Canada, travel

So long, Canada

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With a long delay on the cards, I could be sitting here in Calgary Airport for some time.  Air Canada slides from their position of decidedly average in my mind to somewhere worse.  But never mind, I have no pressing engagements in London.  The last week has been spent enjoying summer, riding, entertaining the resident child, cleaning, packing & snatching the last few moments with various friends.

Wednesday last we had an early first birthday celebration for Finn. I remember eating a lot of cheese, sliced meat & chocolate (fondue will do that) before Megan served up a delicious spiced chocolate cake – in true Australian Women’s Weekly, it was shaped as the digit one. Finn particularly enjoyed his first taste of cake – as the photos here show. On Friday we were off to the airport as Megan, Alex & Finn headed in a big metal tube to Iceland for near on three weeks of hiking, being cooked in hot pools & chasing geysers. I wonder, given his fondness for eating dirt & rocks, if Finn will fancy a drink from a mud-pool. So the round of Canada good-byes started there as I farewelled great friends that have been so helpful & the source of many varied adventures (not to mention many games of Settlers). Funny to think it all started well before we, or even our parents, were thought of – as Megan concisely explained.  I hope I see them again soon – Canada, UK, Australia or NZ – any of those will do.

It must have been Thursday that I sold my car, got the cash in my hand & now have just the registration plate as a lasting souvenir of all that driving in the States & a winter of sending the wheels through a lot of snow. Rides for the last week have included the Montane Traverse (which was very boring by myself), Riders of Rohan & the Highline (which may have been a little optimistic to take Joel & Steve on – but we did get nice & close to a big herd of elk along the riverside), & a nice little jaunt with Steve around the Nordic Center’s Orange Loop for the last time.

This is definitely the most luggage I’ve ever taken on a plane with me – in there is my bike, my hiking backpack, my skis (& boots), a suit bag & a small backpack as hand luggage. It only cost me $275 for the privilege too – a bargain compared with shipping skis.

So after final farewells with good friends over (also my last plate of yam fries from the Drake), I’m heading off to London. Checking in all that baggage took a while, just as well the flight was delayed so I could pop off back into Calgary to see Anya & go to Tim Hortons one last time (Timmy’s wasn’t important). Last week with all that rioting I wasn’t overly keen on heading to London – but more unknown adventures await in all manner of places I hope. But I sure will miss the mountains, the riding & the skiing – but it’s probably a good thing not to be facing another winter like the one past. Knowing I was only doing one was probably got me through all those days when it was below -20ºC.

Canada, roadtrip, travel, USA

USA Roadtrip 2011 Map & Data-fest

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Here is the map of my recent travels promised some time ago to Liz (who has a great blog going of her & her husband’s ever-increasing self-sufficiency on a small block of land in rural Queensland). It’s taken me most of the day to compile this & frustratingly I found out two-thirds of the way through that to keep page-speeds up Google separates larger My Maps in to different pages which you can’t view mashed together. I was looking forward to adding in all the rides I did & some photos at various scenic places, but with such a poor user-interface & result it’s not worth the effort. I did manage to find a way so that one can view the whole map at once – so here it is.  As it’s not obvious, the trip started & finished in Canmore, Alberta, & was a counter-clockwise loop (or thereabouts).

edit – You may have to zoom out a bit for it to work first time.

A few more links for those that are interested or just like spreadsheets:

bikes, Canada, friends, MTB, national park

Being Lake touristy

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Exhausted from Sunday’s big ride, we had a late start before I took Brent & Emma up to see Lake Louise & Moraine Lake. We blew past the park gates at the busiest I’ve seen them for a long time (twas Monday too) & of course when we got to the lake it was insanely busy. But never mind, we found a sneaky parking spot & went to gaze at the beautiful lake for a while, feeling wonderfully lazy. There was considerably less ice than early May in the lake – in fact, there was actually water in the liquid phase, brilliant.

If we hadn’t have been so sore & tired, I would have been pushing for the nice little ride to Moraine Lake – you actually earn the view, instead of just driving there. As it was, we drove & there were less people there than at Lake Louise. The lake was a lot higher than last time I visited in the fall – all the logs at the outlet were floating. Brent tried valiantly for quite a while to cross them, but in the end he was too big to not sink. Emma managed to get a very wet foot trapped under a log or two for a while. The frivolity over we wandered up the lookout point.

A cruisy drive back down the parkway home – we saw a couple of huge-antlered elk.

Tuesday morning we were in a fit state to ride, but as Emma & Brent had to hit the road south I opted to show them the rocky & rooty technatality of the Nordic Center. With a bit of the Yellow Loop, a little bit of “Brendan getting slightly lost” & then some of the Orange Loop across the meadows & down we came to the Coal Chutes intersection. Brent persuaded us to go down the black run. I’d forgotten just how much fun it is – a little steep, but on the smooth & non-grippy coal surface I was just on the right side of the edge of control & it was a blast. With the nice Georgetown climb, a bit more of the Orange Loop (Orchid) & a little more toiling up hill we were back at the day-lodge after watching little kids with guns (not something you want to come across on your MTB ride) at the biathlon range. The usual fun down the berms, table-tops & doubles on Soft Yoghurt & then down Devonian Drop & along the loose gravel beside the hydro facility & our nice little jaunt was over. Sad to see my Kiwi accented visitors leave, but I’m sure I’ll hear some Kiwis in whatever is left of London next week.

bikes, Canada, friends, GPS, MTB

Lusk Pass – Jumpingpound – Cox Hill – Lusk Pass epic

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I was surprised to learn earlier in the week that Emma & Brent were going to be up around Canmore so soon in their big American roadtrip (we saw them mid-June in San Luis Obispo, CA) as this weekend just gone. But they managed to get up here just in time before I go back to London next week (which I’m not looking forward to so much after the last few days’ news) & I was very pleased to have my first Kiwi visitors to Canmore. A lot of Saturday evening was spent sharing roadtrip & mountain-biking stories – I hope we didn’t bore Megan & Alex too much. A small period of time was given over to discussing the ride we were to take them on the next day. My favourite ride from last summer was Jumpingpound Ridge & Cox Hill, so I was keen to show off some good backcountry riding in Kananaskis Country. I think Alex has been missing big rides this summer – he wanted to go over Lusk Pass to start & finish the loop (making more of a lasso). We, perhaps naively, were up for this.

Parking at the University of Calgary Barrier Lake Field Station, we were soon climbing up towards the top of Lusk Pass. It was mostly double-track (we followed the Trans-Canada Trail for a while towards Baldy Pass) & steady climbing. However, near the top of the pass it got really quite steep & so loose in parts that we were all walking. I was beginning to think that we were spending a lot of energy that we would want later in the day. Nonetheless, we had a little descent from the pass to the road, Powderface Trail, where we turned south & headed ten kilometres or so to the trailhead. We were fortunate to have a thin layer of cloud keeping the sun off us & not much wind to contend with.

I covered most of the trail last year, but that climb up to Jumpingpound Ridge is still brutal. Looking back on my last trip report, I think I was able to ride the same as last year – but the big wheels made it a bit easier & less energy sapping. We all kept a good pace up – well three of us kept a good pace & Brent was noticeably ahead of us as he cleared everything. That hardtail with a single (30T) chainring obviously works for him. The rocky part along the ridge was definitely easier for me on a 29er; soon we were out of the trees & at the summit as the clouds cleared & we got the views we deserved.

Before long we were snaking along the ridge – the lack of wind compared to last year was great.

After the ridge-riding, the trail drops nicely through a couple of hundred vertical metres & is great fun. There’s a few rocky bits & small periods of unobstructed panoramas.

Can you tell I was enjoying myself?

It’s more steep climbing to regain most of the altitude just lost to summit Cox Hill. That first Lusk Pass bit must have had me tired, because I feel that I didn’t ride quite as much as I did last year & this time there were no insane gusts to contend with. We all rejoiced (well, three of us) when Brent’s climbing ability was finally defeated by a lack of traction less than fifty metres from the end – he is human after all.

Once again, the huge downhill off Cox Hill made the 1800m of climbing we did in the day worthwhile. Starting with those big open traversing switchbacks on loose rock before diving in to the trees & the trail changing to roots, to rocks & frequently back again it was a blast all the way down. I was pleased to mostly be keeping pace with Brent – I’m still not completely used to having the brake levers on the opposite side, so I’ll stick to that as some sort of lame excuse.

We had a steady climb along the road for seven or eight kilometres & after being out for six hours & climbing so much, we were all starting to feel rather exhausted. But we kept a good pace along the road & were eventually back at the Lusk Pass trail – which, naturally, had more of a climb to the top than we remembered going down earlier in the day. But those steep bits we had to walk up were a complete blast on the way down as we blew through many loose rocks. Brent & I got a nice little surprise to come around a corner at speed & see a bear cub running off down the trail – we started making a lot more noise after that. The last part of the old fireroad had a lot of logged trees across it, which was a bit of drag.

We persevered & were back at the car 56 km & almost seven and a half hours after leaving it. Truly the longest, most epic & best ride that I’ve done all summer – which is great, as I’ve been looking forward to it for many months. We all hurt, but were pretty happy with the riding & that we’d achieved it. Joel & Kristy had us all (Megan & Finn included) around for barbecued beer-can chicken dinner, all that meat was much needed & deserved!

– Some photos taken shamelessly from Alex & Emma.

Biking to go places, going places to bike.