North of the Border

I haven’t ridden a geared mountain bike in the US since a demo day at Pajarito Ski Mountain a few years back. The same statement can no longer be made about North America.

Sans ss (long story, UPS and USAirlines both suck), I went to Vancouver to do see an old friend, and mix in a little mountain biking. It’s always good to have a personal trail guide, and this incredibly-well-done-job was expertly executed by fellow Oredigger, Emily C. We hadn’t seen each other since mc and Tory’s wedding (2002ish) and hadn’t ridden together for a few years prior to that. But, this didn’t stop her from offering to show me the goods in Vancouver riding, which she describes much better than I could hope to accomplish

Saturday’s ride was on a borrowed bike (thanks Rob!), a Brodie Sauce (when in Canada, ride Canadian). Despite great intentions and the trust extended by allowing a complete stranger to borrow your prized possession (of course, I didn’t tell him how frequently I crash!), but the Sauce hadn’t seen trails in a while. Before hitting the trails, we stopped by Obsession Bikes to have the shocks adjusted; too bad I didn’t think of checking the brakes… (cue ominous music)
Not too long after hitting the singletrack, Emily looks on, in the first descending switchback, as I beg the Hayes for any braking at all. Despite Emily’s inquiries about the necessity of brakes, we turned back and rode into town to have them adjusted..

Emily is peaking for her first foray into enduro racing, BC Bike Race and her current fitness suggests that she’s going to do great..

The next climb had me flat on my back, looking up into the bluebird sky filtering through many shades of green

The picture I don’t have is one of me, after five hours of riding, during the final climb on the side of the trail, grasping a tree, gasping for air, while Emily steadily climbs to the top.. chicked..

After limping back to North Van (detouring by Obsession Bikes to pick up an Enduro for the rest of the weekend), we took the SeaBus downtown, but we were far too hungry to explore. Looking back across the water towards North Van.

Pasta and beer at the Steamworks Brewing CO… mmmm Coal Porter….

Sunday, we headed up to Squamish (Emily drove, I goggled) to hit another network of xcountry trails (she is training, after all). After a few false starts (new housing development wiped out the trailhead), we finally hit the dirt, following the Test of Metal race course. We didn’t really intend to follow the course, but the trails we sought were closed for the season, so we pre-rode.. After getting to the top following some very stiff climbing, we bailed from the course descending a logging road in order to traverse to some other trails on the next mountain, only to be stopped by ongoing logging. yay back up to the Test of Metal course. Actually, the next sections of the course were incredible, from this powerline track.

to another trail, aptly named Rollercoaster. The pix would’ve been incredible, but it was way too fun to stop, and Emily is way too fast for me to get enough of a gap to break out the camera.. Unfortunately, despite alternate routing to get to the other trails, my knee decided that it had enough, so we bailed on the ride and I took some advil and had some beer (and fish and chips) at the Howe Sound Brew Company (I have to confess, the veggie burger tasted much, much better)..

Since the day was cut short (only four hours of ride time), and hiking doesn’t seem to bother my knee, we hiked up past Shannon Falls to the top of the Chief’s First Peak..

red and green

green and white

Green, white, and grey

Diamondhead from the summit of Peak 1

Looking out towards the bay

A little bit of Colorado sunshine in a flask. The time spent lounging in a windbreak at the top was not insubstantial.

Monday, Memorial Day back south of the border, was to be a shorter ride, since I needed to make it to the airport and begin my trek back to Bako. Em had picked out something close (Fromme) that would allow me to open the shock to it’s full 150 mm capacity, and feel much more comfortable in armor and a fullface helmet. Which was nice since I went through the trouble of bringing it along as a carry-on.
Mines’ grads are kind of geeky

After a nice nice warm-up, dirt road climbs at a conversational pace, not even thinking of chasing the lightweight crosscountry riders that passed us, we turned onto the Pipeline singletrack (after only one wrong turn). Amored Emily hitting three armored rollers.

I followed her down (gears, suspension, armor, baggies, what happens in Canada, stays in Canada)

Emily on a teeter with a high pivot, whose entrance was a long skinny

I couldn’t master the long skinny entrance, and unlike Emily, I was quite uncomfortable with precarious starts, so I did the ride around. Throughout the ride she rode stuff that I walked.. chicked again…

Later in the day, after devouring some yummy Red Burritos, she broke out a slackline in the park near her place..

chicked again…

Sunday’s ride up in Squamish would’ve been very nice on my Walt, but gears and suspension were probably required on Saturday and Monday.. ahhh, it kills me to say that…

Em, thanks for a great weekend, we shouldn’t wait so long to ride again…