Canada’s train that takes hitchhikers

Compared with Canada’s more celebrated routes, the Skeena is far lesser known. But it’s one of the world’s most beautiful rail journeys – and remains vital for local communities.

A line of SUVs ground to a halt, horns sounding out before the reason for the hold-up became clear: a mule deer and her fawn trotted between the traffic, then hopped onto the pavement and carried on in the direction of the train station. I was in downtown Jasper in Alberta, Canada, a mountain town that’s reminiscent of a ski village, with wandering elk and gift shops selling bear spray at the counter.

Located in the middle of Jasper National Park, the alpine town of just 4,200 residents is a major junction on some of Canada’s greatest railway routes. Both The Canadian (a transcontinental passenger train from Vancouver to Toronto) and the luxury Rocky Mountaineer (whose routes include scenic trains in Western Canada and the Canadian Rockies) are a regular feature of the landscape, their carriages dwarfed by peaks gathered like a group of elders.

But there’s a third, lesser-known train that departs Jasper three times a week, pulling passengers into the farthest depths of British Columbia. Completed by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway in 1914, the line spans 1,160km, linking Jasper to Prince Rupert, a port city on Canada’s north-west coast. Known locally as the “Skeena” or the “Rupert Rocket”, VIA Rail’s Train 5 takes two days to make the journey, with an overnight stop in the city of Prince George. Compared with Canada’s more celebrated routes, it’s virtually unknown by international tourists, but is one of the world’s most beautiful train journeys – one that provides a major lifeline to local communities.

The Skeena’s two-day journey links Jasper to Prince Rupert (Credit: Via Rail)

It was a glorious autumn afternoon when I boarded the Skeena: the sky was electric blue, the Rockies sparkling in the sun as we rolled out of Jasper and rapidly picked up pace. In the carriage vestibule, the top half of the door latched like a stable door, so I swung it open as a tornado of cotton wool spun past – dandelion heads carried off by the wind. Curling around the Fraser River – home to coho, chinook, pink and sockeye salmon – we caught the attention of a lone angler in waders who waved up from the beach-like bank. Over the first hour, turquoise rapids roared trackside, golden eagles soared and the sharp scent of balsam fir and pine whipped through the open doorways.

Tracy MacLean, the service manager on board, announced the approach to Moose Lake, which was as clear as a sheet of glass, the forest reflecting onto its perfect surface. Running tight to rock faces slicked with walls of ice, we rounded a curve to find Mount Robson rising through the blue, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies. With bundles of cloud at the summit, it resembled a volcano venting steam, glaciers grazing its sides.

In between oxbow lakes, banks of yellow snapdragons and feathery fingers of conifer stroking the sides of the train, there were regular signs of the area’s industrial past – and present – where gold panners, sternwheelers, farmers and fishermen made up many of the communities dotted along the line. However, it is First Nations reserves that dominate here between abandoned sawmills, quarries and towns called Penny and Dunster, where double-digit populations reside around little more than a post office and a petrol station.

The train passes Moose Lake on the way to Prince George, where the train stops for the night (Credit: Kelly Fletcher/Getty Images)

The train passes Moose Lake on the way to Prince George, where the train stops for the night (Credit: Kelly Fletcher/Getty Images)

Late in the afternoon, while passengers were dozing or scanning for moose and caribou, the train began to slow, coming to an abrupt halt by a forest. There was murmuring down the carriage and a few passengers craned their necks to see if there had been a wildlife sighting when the train eased off again. As a flag-stop service, the Skeena had stopped to collect a mushroom picker who wandered out from the trees and flagged down the train.

“We’re the only source of transportation to get in and out of remote areas,” said MacLean, explaining that the engineers and the staff always have a heads-up and look for regulars who get on and off the train: hermits, remote dwellers and fishermen. “Just before we drop them off, they’ll say: ‘I think I’ll be coming out of the bush a week next Friday, have an eye for me.’ I then communicate that with the engineers, they take note and watch for the individual at that point.”

She added: “On one of my last trips, I picked up two hunters who were lost and couldn’t find their way back to their truck. They could hear the train, so they went down to the tracks: when they got on, they were filthy, very cold, hungry, and just so happy to see mankind that I didn’t even charge them.”

As a flag-stop service, the Skeena will stop to pick people up anywhere along the route (Credit: Via Rail)

As a flag-stop service, the Skeena will stop to pick people up anywhere along the route (Credit: Via Rail)

As the sun began to drop, turning the lakes to molten lava, the train slowed into Prince George for its obligatory stopover. After most passengers disembarked, tourists filtering off into nearby hotels, I spoke to train engineer Ed Neis and discovered that the Skeena was once an overnight service. “We had a cook car on here, we had roomettes at the back, it was beautiful. I think they phased it out in 1993,” said Neis. “The downturn in the economy was bad, and so the railways got together with the local mayors and made an agreement with these communities to bring business to them. They agreed that this train would stop over in Prince George. If we put it straight through again, the ridership would shoot up.”

The following morning, the train set off while passengers were having breakfast, following the curves of the Nechako River, a major tributary to the Fraser River that swung back into view beneath mounds of white froth and fizz. At the town of Smithers, a number of First Nations women boarded the train and, after a lull in the journey, MacLean mentioned the Highway of Tears – a 725km stretch of road that runs parallel to the tracks. Since the 1950s, a number of young women have gone missing while hitchhiking between Smithers (where the locals are known as Smithereens) and Prince Rupert, owing to poverty and a severe lack of public transport along Highway 16 other than a twice-weekly bus.

Official figures suggest that the number is around 20, but families and community activists estimate that it’s more than 50 women who have disappeared or been found dead. According to MacLean: “If you’re a young woman in northern British Columbia and you choose to hitchhike on Highway 16 east or west out of Prince George, you can kiss your loved ones goodbye. Indigenous people hop on and off this train to go to gatherings and events or there’s no other way but that bus.”

Kwinitsa Train Station is the old train station in Prince Rupert (Credit: Christa Boaz/Getty Images)

Kwinitsa Train Station is the old train station in Prince Rupert (Credit: Christa Boaz/Getty Images)

As we rumbled across fragile bridges, I glanced down at teal bodies of water flowing beneath the tracks while other passengers scanned the forests for grizzlies and black bears. Just as we passed Kwinitsa station, I spied a small black bear bounding away from the tracks and realised that what was becoming one of the greatest journeys of my life is just a regular commute for another.

Towards mid-afternoon, the eponymous Skeena River emerged from the north and stayed tight to the train, cheering it on to the finish line. Taking its name from the indigenous Gitxsan band, meaning “river of mists”, the Skeena River thrashed through canyons and passed through mountains before it finally peeled away from the train and poured into the Pacific Ocean, leaving us to journey into Prince Rupert alone.

Monisha Rajesh is the author of Around the World in 80 Trains

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