So I havnt fulfilled my promise to write more, not even close.
whats happened? Well I'v been away for 5 months already, 5 months!
I purchased a little Nissan Ute (little in comparison to the huge "trucks" they have here, and trust me some of them actually do qualify for the term truck!) at the start of July and then made plans with a new friend on the north shore to drive to Calgary for the famed Stampede. We followed hway 1, first stopping in Revelstoke, surfing with Chad again. Another stop in between Lake Louise and Banff at Castle Mountain Wilderness lodge, before arriving in the home of the Flames.
7 July - 20 July After some shenanigans for stampede and a bbq for the UFC100 event, Craig hitch hiked back to Vancouver and I turned my focus to aquiring a bike for my summer of epic riding in British Columbia.
drumheller
21- 23 jul Fernie
The drive down to Fernie was kinda long, but some great Albertan scenery out the window. Country music on almost every radio station i could tune in!As i headed south I could see out to the east the huling range of the mighty rockies looming on the horizon. The last couple of hrs of the drive brought me slowly closer and then into this gargantuan strip of rocks. I arrived into Fernie, a quiet little summer town, and met my host for the next couple of nights. A cool guy who does a lot of white water rafting and works as a guide locally. He was heading to the Nahanni NP in the Norhtwest Territories after I left to do a 9 day rafting tour. Sounds fantastic!
I rode out of town a bit and tackled the combo of Hyper Ventilation / Hyper Extension. I should have done it the opposite direction to how I tackled it, as i spent some time grinding up the exposed side of the mountain in the host sun and then came barrelling down the other side in the trees, both descents would have been equally exciting. But whatever, dusted.
I slept out under the stars every night that I was there and it was absolutely fabulous. The clear skies and minimal light pollution gave me a wonderful view of every star in the sky. The third night I was kicking around at a local jump park practicing with my still relatively new (to me) bike. I noticed an evil looking storm front coming in and could see the flashes of lightning coming through the dark brooding clouds.
I booted home as the darkness encroached and set up my camera on the roof top deck under the shelter. The lightning was amazing and the wind and rain that came with it was swift and heavy. I captured a great shot of Lightning striking the top of the bowl at Fernie Ski resort. My first decent lightning photo, I was pretty stoked!
I was going to ride at the fernie bike park but car troubles set me back and I ended up missing out. I satyed an extra night while I tried to sort it out, its a long story, in the end I tried to run out of there to the next bigger town to try and get it sorted. The local services where useless. Things went well until about half way between places and the car nearly died, in the middle of nowhere. Luckily she limped into cranbrook and a mechanic foudn the problem and fixed it immediatly. They were good people there, I made friends with the owner and his sidekick, I was working on my bike in the workshop while they fixed the car. Afterwards I sat around and chatted with them for a while, they seemed most interested in my little trip and in divulging information on the local area. McGibbons was the name of the place, if you ever break down in Crankbrook, go see them!
24-27 jul From Crankbrook I drove north along the east coast of Kootenay lake. It was hot and sunny but there was no shortage of storm clouds in every corner of the sky. Threatening to band together like a bunch of street thugs. I finally arrived at the ferry crossing and had a bit of time to take some photos in the unique afternoon light. Some guy was blasting Jimi Hendrix from his car in the line up, i rather enjoyed that.
Ferry crossing was a lovely journey, once I reached the other side I still had a short drive around the arm of the lake and across the bridge into Nelson. I got a great feeling as I got my first glimpses of town, turns out i was in for a memorable few days in Nelson.
There was a street market on when I arrived, I wandered around checking out the scene and soaking up the music and the atmosphere. After trying a local pie, I met up with my host Rob, and followed him out to a friends place where they were having beers and playing call of duty on the biggest television I have ever seen. after a couple of hrs i followed rob back to his place, got changed and headed back into town for a look at Nelson nightlife.
I went into town the next day to get the lowdown on the riding spots around the area. Mountain Station is the local scene, I drove up the hill at the edge of the city area and parked before pedalling up a series of fire roads that were criss-crossed with bike trails ranging from intermediate to extreme. At point I noticed a kicker on one side of the road, quite highly elevated, that easily would have sent the rider across the road 15 odd feet in the air!
I enjoyed the afternoon on the steep decsents and technical trails, my learning curve was as steep as the trials but it was great experience, however it was nothing compared to my ride the following day.
Robs mate house was a short drive from the forestry road that takes you up the side of a mountain where a large number of well known Nelson highlights are located. We had driven a long way up in his F150 when we met some other guys who were going as far as the trail goes, then going to park and then hike-a-bike to the top, before coming back down a relatively new trail called "powerslave". So i switched parties and though my stuff in with those guys. When we finally got somewhere were we could pull off the extremely narrow trail and park, there was someone actually working on a section of powerslave, we had a quick chat and headed for the top.
It was hot and there were lots of mozzies, but the effort was worth not only the view from the top out over the lake and Nelson, but the looooooong decent back down. It was some of the steepest, roughest, most technical riding I had ever encountered, but with 2 local guides leading the way I couldnt go wrong. It was fast and flowing in some parts, some great wooden features, rock wall descents, shale hills, it was sensational. We even saw a moose. I should mention that one of the guys had a dog with him, just a small one, he kept up with us the whole way down, he was one cool dude!
knackered at the bottom I head back to robs, the trail came out only about a click from his house, I showered and crashed early that night, but what an epic day!
I was blown away further by the weather patterns here, the way heat and sunshine mixed with humidity and thunder storms that just came and went like the milkman. The sunsets were A1 too! and then at night if it wasnt a lightning show, the stars were dazzling bright in the pitch blackness. Robs place was on the other side of the mountain from town so no light pollution. It was seriously so dark with any artificial light that you could not see a thing. Ultimate blackness until your eyes adjusted.
28-29 jul I strapped up the bike and headed for Rossland. It wasnt a big drive and I stopped in fruitvale to meet up with a friend i had met in vancouver earlier. We had a couple of beers and some lunch, then i continued on to Rossland, the home of the world famous 7 summits trail. Did I want to ride it, yes. Could i in my condition and in this heat (its been over 30 everyday since i left Calgary) perhaps not. 31 ks outside of mobile phone reception on my own, I chose to ride the trails of the local mountains behind the quaint little township, whos main street looked like an old country town out of a western film, with a wide road down the middle and lots of old buildings.
I stayed with Mark in his apartment not far from the town centre. We had a lot in common and organised a ride with some of his friends for the last day that I was going to be there. The local mountain was fun but i needed more time, the trail markings were poor and hard to follow, a local guide would have been very beneficial here!
The ride we did as a group was awesome, we shuttled to the parking area and then cycled some distance further up to the top of the trail. Whiskey was fast and flowy with some slower steep descent areas, some cool jumps and fun obstacles. Very enjoyable, although it was a little strange to be the lead rider this time, I was often waiting for them to catch up, but all good, it was just great riding with other people!
I will never forget the old lady who lived next to mark, she drank wildcat beer and loved Australians!! (the nicest people in the world apparently!!) she was an amazing character.
30 jul I heard from a Danish friend of mine; Kenny, and they were headed for Banff from Jasper. We met in the USA on a 3 week tour of the western dessert areas. Been mates ever since. He and his parents were travelling around Canada so it made sense to catch up.
I left Rossland and headed for Banff. I had to back track a bit to get to the highway to take me north through Radium and Invermere, through the kootenays national park and then round to Banff. I was trying to get to Invermere in time to get a half day ride in at the local bike park, but i forgot to factor in mountain time change and lost an hr so that kinda screwed that.
I went up to radium to try and find a place to stay but there were no hostels. I went up the road a bit to radium hot springs and chose to soak it up a bit for a while. I went back to town, and watched some amazing storm fronts rolling across the far hills and straight for us. I grabbed some food and drove back up the highway 10 mins and sat and watched as this huge cloud bank slowly blew over and then drenched the area with solid rain. I realised at this point that the evening sleeping in the back of the ute may not be to ideal. But, I tried it anyway.
After being moved on from a couple of places, I found a spot down near the local timber mill where i could pull off the road and not be seen. It was raining still and everything was wet and muddy. I tied down my tarp and tried to settle in in the back. I spent nearly 2 hrs trying to get to sleep, being attacked by mosquitoes the size of blowflies, wondering what every single sound outside was and being generally uncomfortable. I gave in in the end, got out, and saw 3 deer within 10 feet of where i was standing. Better than the 3 bears i guess.
Ended up getting a couple of hrs sleep in the front seat and then waking up at 5am. I packed up (had to move a lot of stuff in the car to get comfortable in the front seat) and headed back for town, grabbed some breakfast and then went to get fuel so I could make it to Banff. Radium had other ideas. There were 3 fuel stations on 1 intersection. The first one, the biggest, the girl tells me "sorry we are out of fuel" hmmmm. She then volunteers the information the the Chevron across the highway is also out. But the Husky on the other side of the road still has some, but they are almost out too. Out of interest i asked when they were being refilled, the truck was due the following day!!!
Its about 6.30am, the sunrise is quite nice and the clouds from last night are dissapearing, its going to be hot again. I see beautiful photographic opportunities arising everywhere, but i cant go anywhere because I am parked in the Husky service station that apparently has some fuel left, waiting for it to open at 7am. At first its just myself and a guy on a motorbike, both of us itching to get going. By 7am, there is a line of about a dozen vehicles behind those of us that have our vehicles at a pump. Its 7.30 before the staff member responsible for opening up rocks up for work, obviously hung over as hell. She spends another 10 mins remembering how to turn the pumps and then the free for all ensues. I fill up and bail, but wonder how many other behind me would get to fill up before the tanks run dry and then everyone in radium who is low on fuel is going nowhere!!
The drive through the park to Banff was stunning, I missed some of the best light due to the servo debarcle, but still got some great shots on that drive, would have taken possibly one of the best photos of the trip if I could have found somewhere to pull over, but in this particular spot there was about 6 inches of shoulder and then railings. I drove almost a k before i could stop, so i missed it. Golden sunlight filtering down through the trees as it peaked over the top of a hillside, beautiful pink and purple mountain flowers glowing brightly on the forest floor. It was a massive scene would have been an impressive shot, damn.
31 jul - 1 aug banff - kenny
2 - 3 aug golden - kicking horse, mt seven
4 - 5 aug revelstoke
6-8 aug silverstar resort- hammers, riding shooting, fires
9-10 aug Sun peaks - riding
11- 16 aug whislter - crankworx, riding
17 - 19 aug squamish, the chief, kiteboarding
20 - 23 aug okanagan party
24 - 26 aug victoria - whales, parliament building
27 - 30 aug courtenay, bear, mt wash, bearclaw jumps
fern st
afl finals
granny
whistler
ankle
celestes 21st
beer pong
house warmings
thanks giving
new house
