Category: bikes

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bikes canada general

One last ride for the season!

Bound to leave for a visit to Australia, I wanted to get in one last good ride before we left. Was it Felix who came up with the plan to ride this route? I can’t remember now. But we set off around 8.30 on Sunday morning, up the pass, and towards the High Rockies trail.

I’d been dreaming of trying to ride the further south section, beyond Buller. Sadly the recent snowfall gazumped that plan. But we still thought we may as well see how far we could get.

Seeing how far we could get seemed to involve quite a lot of snow, from quite early on in the day. Turning off Goat Creek, we found the High Rockies trail through the dog sled area was already snowy enough to be pretty hard work. But we’re nothing if not stubborn, and so pushed on.

Soon enough we were through to Driftwood, and onto the fun part! South of Driftwood the single track was mainly bare dirt. But as we rode further and further south, the patches of snow started to take over. By the time we hit the open scree slopes just north of Buller there was a solid base of snow on the trail.

It was still possible to ride, it just required concentration. And then more concentration. And more concentration. We were close to giving in on the final kilometre down to Buller Creek. The fat bike tracks we were following had turned back.

But no! We’re more stubborn than a couple of fat bikers. We kept going.

Then we hit the Buller trail – it was well packed, so we may as well keep going right? Ah, but then where was the turn off to the new trail? Just through the trees there, that must be it. Ohh, let’s just ride a little way… and so we rode uphill in deeper and deeper snow, until finally common sense took over, and we decided to turn back.

We’d assumed it was just hard work because of the snow, but it turns out we were climbing too. As a result, weeeeh, fun descent back to Buller Creek, snow surfing our bikes around corners, flying along! Rather fun. No photos, because we were too busy riding :)

We decided to skip the snowiest sections on the way back though, and instead jumped back on the trail at Sparrowhawk, to enjoy some sweet dry singletrack on our return towards Canmore.

The aqueduct variant is really a nice option, and much more scenic and sunny than the actual High Rockies trail through this section. Recommended.

But then, we hit the pass. We could ride straight back down and go home, but there was still daylight left! And so somehow, feeling already fairly shattered from a long hard day of riding, Felix talked me into doing Riders of Rohan and the Highline as well, just to extend the ride a little more.

Thankfully he got a puncture out near Three Sisters, and so I had a valid excuse for suggesting the river trail back instead of riding Loki’s. Yes, I was that tired. Definitely a worthy final ride before the Australia trip!

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bikes canada general trip reports

When Minnewanka rides get out of hand

The one problem with riding Lake Minnewanka is that it’s an out and back. And it’s a busy and out back, popular with hikers and bikers alike.

And so when we rode out, and reached the cabin, I was happy to keep going, and put off the return journey. I’d never ridden past the cabin before (it’s at 15km, and makes for a nice 30km round trip) and Minnewanka was in great late season condition.

And so we got up towards the end of the lake. The terrain becomes more technical, and it’s much harder to ride everything. There was almost no deadfall though.

A couple of big wash outs from the 2013 floods were slow going, but as we drew closer to the end of the lake, I realised that I really wanted to keep riding. I only had one bottle of water with me though, nearly empty, and just one bar left.

Thankfully I have friends who come oversupplied, and I stocked up on both water and food, and even managed to convince Danika to come along with me. Meanwhile, I passed on Alex’s phone number, so he would get the heads up that I might phone begging for a lift when we emerged into cell service at the other side of the ride.

And so the two of us set off into the semi-unknown.

There were two creek crossings ahead of us. The first was at the end of the lake, where you cross onto the south side of the river. It ended up being the deepest, at mid thigh, and bracingly cold.

From there, we were onto well-travelled horse trails, much more well defined than the eastern Lake Minnewanka trail, but also much muddier, much more rutted, and much more inclined to have snow due to the aspect.

But it didn’t really take long at all to get through that section, then we were out onto double track, then crossing out of the Banff National Park and into the Ghost Wilderness Area – where civilization quickly caught up with us, with 4WDs wandering about, and groups camping everywhere.

The second river crossing was a breeze, and soon we were pedalling up the big hill, onto fairly well-travelled gravel roads.

Well-travelled gravel roads that were covered with snow and ice for kilometres on end! But still fun to be exploring new terrain, and a thoroughly worthwhile adventure, although I’d still like to ride the full loop from home.

And for reference – there’s cell service on and off for most of the ride, definitely far more than we were expecting anyway. And we were picked up about 10km shy of reaching the 1A, to make for a 66km ride an an unexpectedly long day.

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bikes general moosling

Packing for bikepacking with kids

Before the Moosling was born, we went on a big bike tour of the more traditional style, with Surly Long Haul Truckers and panniers. But even on that ride we were seeking out gravel roads and connectors as much as we could. Our heart was with the gravel and singletrack, and so our first overnight bike trip with him four years ago turned into the beginning of our love of bikepacking – and the beginning of our trying to acquire better gear for it too.

I’ve been thinking about packing lists, and the logistics of travelling with kids recently. Partly because we just took Kat and Mike on their first bikepacking trip. Partly because I was getting ready to present at the Bikepack Canada conference on the subject of bikepacking with kids. And partly because someone (thanks Christina!) asked about it on my last bikepacking post.

First up, here’s some of the setups we’ve used over the last few years.

2012

Just a Chariot with a backpack strapped to it and a shopping bag hanging off the back. I think I was just carrying a backpack too.

2013

This is the year we got the Tout Terrain Singletrailer! It meant we were able to get out into all sorts of terrain that just wasn’t accessible with the Chariot, and opened up a lot more local route options without having to pedal on gravel roads.

We still didn’t have any ‘proper’ bikepacking gear, but were just wearing running backpacks and strapping stuff to our bikes (not very well). I upped my water carrying capacity by clamping bottle holders to my fork – which can go wrong if they’re not on solidly, but it was fine for this trip.

2014

We got awesome bike bags from Porcelain Rocket! This made life much easier, but in hindsight enabled us to start bringing along more gear than we had done in 2013, and so a heavier load.

2015

The switch to travelling with the trail-a-bike. Our setup was otherwise mostly the same, but we ended up strapped a seat bag and a handlebar bag to the handlebars of the trail-a-bike.

2016

More of the same in 2016, although we’ve started managing to get out bikepacking with other families. More of this to come in 2017 I hope! And maybe even in winter 2016-2017.

Below is our list of gear we’d consider taking on a one or two night trip, showing how it’s morphed over the years as we acquired new gear and the kiddo got bigger. Some items are luxury items that we’d only bring along on an overnight trip – others we could get away without on a short trip, but would definitely want along for a longer trip.

Disclaimer: With only one kid we can get away with taking more luxuries while still travelling lighter than people out there with extra kiddos.

As always, your mileage may vary – your essentials may be unnecessary for our comfort, and our favourite items may seem weird and unusual to you. We’re always working on refining our packing and gear too – slowly, some of our heavier items are being replaced (yes, I’m super excited that we’ll finally be getting rid of our ancient pock-marked Aluminium ex-Tefal coated pots this Christmas) and we’re always trying out new ways of doing things. The best way to find out what you need is to head out for an overnight trip and start experimenting.

The bike-packing with small kid packing list:

Tent
We used to use a Tarp Tent Rainshadow 2. It was very light (1.2kg) and packed small, but we found we were often getting cold in it, and there wasn’t a lot of space in the tent given how large the footprint was. Then for a while we were using our old Big Agnes Seedhouse 2 (1.36kg). It’s a great tent, but as Finn got bigger, we decided to upgrade to a Big Agnes Copper Spur UL3. It’s what we’re using now, and is a little heavier at 1.8kg, but has kept as perfectly warm when we’ve been using it in temperatures as cold as -5oC. If the weather’s looking great we’ve left the fly behind and it’s just 1.3kg.

We really like having the mesh to keep the bugs out. This summer hasn’t been too bad, but sometimes we’re camping in a sea of bugs. And having two doors and two vestibules is great for being able to sneak in and out of the tent around a fast asleep kid (or tired out parent).

Sleep system
We’ve used a range of things here. When Finn was small, it was our old Prolite Thermarests, plus just throwing some extra layers on the floor of the tent. I always seemed to end up sleeping on the cold tent floor without a mat (and despite my best efforts, I just don’t seem to sleep well without a mat).  So we tried bringing a basic foam/ridge mat for him. That never worked out well, it wouldn’t stay put. These days we’re all on Neoair Thermarests, two regular length and one 3/4. That’s working well, and they’re pretty light.

Once he got big enough that he wouldn’t fit in fleecey sleep suits, I made a down quilt and we tried sharing that. As he grew, it no longer really worked to have us all in there. So we tried having him in an enLIGHTened equipment ProtegeX sleeping bag (synthetic insulation, very light). When he was small he would always squirm out of it and end up under the down quilt with Alex, while I tried to drape his tiny sleeping bag over me to maintain some level of warmth when I was kicked off my thermarest and out from under the quilt.

But the past couple of summers he’s been really good about sleeping in his bag, and then we’ll either bring two sleeping bags for the adults, or just the down quilt if it’s warmer. Sleeping bag liners also help for extra warmth.

I’ll be hacking up my 15 year old down sleeping bag and converting it into a kids bag for him this winter, as he’s getting to the point of outgrowing his Enlightened Equipment bag.

Cooking and eating
Here we just use what we already had – an ancient MSR pot set, heavy spandongles, 3x titanium sporks. We’re currently using an MSR Pocket Rocket for a stove. Cutting knife & spreading knife.  Small and light washing kit – teatowel, scrubber, Dr Bronners (we don’t always bring these). Also a couple of flatpack plates/bowls from Orikaso – they’re bombproof and have been with us since 2008. Sometimes we’ll bring mugs as well.

Food and water
Water – depending where we’re going we try to carry at least 1L each. We’ve tried using a water filter, Steripen, Aquatabs (or similar) and Pristine, but our favourite is the Pristine system. Having to spend the time sitting around while we are getting water is never an issue, it’s actually preferred for entertainment value.
Headlamps x3
Dinner- we often do some kind of pasta, tuna, cheese and veggies variant, but are probably going to get more into dehydrated meals in the future. Easier to manage in camp if we’re just boiling water!

Clothes
We try to bring enough clothes so we’ll be warm and dry when it’s as cold as it’s going to be, but no spares for the grown-ups if it’s a short trip (and minimal spares on a longer trip). Everyone’s clothes are stored in a different colour light-weight dry bag. The default pack list for all of us is:

Legs: shorts, sometimes long pants, sometimes thermals, sometimes rainproofs, often fleecy pants for the kid,underpants, socks, shoes. No extra shoes for camp usually.
Top: t-shirt/jersey, then some combo of wind shirt/light shell/light fleece/softshell/heavy shell jacket/down sweater – weather dependent.
Extremities: gloves (sometimes also warmer gloves/shell mitts), buff, toque/warm hat, sunglasses. No extra shoes for camp usually.

For Finn we’ll bring extra pants, underpants, socks and upper body layer. When he was small we tried cloth diapers (a hassle to cart around wet, but doable overnight), disposable diapers (last a long time and light before use) and biodegradable diapers (as we’re alpine so often, the main benefit was being able to shred them into backcountry long-drops, or burn them, if necessary).

Technology
Phones (loaded with audiobooks and podcasts for listening to half the night, when kicked off thermarest by restive toddler)
EOS 7D Camera
Spot tracker
GPS
On longer trips we’ll bring cache batteries

Other bits and pieces
Sunscreen, chapstick, 1000 WETWIPES!, hand sanitiser, TP, toothbrushing things, first aid kid (we keep the first aid kit pretty light, but include tick remover, fire, bandaids, sling & roll bandages, hand warmers). Spare plastic bags (especially when he was younger, for diapers or possible potty training accidents). Some of these things are left behind if we’re just going for a night, or depending on the weather, but wet wipes always come. Sometimes a pack of cards. Bear spray and bear bangers. Plus helmets, bikes, bike repair gear!

I’m looking forward to refining our setup a little more for next summer, and lightening it a little. But hopefully getting in our first winter bikepacking trips before then too!

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bikes canada general moosling trip reports

Fall bikepacking to Lake Minnewanka

Getting out on a family bikepacking trip is one of those things that we kept meaning to do, but somehow we had nearly run out of summer weekends and it still hadn’t happened.

We’d initially been thinking of riding the Elbow Loop. Or maybe just going out and back on the north-west side. But our attempts to book a campground failed. Curse you, Alberta Parks with your “oh, sure, we have sites available” website, but then when they get back to you 48 hours after you tried to book online it turns out that there are indeed no sites.

Contemplating alternatives, we realised I was supposed to be back in town by 3 or 4pm on Sunday afternoon, so it would be better to stay close to home. And so Lake Minnewanka it was. Especially as there was a whole lot of camping availability out there – for some reason K-Country was packed, but the lovely LM8 campground on the shores of Minnewanka was fully available on Friday. We ended up sharing it with one other couple. It was amazingly deserted out there.

We convinced our friends Kat and Mike that they should come along on their first bikepacking trip too, which meant a lot of borrowing gear and working out how on earth to fit everything into such a small space when you’re used to panniers or hiking packs. It took a little while, but they sorted it!

A lazy start meant that we decided to head out on the Legacy Trail rather than Goat Creek. The downside was that we had no justifiable reason to stop at the Wildflour Bakery in Banff. But at least it was fast and easy going, and plenty of chances to work on fine tuning gear setup.

With a three and a six year old along, we made regular stops along the way for them to get out and play. And for snacks.

We made it onto the Lake Minnewanka trail in the mid-afternoon. This was our family setup above – pretty similar to our Scotland trip last summer.

Getting up The Hill before you start heading north along the lakeshore always warms you up. And sometimes, just sometimes, loaded bikes and towing kids means you just can’t ride everything.

But while Alex kicked the boy off the trail-a-bike, the boy discovered the joys of poking puff balls with a stick.

Then it was just scenic lakeside singletrack, through golden aspens and alongside the turquoise lake.

It’s only an eight kilometre ride in to the LM8 campground (unsurprisingly, if you think about it). As we hit the bridge just before the campground, the kids hopped out and ran the rest of the way to camp.

There were so many deers hanging around! Fairly oblivious to us, they wandered around and did their thing, and had me jump out of my skin a couple of times when one wandered up unexpectedly close.

Collecting water from the lake was more challenging than usual. The camping pads were quite sheltered, but the cooking area was further south and thoroughly exposed to the wind. A nice series of waves was rolling onto the stony shore, and a few of us received an accidental foot soaking.

Cooking dinner in the trees, thankfully we had a shelter at our cooking spot.

We all curled up in bed pretty early. I was testing out how the boy would go in a full-sized sleeping bag for the first time, after realising his kid bag was just no longer big enough (or warm enough for shoulder season adventures). The end result was – he was super snug and warm in my 15 year old down bag, and I might see if I can adjust it a little so it’s a bit shorter/lighter/smaller, and he’ll probably be able to get at least five more years of use out of it (depending how fast he grows).

Morning light is gorgeous on the aspens. We slept in until 8 or so, and then eventually gave in and got up for breakfast.

There’s been so much going on before the trip that food had been thoroughly disorganised. Breakfast was mostly pastries that we’d picked up the day before from Le Fournil Bakery in Canmore. Delicious tasty pastries.

The boys enjoyed hanging out some more, and playing in the forest.

And then we got things packed up again, ready to hit the trail before it became too busy.

It was a beautiful ride out, and it felt much easier than the day before – even the hill climb!

Although – sometimes it’s just so steep you have to push. But the trail has recently had some work done on it, and the section on the hill that used to be loose and rocky and pretty interesting to ride… well now it’s flat and hardpacked soil, and far easier.

Just after we got the group shot below, some tourists came up to get their photos taken with the crazy group of bike people (and were thoroughly startled when they realised that the trailer had a child inside it).

After this, it was a tail-wind home on the Legacy Trail.

Bikepacking trips sometimes seem to require a lot of effort, but are thoroughly worth it, and so much fun once you’re out there pedalling and camping!

Route: From Canmore, along the Legacy Trail, via Cascade Ponds, on the road to Lake Minnewanka, then along singletrack to LM8 campground
Distance: 35km one-way
Elevation gain: ~400m on the way there, ~200m on the way back

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bikes canada general trip reports

Hurt’n Albert’n 550

It was 5.40 am and only just light when we arrived in the Cross Iron Mills carpark for the start of the inaugural Hurt’n Albert’n. The carpark already had a cluster of riders gathered in it, and I got my bike together with a whole two minutes to spare. Group photos, hugs and goodbyes, then we headed off for a neutral rolling start along the pavement at 6.05 am. I was mostly in a sleepy daze at this point. There were lots of awesome looking bikepacking folks riding around me. I didn’t know any of them, felt like it would be good to get to know them, but was too tired to make it happen.

We rolled along easily, and I ended up chatting to Jackie and Jeff. Jeff’s fat bike tires were at 30psi. Jackie also hadn’t ridden any of the roads before, but like me had tried to Google Streetview a little to get some idea what they were like.

And then it was gravel time. Ryan, Chris W, Justin and Adam peeled off in front, I sat behind them but didn’t try to keep up. Soon enough I couldn’t see anyone. The guys had disappeared off in front, and the rest of the pack had disappeared behind. Mist hung around, everything was covered in dew, and the shadows were long.

Having to navigate kept things interesting early on. Some of the route choices seemed weird when I looked at the map beforehand, but once I was riding I didn’t care, because having to constantly watch what I was doing kept me occupied.

I didn’t really have a plan, other than trying to ride the whole thing as fast as I could, without hurting myself. I figured I’d keep stops short, and I probably wouldn’t sleep for long – but I’d brought along my bivy and mat, and was definitely thinking I’d use them. Never having ridden any of the roads before, and not knowing what the winds would be like, it was hard to have any idea how long this thing would take me.

There were so many birds in the early section; I saw a few hawks, I think a falcon too, and lots of water birds. I wished my friend Miles was there, he’d know what all these birds were. I spotted crops of canola, wheat, clover, and maybe barley and oats, and felt guilty for not knowing what everything was. I was a terrible farmgirl, I should remember these things. Then there were sunflowers growing alongside the road! And a John Deere tractor that looked alarmingly like a spider, or a creature from a post-apocalyptic future where robots ruled the world and kept humans firmly indentured in slavery. Whatever, in my day tractors looked like tractors.

I rolled through Rockyford without stopping – I didn’t need anything yet. But I waved at a man sitting on his porch with his yappy dog.

The roads varied. Sometimes hardpack clay, great for riding (as long as they’re dry). Others were covered in rocks – gravel I guess, but big gravel that you had to pick a line through. Sometimes, especially later on, there were smaller roads with ‘impassable when wet’ type signs, with huge wheel ruts and quagmires of standing mud.

(Disclaimer: All the road photos I have, I was riding one-handed, so they were only taken when I had a fairly friendly road that was pretty flat. May not be indicative of the rest of the route)

The route started to enter into the Badlands, which were beautiful, and not bad at all. It was almost a shock to hit the area near Wayne and Rosedale. Suddenly there were cars on the road again! I’d gone hours without having a single car drive past me, and suddenly they were all over the place. I stopped in Rosedale to fill up my water, and grab a chocolate milk and Sea Salt Caramel Haagen Dazs (the best icecream ever). I chugged my chocolate milk then hit the road, eating my icecream with one hand. The inevitable happened and I lost a chunk of the chocolate shell on my icecream. Woe!

SCENE: Megan cycles along the road, riding her bike and eating an icecream. She is happy. CLOSE UP of the icecream as the last piece of chocolate shell on it slowly slides off. SLOW MOTION shot from ground level as we see the chocolate land and bounce on the road before settling, as Megan rides away. CUT TO Megan as she glances down at her icecream to eat some more. She double takes and realisation finally dawns as she throws her face towards the heavens and screams “NOOOOOO!”

The main thing of note that happened between Rosedale and Drumheller was my stomach turned bad. Angry and bloated, it wouldn’t let me ride in the drops, and I had to make a couple of emergency roadside stops. I blamed the salami wrap I had brought from home. It had been kind of warm and didn’t feel good to eat. I told my legs that they had no excuse to slow down just because my stomach wasn’t feeling great, and tried to keep my pace up. There was a light wind from the south, and I muttered a little when I had to ride into it without being able to drop into my aero bars.

But it didn’t take too much longer to get to Drumheller. Suddenly I was on the Hwy 9, and the descent on smooth asphalt was fast and easy kilometres. It’s a bit of a shock to re-enter civilisation after hours of peace and quiet and no-one but cows to talk to. (SIDE NOTE – Speaking of cows, there are an awful lot of red Angus in Alberta. Australia has far more black Angus) I rode past the splash park in Drumheller and was looking at it wistfully (oh so nice and cool, looks fun, would be nice to get wet, but also wet shoes and pants are not great and can lead to chaffing, but ah, it looks nice and cool) when I noticed my family there waving at me. I slowed down and waved back, and we yelled hellos. I headed on to the Husky. I’d thought about riding off route to Tim Horton’s, but decided I could manage on service station food.

I ditched the rest of the salami wraps I had with me – I no longer trusted them. My stomach was still angry, and I grabbed a freezie, a green smoothie drink, a protein drink, 1.5L cold water, a sandwich, and a little bag of M&Ms. I got the nice service station people to cut the top of my freezie, shoved the smoothie drink in my back pocket, and stored everything else away. It was pretty warm at this point, and I knew there was a climb up ahead. With my water bottles all topped up with lovely ice cold water, I drank as much as I could then tipped the rest of the bottle over my head and neck – glorious!

I set off eating my freezie. It was also glorious. Alex and Finn had parked by the side of the road just a little further ahead on the route, and they cheered me on and we said our final goodbyes. I kept riding.

At this point, I didn’t really have much idea what was going on, as the phone I was using wasn’t that great – the battery dies quickly and it has really poor reception. So when I tried to check trackleaders in town it just wouldn’t load, so I gave in and stopped trying. I knew the four guys were in front of me as I was headed into Drumheller, but I had no idea that I’d gotten ahead of them with my quick stop.

So I was kind of surprised when two guys came racing up to me as I headed up the hill out of town. And it was only after chatting to them as they rode by that I realised that I had been the lead, and I was now in third place. Huh. Having them to chase in the distance made the long west-ward road towards Beiseker a little more interesting. Uphill, downhill, uphill, downhill. Looking back I couldn’t see anyone. Looking ahead I could see the guys, sometimes close, sometimes further. Sometimes silhouetted on the top of a hill. I put some music on and churned out the kilometres. My stomach gradually started to feel better, so I stopped to eat half a sandwich. Hmm, maybe not that much better. Riding past a farmhouse, a woman came out to cheer with a drink in hand. The rampant enthusiasm in her cheering suggested that maybe it wasn’t her first drink of the evening.

When I rolled into Beiseker Centex the guys were having another sit-down meal (don’t they know it’s a race? :P) and waved me over. So after going for a quick shop in the store I went and chatted to them, found out they were Chris and Adam. Chris was having back issues, and probably going to rest. They let me know that Justin and Jackie had scratched, so had a few others. And sure enough, Justin and Terri showed up at the Centex. I washed the bugs off my arm (I looked like the hood of a car – thankfully they weren’t biting me before dying in my sunscreen). I decided to grab some more food (including the nanaimo bar that was the perfect breakfast the next morning), chatted a bit, then headed off to chase after Adam.

The lead switched back and forth as we rode west, chatting occasionally, but mostly riding on our own. Adam stopped a few times to chat to his legions of fans. He put on his lights, and then I put mine on. Then I stopped to add some more layers. And then at one point I just started to pull ahead. There were some fantastic muddy sections between Beiseker and Water Valley, and I was thankful for good lights as I tried to negotiate them in the dark. This section was largely a long west run, and it was glorious as the stars came out overhead, the gibbous moon hung in the sky to the south, and the lightning of a huge storm cell flashed away in the sky to the north. Spectacular sheet lightning and fork lightning were amazing to watch, but far enough away that I couldn’t hear the thunder.

(Night photo stolen from @flixlee on Instagram)

Far enough away that is, until we hit the edge of the storm cell (I was ahead at this point, but I think Adam was still pretty close behind, I remember seeing his lights… although later on, I’m pretty sure I was hallucinating seeing them). The calm and peaceful night was suddenly filled with a ferocious north wind blasting through the trees. Leaves and twigs were flying everywhere, and I leaned my bike into the crosswind. Then the route turned north, and I was riding into a headwind. The lightning looked a little closer, but I still couldn’t hear any thunder – it was definitely good incentive to pick up my pace a little, I figured the storm was unlikely to be moving westward, so all I had to do was get far enough west and it would go away.

Which actually worked out. Well, at least the wind eventually died down, and I was back to the calm, still night. Nothing was happening, barely a breeze, and my world was reduced to the patch of road in front of me. Sometimes I’d turn my headlight on, and just outside of Water Valley I saw my very first skunk – scampering along the side of the road (and thankfully not going anywhere near me).

In Water Valley I’d decided I just wanted to get in a couple of micro-naps. I’d gotten so far that it seemed pointless to try and get a proper sleep. So after refilling my bottles at the church, I just put on all my clothes, set a 20-minute timer and curled up on the ground for a nap. When it went off I got up, had some more food, then another 20-minute nap. And after that, I felt much more awake, and good to keep going – also quite cold, so that was a good motivation to move on. It was 3.38am and I felt as rested as I had done after our 5 hours of fitful sleep on the Kootenay Gravel Grinder.
I was shivering violently for the first 10 minutes or so after leaving Water Valley, but gradually warmed up. I didn’t see Adam at all, but looking at Trackleaders after the fact, it looks like he rolled into town while I was having my second nap. I was moving slowly, but still moving. I wasn’t feeling super tired, but definitely not very alert and strong either. Because we were on gravel I could tell by the lack of tire marks that there was no-one ahead of me, but I had no idea how far behind Adam was, or if anyone else was coming up from behind. So, it was a slow climb in the dark, into the Waiparous area. I’d look behind me occasionally to check that it was downhill that way, and I wasn’t just being particularly feeble. There were more and more trees around me – I’d never been in this area before, and it was hard to tell what it looked like. I assumed any bears would see my lights, and so wouldn’t try and eat me, I was too tired to bother with bear yells.

As I was glancing back to confirm I was going uphill, I finally started to notice some pink on the horizon. Dawn! Hurrah! I got to turn my lights off somewhere near the high point of the route, at about 450km. My vague route notes suggested it was mostly downhill from here, at least for a while. They lied, and I cursed pre-race Megan. There was another climb almost straight after the descent. “It’s ok” I told myself “I love climbing”.

I’d made a note that there was supposed to be water in the Waiparous campground. The first pump I found was rusted away, but the second seemed ok. I pumped and pumped it, but gave up after 20 or so pumps. Maybe it would work eventually, but I was feeling incredibly self-conscious about being a noisy jerk next to all the people asleep in their tents (at least, they probably had been asleep until some random bikepacker rocked up and tried to get the water pump to work). I still had 1.5L or so of water after filling up in Water Valley. It should be fine.

I wondered if Adam had overtaken me while I was messing around with water pumps. I tried to read the gravel roads – nope, don’t think I can see his tracks. There was some fast sealed road as I cruised into Waiparous Village, and had a rest stop – sunscreen, chamois balm, food, and seeing if my phone had any cell reception (nope). The main part of my breakfast was half a nanaimo bar. It was wonderful, and I finally felt energised again. I hadn’t been eating much sugar so far, so the blood sugar kick was pretty effective. I settled down into my drops and tried to churn out the kilometres.

I was doing ok until I hit the hill of doom. It starts at around 495km, and it’s probably no worse than other hills on the route (or is it?), but covered with gravel, few good lines, and on tired legs, it seemed unnecessarily evil. Plus I kept looking behind me to see if Adam was coming. “For sure,” I thought, “he’ll be able to see me stuck on the side of this hill from miles away.” The descent was equally gravelly and slightly hair-raising, but I was too tired to bother braking much, which was probably a good thing.

After that, there were a series of rolling gravel hills, and I tried my phone again. Service! I sent a message to Alex requesting a beer, and a burrito the size of my head, at the finish line. And then I realised he’d sent me a message telling me my Spot had stopped working. “But I’m checking it regularly, it’s probably ok now… I wonder why it isn’t getting a signal?”

But when I checked it, I found it had been off for hours – I’d forgotten to check it, and the problem wasn’t lack of signal, it was flat batteries. I quickly tried to swap to my spare batteries. Still wouldn’t turn on. Gah. Tried my spare USB battery pack. It wouldn’t power it either! “Maybe it’s broken?”

I was a little sad – I had a great crew of folks watching from home and cheering me on, and I know how much fun it isn’t when someone’s Spot goes dead (also potentially anxiety-inducing). Oh well, not much I could do about it now, I may as well just finish the race. Adam was probably going to catch me while I was wasting time messing around.

I could smell the finish line now and was determined to get there as quickly as possible. I pushed as hard as I could up every hill, because when you’re silhouetted on the top of those things you’re visible from kilometres back, and I knew if Adam caught sight of me he’d try and chase me down. But whenever I looked back I could never see him. My legs felt good, and I finished my Nanaimo bar then rationed out a Snickers over the last hour. I was pushing along easily, counting down the kilometres. And then I was at the finish. And I lay down in the grass and drank a beer and ate my burrito, and hung out and waited to cheer Adam over the finish line. And everything was fantastic, and life was good.

Thanks to Justin and Trevor for putting together such an awesome route, and a great event. It was super fun, and I really enjoyed it – highly recommended, go race it next year! Just remember to get a Nanaimo bar at the Beiseker Centex!