Sunday 23 September 2018
Coquihalla conquered!
And what a spectacular province this is – a breathtaking day (not only because of the 900m of climb in the first 35km). The fiery luminous reds of the maples in the valleys and golden yellows of the higher altitude birches and aspens, the lime green mosses and fingers of clouds against wet grey granite were just jaw-dropping.
One of the big challenges of crossing Canada in bits and pieces is the logistics. We were fortunate again today that it all came together, once more with the help of Kundeep and his wife Navdeep of Hope Taxi. We drove our bikes up to the start point on the bike rack on our car, hid them in some trees next to the trail and drove the car up the Coquihalla, to about 23km past the summit. There we double-backed on a little country road for a couple of kilometres and parked at our selected end point next to the Coldwater River, then hiked back up the hill to the highway exit where Navdeep fetched us to drive us back down the Coquihalla to our bikes. All this had taken three hours so it was 10.30 by the time we hit the trail. And this was the first time on this cross-country journey that we were seeing in the car (twice) what we would be riding later. Each time we have been picked up at the end and driven back, we’ve been quite impressed with what we have ridden. But this time the drive up and back down before the ride instilled a sense of trepidation. This would be a long, arduous uphill day.
We were delighted, though, that none of it had us on the highway, although once or twice we were only a concrete barrier away. We rode on a beautiful hobbit-feeling forest trail and on Kinder Morgan’s private access road for most of the first, climbing 35km. Parts were quite steep, and lots was just nagging climb.
But it was beautiful. Even when the rain came down about 10km from the summit it was still a lovely ride. High above the Coquihalla river to start and following it and its tributaries past their sources, we had waterfalls and bright colour displays to ourselves (we saw four people the entire ride).
The summit was cold – about 7 degrees – and we celebrated briefly then donned warmer layers for what we expected would be a fast last 25km downhill to the car.
Instead we had narrow single track, sometimes no track, occasional road and sometimes makeshift path high above the Coldwater river with a sheer drop down to the river.
We were grateful for many things today, great mountain bikes (Rocky Mountain Instinct with their 29” wheels) were at the top of the list, closely followed by the skills lessons we had taken on Vancouver’s North Shore riding uphill over rock gardens and over “skinnies” a few inches wide.
Much of today was technical – picking our way over roots and rocks. Much was loose, shale gravel road on which we had to dodge water-filled potholes. Some was walking – when we needed a break from the saddle on those long climbs.
What we were not grateful for – again – was the litter, especially close to the highway! Tim Horton’s cups, beer cans, McDonald’s cups, a car seat, a few dumped car parts, oven racks, general household garbage. Staggering.
59km today…and close to 6 hours on the trails. Two tired bodies did the 2hr45 drive back to Vancouver. We’ve come a long way!
579km total
Trans Canada Epic 