Day 56

Video from last week's blog post, camping outside Cache Creek: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQ_QWakS9bA&feature=youtu.be
This video depicts the arid landscape around Kamloops.

We left Sarah's place in Kamloops and headed towards Jasper National Park over the next week. We started to notice that the vegetation again changed from the arid hills of Kamloops to the dense vegetation and snow tops of the Rocky Mountains. Anytime we have a packed lunch we manage to bike an abnormal amount of kilometers, and again this was the case as we biked 130km and finished in Clearwater.

After camping in the backyard of a motel in Clearwater we woke up to torrential downpours. We hid out in a cafe for around an hour, however, it didn't help in the long run as we were soaked by the end of the day. We managed to bike 109 km over 8 hours on just protein bars and apples, so we were happy to reach our destination of Blue River and have some dinner. We set up camp behind the restaurant where Will managed to kill close to 6000 mosquitoes double-handedly.

 

Our first black bear sighting

We left our campsite and it was still raining, but luckily we managed to miss the forecast of thunderstorms. The hills were starting to get larger as we got closer to Jasper, but they were still quite manageable. We also had our first major wildlife encounter, as there was a black bear on the side of the road. As the day went on, the rain was on and off, so we decided to have lunch under a bridge.
Here's a video demonstrating "how we do": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rErs-i37sMg&feature=youtu.be 

We made it the town of Valemount which was surrounded by mountains and may be considered one of the most scenic towns that we've come across. When we had finished buying some groceries a man by the name of Dave donated $60 to our cause and also gave us a jar of homemade raspberry jam. Afterwards we managed to bike another 15 km before the headwind became too much and we camped in the Jackson Flats Provincial Park.

 

Harry rocking short-shorts in Valemount. He lost a bet.

We had one more day of biking before we reached Jasper National Park and the city of Jasper. The mountains were becoming larger both in size and in number. Mount Robson, the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies at 3940m, and Mount Terry Fox at 2680m were some of the more notable ones. We were a little disappointed though because, as it was raining again, there were clouds covering most of the peaks. About 10 km into the day we entered Mount Robson Provincial Park, which not only offered great scenery, but clear blue rivers formed from glacier water. Legends say that it's not in fact water, but blue Gatorade, or maybe even Blue Gatorade powder in liquid form. When we passed the Alberta border and into Jasper National Park the scenery was even more spectacular and a sign of great things to come.
 

 Alberta. You're welcome.

 

Great things are coming

As we left Jasper we had to pass another gate to enter the National Park...again. However, before we even passed the gate we saw a herd of caribou (which we took the liberty of pronouncing "elk") and you can see the video here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaTrfUkc22Q&feature=youtu.be), and we also saw two coyotes hiding in the bush.

Once we passed the gate we saw two more black bears. So in the span of under 5 km we saw three different large mammals. Further down the road Will also spotted a very large caribou and two wolves. We thought we were about to witness a show-down of epic proportions, but the wolves chickened out. Harry also had the privilege of spending some time alone with a black bear at the side of the road, for about 5 minutes before all the crazy tourists showed up and scared it away.

 

"Hey Harry"

The day consisted of very long and steep climbs, with very few downhills. We also had our first flat tire, Harry's rear tire was completely deflated by a piece of glass at the top of a large hill. We managed to repair the damage without a hitch. But then, we came face-to-face with a mysterious and majestic animal known by many as a mountain goat. We decided to use a more authentic pronunciation of goat in the video though:
http://youtu.be/B8GDgzXPmOw

By day's end we were at an altitude of close to 2000m at  the Columbia Icefields Info Center. We set up camp less than a kilometer from one of the largest glaciers in the Rock Mountains, so it was a little chilly.

 

We left the Icefields in the morning for another day of long hills. However, we were surprised to find that we also had about 20km of straight downhill in the morning. We did 20km in probably 30 minutes, a new world record. The Icefields parkway was scattered with gigantic mountains and clear blue lakes, the scenery is unbelievable. We finished the day passing Bow's summit, which marked the highest altitude for the entire trip. Our legs were tired but knowing that it was going to be downhill for the rest of the day made it easier. We camped just outside Mosquito Creek campground, about 25km from Lake Louise.

 

Just after biking 20km in 30 minutes, not even tired. 

 

Just a taste of the two days that we were on the Icefields Parkway 

Our next destination was Banff, which would be a much flatter route but would prove to be difficult in other ways. One particular difficulty involved The first wipe-out of the trip, as Will flew over his handlesbars along the shoulder of the Trans Canada Highway. Harry caught-up with Will about an hour later, and we've decided to include the conversation we had in this blog, verbatim:

Harry: hey

Will: Hey, I wiped out.

H: what happened?

W: So there I was, minding my business, biking along, and then a road sign appeared on the shoulder, out of nowhere! So I swiftly swirved to the right and dodged the sign perfectly. But turned out that the fresh pavement on the shoulder was way too loose so my front tire turned 90 degrees. I went about 3 or 4 feet forward, but my bike didn't. I got my hands up pretty quick and capped off my landing with a forward roll, so i'm alright.

H: did anyone pull over to see if you were alright?

W: Nope. But I don't blame them. Do you ever stop what you're doing when you see a butterfly flutter and with a determined elegance land on a branch? No. And similarly, people didn't stop for me because I looked like a pro. One van even had a passenger judge my landing, and gave me a 9.5 on a scale of 1 to 9.5, presumably.

photograph taken by Anonymous

Will got right back up and kept trekking, but within a few kilometers his rear tire decided it couldn't handle being a part of such a legendary bike ride, so the inner tube popped. No problem though, Will had an extra inner tube in his bag so he just replaced it and went on his merry way. But the tire was relentless in it's effort to throw in the towel, so the brand new inner tube popped within 2 kilometers. 

Will giving a stern talking-to to his tire.

It's important to note that none of these hardships were caused by human error. Obviously. We then realized that the tire was in such bad shape that we wouldn't be able to make it to Banff. So we hitched a ride on a coach bus and made it to a bike store in Banff, where we proceeded to buy brand new tires that promise to never wear out on us.

We then spent the night in Canmore, and the next day we made our way to Calgary, thereby ending our run in the Rock Mountains. After having biked a stretch of 13 straight days and 1200 kms, we decided to take two days off at Harrison's Grandfather's place just outside of Calgary. Thank you to Roy and Jan for their hospitality.

NB: One of the highlights from our time in BC was when we stopped in a restaurant in Lytton and had a great conversation with the owner. She was a very talkative woman. One of her stories that she shared was about her then 5 month-old son who was terminally ill. Her son managed to survive and is doing very well now, 15 years later, but her story very much struck a chord with us. She told us that when it was determined that he was terminally ill, a government program made it so that she would be able to take him back home to her small town, so that he could spend his last days with his family, rather than in a hospital in the big city hours away from his family. She told us one of the most disturbing things for her, at the time, was that the government, which was allowing her to take her son back home by offering to cover the exepenses for all the necessary medical supplies, made her take four years of supplies at minimum. She, as well as the doctors, knew that she would only need one year's worth of supplies, but there was no way around it. The supplies had to be given to her, and she knew that this meant that they were going to be wasted. She did manage to give some of the supplies that didn't have expiry dates to the local doctor, but she felt bad that so many supplies had been needlessly wasted. In her own words, she told us that the supplies could have been used to help three other families, but that her hands were tied by the very program that was trying to help her. The reason why this struck a chord with us is because of how closely related it is to the cause that we have chosen to support. Among other things, including improving educational programs and social programs for on reserve aboriginal children, the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society is actively involved in legislating something called "Jordan's principle". The program that allowed this woman that we met to take her son home for his last few days or months is a program that does not apply to on-reserve aboriginals, because neither the provincial nor federal government is willing to front the bill. All this while simultaneously affording an over-abundance of supplies to people that don't need them. You can read more about Jordan's principle, which aims to put an end to this discriminatory procedure, here. This was a great reminder for us about the cause behind our trip, and a great opportunity for us to extend our thanks to everyone who has donated to the cause and helped in any way. Thank you.