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Route update · September 27

The walk now goes through Tsawwassen, and is back on schedule in Victoria

See the route, stop by stop

North to the Peace Arch

Day 17 · Scheduled earlier

Elgin, Surrey

Elgin, South Surrey, British Columbia

Across the Peace Arch to Elgin

This day on the route

Planned date
The day
Walking
Planned walking
8.6 miles

Day 17: 8.6 planned walking miles across the Peace Arch border to Elgin, Surrey. Jeana walked across on September 23, a day later than first planned.

Route overview, not turn-by-turn directions.

Gouache illustration of the white Peace Arch above a park path. A tiny walker in coral passes beneath its rounded opening, framed by autumn trees and flower beds.
Peace Arch, on the planned stage to Elgin, Surrey. Illustration.

The crossing to Elgin, Surrey, was planned for September 22, 2026, World Marrow Donor Day. Jeana rested in Blaine that day with a cold and walked across the border on September 23. The land stage carries 8.6 planned walking miles.

The itinerary crosses the international boundary at Peace Arch and continues to Elgin in South Surrey. September 22, 2026 was both the planned date for this stage and the date on the official World Marrow Donor Day website. As it turned out, Jeana was resting in Blaine with a cold on World Marrow Donor Day, and she walked across the Peace Arch border into Surrey on September 23.

Elgin has its own history of crossing and connection. The City of Surrey’s account describes a way station on the Semiahmoo Trail and an 1865 telegraph line crossing the Nicomekl River. River transport and the building of dykes helped shape the farms along its banks. The Stewart farmhouse, built in 1894 on land John Stewart bought in 1880, preserves part of that late-nineteenth-century landscape.

The campaign’s family story also crosses a border. Jada Bascom’s donor, Torsten Huber, was registered in Germany before her birth. His marrow was used for her transplant in Washington. A decision he made before her birth became part of her family’s story across the Atlantic.

Readers can find registration information through the organization serving their home country or province. NMDP provides the United States process; Canadian Blood Services directs Canadian applicants outside Québec, and Québec residents are directed to Héma-Québec. Each organization sets its own eligibility and consent requirements.

From the road

Over the border on foot, and into Canada

This was the day she walked over the border into Canada. Two days of rest behind her, and the cold not quite gone, she decided she could manage a short walk up to Elgin, in South Surrey, British Columbia.

At the crossing they asked a great many questions, making sure she was really doing what she said she was doing: walking to encourage people to join a stem cell and bone marrow donor registry — in Canada, the Canadian Blood Services Stem Cell Registry. They looked at the Foundation’s website, and then they understood her intention and her purpose.

It was a short day, just under five miles with the pack, and she found a Best Western to rest in. Her muscles were still achy and she was not back to full strength, so she wanted to be gentle with her body.

After checking in she rested, and then took some of the next day off the front of it. Eleven miles were planned, so she walked three up the route and three back without the backpack, which would help her immensely in the morning.

She talked to several people along the way and explained that her purpose is to encourage people to become potential donors, and how they can join through Canadian Blood Services. The tag round her neck does the work: people photograph the QR code, and it takes them to a link on the Jada Bascom Foundation website to join the Canadian Blood Services Stem Cell Registry.

People have been generous. She walked into a pizza shop and asked whether she could sit at a table for a moment after using the restroom. The proprietor nodded, and then asked whether she would like a piece of pizza. She happily accepted. It was delicious.

I rely on the generosity of others for my food and my housing.

Jeana Moore
A red-framed notice board in the Peace Arch park, headed Peace Arch Centennial Commemoration, welcoming visitors in several languages.An interpretive panel headed May These Gates Never Be Closed, with a drawing of the Peace Arch and an archive photograph of the crowd at its dedication.A misty morning over the water at the border, a long line of rust-red freight boxcars with graffiti on them standing on the track along the shore, a road and a white car below, and a wooded headland in the distance.The lawns of the Peace Arch park under a grey sky, a long bed planted in blocks of red and white flowers, and tall lamp posts behind it.Jeana in a knitted hat and hi-vis vest, her pack on, smiling into the camera with the Peace Arch on the grass behind her.The Peace Arch itself, white against the trees, the words CHILDREN OF A COMMON MOTHER carved across it.A tall sign reading Welcome, British Columbia, Canada, with The Best Place on Earth running down its blue edge, against a green cedar hedge.Jeana beside the British Columbia welcome sign, her pack on, smiling into the camera.A curving divided highway with a pickup truck heading away along it, toward big white letters on a black band across a grassy slope reading WELCOME TO SURREY, with flags, evergreens and a red-leaved tree behind.A yellow and white roadside sign reading TRUCKS - BUSES, To USA Border, NEXT EXIT, with truck and bus symbols and a highway 15 shield, standing in dry grass before a wall of trees under grey cloud.A concrete sidewalk running beneath a row of tall evergreens with mulch at their feet, beside a wide road where a white taxi and other cars pass, as a person carrying a yellow bag walks toward the camera.A weathered heritage panel headed King George Highway, Part of Surrey’s Built Heritage, with a section titled Connecting Two Nations beside a hand-drawn 1940 map of the highway’s route.A yellow section of a roadside heritage panel headed Naming the Highway: King George VI, beside an archive photograph captioned King George VI and Queen Elizabeth at Port Mann, June 1939.A broad, spreading tree with a thick, furrowed trunk and many heavy limbs on a grassy verge, evergreen shrubs and part of a house behind it, and a short wooden post at its foot labelled English Oak.
The walk so far, Seattle to the borderA short film of the first two and a half weeks, made as she reached the Peace Arch.Watch it on YouTube
Distance walked
10.2 miles
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Sources

Local history and background reading for this stop.

  1. World Marrow Donor Day 2026 — checked Sep 5, 2026
  2. Farm Kids teacher notes — checked Sep 5, 2026
  3. Stewart Farmhouse — checked Sep 5, 2026
  4. Jada, Torsten and the reason for the walk — checked Sep 25, 2026
  5. Join the donor registry — checked Sep 5, 2026
  6. Stem cell donation eligibility and registration — checked Sep 5, 2026
The flyer: STOP BLOOD CANCER set in tall letters over a dark plum page, a quote, and a QR code beside a text-to-join line for the U.S.One standing face of the table tent: the same headline and quote on the left, a large QR code on the right.

Take it off the screen

Print it. Put it where people already stand.

A coffee counter, a church foyer, a break room, a race table. Every sheet carries the code that opens Jeana’s walk, and a number to text for anyone who would rather not scan — no app, no wifi, nothing to hand back.Every sheet carries the code that opens Jeana’s walk — nothing to install, nothing to hand back. The number to text printed beside it is for joining NMDP, which registers people who live in the U.S., its territories and the freely associated states. If you live anywhere else, find your country’s registry.

Everything else for running a drive

Rather be the one at the table?

Host a registration drive at your school, work or place of worship, raise funds, or lend a skill. Tell us what you have in mind and we will help you plan it.

Ways to volunteerHost a registration drive