What an amazing day! It was an easy 106 kms from Misson, BC to Hope, BC. I just came back from a refreshing swim in a crystal clear lake outside our campground, which is just east of the community of Hope. The past two days were so easy but tomorrow is suppose to be brutal! We have a 125km with climbs through the Coast mountain passes. On top of that, it is suppose to be the hottest day of the year and we cycle through the hottest place in Canada, Lytton, BC. As we are staying in Hope tonight, the running joke has been that after today we are beyond all hope!
Today was my first morning waking in a tent and it sucked. This crowd wakes at 5:30 and I didn't have a great night’s sleep in the tent. Either way, it was no use trying to sleep in so I got up for breakfast, packed my gear, and hit the road by 6:45. I started with Gary, Bob, Graham, Iona, and Brett. We lost Bob and Graham early on so the remain four continued for about 30km. Myself and Brett, from New Zealand, decided to take a quick detour down to a lake for a picture (see below). Luckily, as we sprinted to catch Iona and Gary we came right upon a huge momma Black Bear! I stopped well before the damn thing but by the time I got my camera out, it was gone. I jumped back on my bike and out jumped her cub! I have a picture below, but I didn't want to get too close to piss off momma (however I suspect that my momma is having a fit right now!) Anyways, no grizzly yet so don't worry!
We made great time, averaging about 30 km/h. At 11:00 we had over 60 km completed so we took a 12 km detour to the Harrison Hot Springs in Harrison, BC. This was definitely worth it! We spent two hours in the indoor hot springs and adjacent glacial lake as the pictures below illustrate. After an ice cream and Iona's flat tire, we left for Hope. The rest of the trip was a little more difficult with some decent climbs but we made it just before 4:00pm. Brett and I moved ahead of Iona and Gary for a while by riding a tight paceline through a headwind. At camp, word spread about my mechanical knowledge of gear tuning. I ended up messing with bike until supper. I swear that we all eat more than three times what I normal person does and the pasta supper prepared by Danielle was awesome!
That's all for now, I should get to bed. We would like to be on the road by 5:30am to beat the mid-day heat.
It was at the outskirts of Port Moody, BC that I hit the pavement for the first time this year. I was climbing a hill when I mad the stupid mistake of shifting both my chainring and my cassette at the same time. This cause the chain to fall off and I managed to unclip the right foot, but fell on the left side. Luckily no cars were on the road. I didn't hit too hard but I ended up with a 4 inch cut and a bloody leg. Not too bad, and I'll be laughing if that's the worst of my crashes this summer.
We continued through the Coast foothills and most of the group ended up separating. I ended up cycling most of the day with Iona from Calgary. She's a triathete and has a cycling ability similar to mine. We were pretty quick from Vancouver to Mission but again, managed to get lost 10 kms from the campsite. This is a pretty rural area and the streets were not marked all that well. After talking with some locals however, we made it to our beautiful camp at 2:30pm.
As I write this, it is 10:00pm and the sun is just going down over the horizon of our camp. We are staying at a local fishout farm and the weather has been perfect! I definitely drank too many beers in the hot sun this afternoon and may end up paying for it on the ride to hope in the morning but it was well worth it. We had fresh trout, salad, and veggies for supper and it was very good. Then we spent and few hours around the lake and chilled out. Well, the weather is suppose to be good again tomorrow and we have another easy day to Hope, BC so I should get to bed. We are hitting up a natural hot springs tomorrow!
