Once A (Vagabiker 1b)
So.. Well my 6 week ‘marathon’ work schedule has officially ended, and there is one more house on the market. In our time, we replaced every floor, re-painted every wall and ceiling, as well as replacing all the countertops with Travertine/ Marble, doing slate backsplashes, and a travertine tile Jacuzzi shower.
The 2600 sq foot house in the nice hill of Bend OR is ‘bitchen’
Otherwise I have already spent a ¼ of my earnings on the Subie, which made it effortlessly up to Prince George (pretty close to the Geographic Center of British Columbia). Yes, there isn’t much there, a quintet of giant polluting pulp mills causes the town to be the provincial leader of Cancer rates, and most every other undesirable disease out there.
For the 2 year anniversary of breaking my collarbone I headed out in to the woods for a 3 day backpack. Nothing crazy or extreme, but it was my first time ever getting into the wild, which was cool.
After a quick re-packing I broke south to the Legendary Quesnel where I started what would become an epic 4 day 766km bike tour south to Pinner’s Comox wedding.
Day One: Quesnel – 100 Mile House 210km
There wasn’t a whole lot going on, and after 9h of pedaling we set up camp, HO negotiated hot showers at the hospital, and we hung out at the Timmy Ho’s which seemed to be the only thing going on. 10 minutes of reading had me cracked, and, we were asleep at 9:30 (this doesn’t seem like anything impressive to you, but this is the first time I’ve been asleep before 1am since June sometime).
Day Two : 100 Mi. House – Lillooet BC 190 km
While I was heating and eating oatmeal Mat went to the Coffee Shop and as we started rolling a light rain started. And it picked up. And the temperature dropped. 4.5h later in Clinton, I have never EVER been so cold in my life. The family style diner served up some spectacularly nasty food, and I was experiencing what Dr. Hewitt medically described as ‘violent body tremors’. After an hour inside, and wearing everything I owned, plus a few plastic bags, and still tremoring, we got back on our bikes. A couple thousand foot descent actually helped by getting us down to warmer weather, and then we managed to maintain our heat with a 20km rolling climb over into the valley of the mighty Fraser.
That was a neat sight, and I started planning a mountain bike tour up the remote far side of the river valley at once.
If you’ve never been this is boon-dock-hick country. We see a Bear running around town as we leave for the resteraunt. There are 3 really cool stunning waitresses. Seriously if you live in a town like this (or Jersey) and have a super hot daughter, get her to a city. They deserve better.
Day Three: Lillooet – Squamish BC 190 km
I don’t want to carry any more unnecessary food up any more passes, so breakfast is a can of tuna and oatmeal. Peeking outside we’re greeted by a snow line only 200 feet higher up the mountain, Fog and rain so thick I end up having my lights on the entire day, and 42 deg F weather. This is a 700 feet elevation with 5000 climbing starting with the first pedal stroke.
We pop plastic bags on the feet, garbage bag jackets, and at the 7-11 we buy work gloves to put on over or lightweight cycling ones.
We slog uphill HEY BUDDY for 4 damn hours. After the second, or was it first? HEY BUDDY Matty makes it clear that we don’t need to converse for the remainder of the climb. Amazingly the warmth of the river we’re following up, always keeps the snow just a few feet above us.
Now there area which we’ve headed into is desolate. Up on ‘the Duffy’ there is NOTHING. Where are no stores, no houses. It’s the sticks, nothing until you descend off the mountain towards Pemberton are you anywhere.
Near the top of the pass we see a helocopter, and some movie filming gear, and coffee. Ha ha. So we head over to, um, uh, well I guess we were planning on scoring some coffee. And what do you know, they’re filming a commercial for something that needed cyclists, and we know half of the characters (the Twins, Mr. Bruneau, and Murray… )
Somehow not only do we get hot chocolate, but a little while later we are eating a gourmet catered lunch in a sand storage shed warmed by a 50 000 btu space heater (which isn’t good to stand too close to when your jacket is made by hefty… FYI).
The ‘rolling’ road up to Whistler, site of the 2010 Olympics, had NO rolling, and all climbing, but after the drop into Pemberton we thawed out, and were much happier.
The upstairs apartment was having a ‘girls night’ which included a few bottles of wine, and later in the night, yours truly. Apparently shooting fish in a barrel, well, not my forte. I endured watching the note book only to wake up 8 h later on the floor by myself.
Day Four: Squamish – Comox BC 164 km
I have to hand it to Jit Jones, because the guy, has a girlfriend, and invites his ex girlfriend over to have breakfast, and then convinces everyone that they should all hang out together for the entire day (when I am realizing a situation is akward… well that’s saying something).
The dreaded sea to sky highway, isn’t too bad for riding, mainly because the construction delays make for large breaks in the traffic, and we’re at horseshoe bay catching a ferry over to the ‘sunshine’ coast.
80km and 2.5h over to our second ferry of the day. But after it’s 25min late showing up we have 33km and 55 minutes to cross the rolling coastline to the next ferry. We unsuccessfully tried to find a ride for our gear, but as the ferry gates open we’re stomping and chomping to get the 80 lb bike hussle underway. Halfway there and it’s dark, I’m frothing, snorting, have a wobbly headlamp over my helmet, and am behind schedule. Hey this is RAAM, I can do this, all you have to do is suffer more. We Suffered. And we made the ferry with enough time to buy tickets, and arrive at Comox at 10:30 pm.
Day Five: Pinergy Keltie Wedding –70? km
I won 3 sprints, but 2 of which were recalled, either way it was no match for Mr. Schum’s 8. Pinner was too busy to attend his pre-wedding ride, and the Hansens were without Bike. It was a beautiful day, wedding, Beautiful Bride, and Bridesmaids…. I believe myself to have behaved very well to boot.
The ceremony was really neat with the ocean in the background.
Andrew had been at U.Vic residence for 3 days before I got there, and told me upon my arrival I am going to date that girl upstairs. He didn’t know her name, or anything about her… 9 years later I’m watching them get married. Truly amazing.
It was a fun ceremony.
Congratulations you Andrew and Keltie.
Day Six : Oak Bay Bikes Criterium – 1h plus 5 laps km
Some kind of Charity club ride, with pissing rain on a 600m hamster loop. Having not raced in 3 months I’m taking it waaaaay too seriously, and am on the brink of sliding out 3 of 4 corners for the hour long event. Max Plaxton back from a bronze medal at Mtb Worlds, has some special rain composition Maxxis tires and is cornering circles around the rest of us (literally). With the aid of a possibly un-straight sprint I ‘win’ second.
Day Seven: Victoria BC – Sequim WA 65km
A morning running errands, and I am on another ferry (the Black Ball) over to Port Angeles, the northern tip of both Washington state, and the Olympic Mountain Range. I guess it’s not lucky to see orca’s breaching, because I’m chased off the deck by Rain.
I manage to find ‘old’ highway, which gets me off of Rush Hour . For Real, and I’m winding along some really cool coast line, before packing it in early in a state Campground.
When I ask the campground host about changing Canadian money, he replies that it’s the job of the Ranger, who won’t be around until 8am. And if I’m not around at 8am, there won’t be a problem. Ya don’t have to tell me twice.
Day Eight: Sequim – SeaTac Airport, 260 or so kms
Some time last night I figured out that my 5:30 pm LA arrival wouldn’t have sufficient daylight for the 70 mile ride south to Laguna Beach. So after riding a foodless 30 miles I eat my first serving of gas station food for the day (there would be two total) and decide that riding all of the 160 miles to the Airport today would be a good idea.
Yeah. So I rode my bike for 11:30. Tempo. Cross-eyed at 8pm I ride, neon jacket, flashing lite – space man style into Seattle’s SeaTac Airport.
Well I am not sure if it’s terribly Kerouac to camp out in the airport for a night. Apparently Southwest doesn’t operate quite like the City Bus line… No Sir, you have to pay a premium to change your flight by a day. So I convinced them to watch my bike and showered in the handicap bathroom. By shower, I mean that I converted the sink, and sprayed enough damn water everywhere to get clean, and then put the pants on that I have slept in/ worn every day and counting….
I found a quite corner, and rolled out the sleepingbag.
