechtman Pass and coming down on the paved
Highway 20 to the Chilcotin Plateau of British Columbia.
Next: Part 3 (Highways 20, 97, and 99)