Broken Shifter

Aiden and I were intending to head out of Calgary tomorrow morning and continue our journey through Alberta. I had lost the ability to shift into my top gear on the on my front chain ring and when I was doing a little bit of a bike tune up today I broke the mechanism in my shift lever. To make a long story short, the bike store has to order in the part, but the guy was nice enough to jump me in the queue, so the bike will be ready on Tuesday. The repair is going to be pricey, but at I’ll least have a back up shifter (they are only sold in pairs) for the side that is apparently more likely to break. Calgary has been great, as we’ve been getting quite a bit of relaxing in. Aiden and I saw our friends Courtney and Curtis from Saudi, JD from Brentwood who we hadn’t seen in a long time, and I’ve been visiting with family. We’ll get to hangout for a couple more days before really getting back into it. If it wasn’t for the horrendous bill at the bike store, breaking the lever wouldn’t have been so bad…

In Calgary for a bit after Slaying the Rockies

So yesterday we got up pretty early at Maycroft Park on Highway 22 (or the Cowboy Trail) in Alberta. We had breakfast while watching a pair of deer cruise along beside the river. While biking we had a good weather and a sweet tailwind at some points as we could rip up several inclines at 30 kph. So we made the 159 kms to Calgary in the same time it took us to do 120 kms the previous day. And there was a lot of a ups and downs since we were right in the foothills. I guess the 159 km day is close to 100 miles or a century using Yankee style measuring so that's a first for us.

The day before we got Tyler's spoke replaced in Fernie and battled a vicious headwind (average speed was 13kph on flat terrain) up to Sparwood where we saw a unique 350 ton restored coal truck that was billed as the world's largest truck. The pictures will be up soon but since I was half as tall as one of the wheel- it was pretty big.

The summit of the Crowsnest Pass denotes the BC/Alberta border. Getting over that was bit of a joke. The climb was maybe 200 metres. Pretty small considering the 1000 metres+ climbs of Anarchist and Paulsen. Still it was a great sense of accomplishment when we finally crossed out of BC. The headwind didn't help but that switched in our favour about five kilometres into Alberta. One of our stops was at Frank's Slide where part of the mountain collapsed and buries much of the mining town was destroyed. Most of the rubble is still there but I guess you can't do much to move a field of giant boulders.

And now we are in Calgary for a couple of days. My bike needs a tune-up for sure: mostly the gears and the front brakes. Tyler has already gotten new front racks for his panniers. And my tent desperately needs a new zipper. I've had that tent up for at least 10 months while I was working planting jobs in the wilderness during the past three years. So I shouldn't be too surprised that it is showing its age.

It'll be good to rest for a while but I'm already looking forward to hitting the prairies.

Among the Giants

Yesterday we were in Cranbrook- home of the WHL's Kootney Ice ( yah, I had never heard of them either)- where you can see the Rockies proper. It was good to finally see them after grinding over the Coastal, Interior, and Kootney ranges. Now we are in Fernie which is surrounded by the Rockies. and that is even better then just seeing the Rockies from a distance. This will be our last night in BC as the Alberta border is just 50 kilometres away at the top of the Crownest Pass. Luckily the highway follows a railroad so the grade should be fairly relaxed and the climb should not be as crazy as Anarchist or Paulsen. We can't leave super early tomorrow because Tyler has been trucking along with a busted spoke so that has to be repaired here in Fernie. Cranbrook unsurprisingly did not have a bike store open on Sunday. But we are still roughly on schedule and we hope to be in Calgary the day after tomorrow.

In other news we have been ripping along since Nelson- three century days in a row on ground that is not exactly flat. We had a day off in Nelson at Tyler's uncle's place which was sweet. He took us to the Ainsworth Hot Springs- the caves and the icy plunge afterwards really helped my muscles which had been pretty dead up to that point. Unfortunately, Creston's Columbia Brewery (Home of Kokanee) does not have tours on Saturdays but we did get a few pictures with their Sasquatch statue.

Time for bed now as we want to go 'balls out' tomorrow.

P.S. My facial hair (well, at least my mustache) is destroying the competition.

Progress as expressed in a table.

For those who are interested in the stops and distances of our trek so far this post will show that. It will complement our ever growing line on the map.

May 10- Mile 0 (Victoria) to Brentwood College School (Mill Bay) 45.0 km
May 11- Mill Bay to Nanimo 94.9 km
May 13- Nanimo to Aldergrove via Horseshoe Bay Ferry 103.0 km
May 14- Aldergrove to Kilbe Park 63.8 km
May 15- Kilbe Park to Manning Park West Gate via Hope 79.8 km
May 16- Manning Park West Gate to Hampton Campsite 49.6 km
May 17- Hampton to Kemeros via Princeton 137.3 km
May 18- Kemeros to Johnstone Creek Park 97.6 km
May 19- Johnstone Creek Park to Grand Forks via Greenwood 85.0 km
May 20- Grand Forks to Castlegar 96.7 km
May 21- Castlegar to Nelson 46.7 km
May 23- Nelson to Creston 120.5 km
May 24- Creston to Cranbrook 107.9 km
May 25- Cranbrook to Fernie 104.0 km

Paulson Summit

What started out as a nice ride out of Grand Forks, turned into a can't feel my fingers/feet and am going to boost down the other side of the mountain as quick as possible to the promise of a warm shower. The Paulson summit was a 1535 meters, so it was officially the tallest mountain we've cycled up. Our original plan was to camp at a park near the summit, and then ride down the next day to Nelson. The camp ground turned out to not be open yet for the season (first one we came across in BC) but this was probably for the best, as setting up camp wet and cold would not have been a fun endeavor. At point there was so much rain coming down that the shoulder of the highway turned into a stream of water and gravel, needless to say, it wasn't the most pleasant couple of hours of cycling I've ever done. Instead we sprung for a hotel room in Castlegar--the first big town down the mountain--had a warm shower, drank some beer, and ate some pizza. Not so shabby. Right now Aiden and I are taking a rest day in Nelson, and are staying at my Uncle's house. A couple big days left in BC and then we will be onto the prairies.

Anarchy in the BC Interior!

Anarchist Mountain kicked our asses yesterday. It was not so much super steep but it just never stopped. Osoyoos to the Anarchist Summit (1233 metres) was 30 kilometres; at least 25 of those K's we riding on some degree of uphill. On the plus side we pretty much coasted all the way to Johnstone Creek Park. And today we had a steep 7 km downhill to jumpstart our day so that's alright. We are hanging out at the Greenwood Museum and going to hit up Grand Forks tonight. Greenwood is "BC's Smallest City" and the filming location for "Snow Falling On Ceders" because it was the site of large scale World War II Japanese-Canadian internment. They also have decent butter tarts (though Tyler has a poor opinion of the greatest of pasteries).

Into the Mountains

Today started early, we were out and heading to Hope by shortly after 8:00 AM. The ride from Kilby to Hope was a good one, we finished off the rest of the Peter Loughead Highway and were in Hope by lunchtime (~50 k). We would have been in quite a bit early had it not been for the mechanical failure on my bike. Aiden and I were riding along this nice flat strectch of road when I heard this metalic 'ping.' At first I thought it was a spoke that had gone on my front wheel, but when looking down it was aparent that a weld on the rack which holds one of my front paniers had snapped and was causing the panier to dangle dangerously close to the spokes. Aiden did a first rate repair job with some duct tape, we noticed that the rack on the other side was showing fatigue on the weld in the same spot so we tapped that up too. We needed to pick up some more brake pads in Hope before entering the mountains so I thought I'd ask the guy for a front rack also. To my disguist they were selling the identical front racks, needless to say, I did not buy them. Probably will try a different brand at the next bike store I see and send these ones to the bike store in Ottawa to try and get my money back...
Leaving Hope to Sunshine Valley was quite the treck. It was 20+ kms of virtually all uphil cycling with the last 6 kms at a 7-8% grade. Aiden and I were rather proud of ourselves, we got up the last part with stopping only four times. The plan was to find a camp site in Sunshine Valley, because we knew for sure that the next one was halfway through Manning Park, so a distance we weren't prepared to be cycling. It seemed luck was just not with us today, Sunshine Valley was devoid of anysort of camground, so we were forced to through up our tent just off the highway and a picknick area at the enterance of Manning Park. Despite those two hick ups the day was great, clear skies the whole way, and some really nice roads to ride on.

UPDATE: We are now a fair ways into the interior, I am updating this from the sidewalk infront of a closed coffee shop (stupid long weeked) in Osoyoos and it is cookin' outside. Next time I get internet look out for some new pictures, off to Anarchist summit now...

The Party is Over...

Now our trip begins in earnest. Even though we have gone over 250 kilometres- more if you add our Sooke daytrip- it feels like we are starting all over. Tonight we will be the first night we have to bust out our campstove and our tent. The fact that it has been raining for a day and a half doesn't help.

The past few days have been great though- we have been meeting and staying with a lot of people we haven't seen for a long time. In Vic we stayed at our buddy Adrian's house. Tyler hadn't seen him for four years. Barbaque for every meal defintly increased our nuritional health. We parted ways at Mile 0 in Vic. There was a nice bike trail that went up the Sannich. The Ferry was a good call- defintly more safe skipping the Malahat.

It was awesome going back to Brentwood. Though it was weird since we only know about 8 students there now so we knew more teachers. We stayed in Ellis House with the Hardies who gave us a great dinner. We also saw our former houseparents the McCarthys for the first time in four years.

After a Sunday Brunch at the cafeteria we headed up to Nanimo where my former roomate Allan and his family lives. They were great hosts and we stayed an extra day there as well. The ride to Nanimo was 94 K and pretty challenging in parts.

Yesterday we hit the Mainland at Horseshoe Bay and rode into Vancouver via the Lionsgate Bridge and Stanely Park. The total distance to Aldergrove that day was 103 km which happened to be done all in the rain-Good to be back on the Lower Mainland. We stayed at my aunt Maggie's who I hadn't seen in 2 years. The hot shower after the wet biking was pretty key. And dinner continued out week long streak of BBQs.

Now we are off to Kilbe Park. Thanks to everyone who hosted us and it great catching up with everyone.

Start Tomorrow

Alright, we are rolling out on Saturday to our alma mater- Brentwood College School. We are going there via the Brentwood Bay to Mill Bay ferry which skips the kinda sketch Malahat section and makes for a leisurely first day. We were planning to start today but my Greyhound delivered bike just arrived here after ten days on the road. Only a few parts were bent but we fixed her up real good. We are both stoked to begin. Let the journey begin, eh?

So it begins...

Aiden and I have been planning this bike trip for a while, so it is a little overwhelming to think that a week today we’ll be cycling somewhere along the Lougheed Highway in the Lower Mainland. Looking back at all those hours spent on a stationary bike in Ottawa I can only think how nice great it’ll be to actually get going on our trans-Canada trek. We are planning on starting May 9th in Sooke, on Vacouver Island, and finishing sometime in August in St. John’s, Newfoundland. All told we should put around 8,000 kms on the bikes heading through all ten provinces. If you think we’ll have a chance to cross paths with you on the trip let us know and we’ll try and set something up. Back to boxing up the bike and camping gear!