XC

Kettle Valley Railway — Link Lake to Princeton

Posted on by Smoke

** If you are a St. George’s student, E-MAIL ME about pics.

The first full day of riding. a bit grey and cool this morning, and the rain last night had the boys sort of quiet. Can’t say the same about Mr. Kay (Andrew), who likes to chop wood at 5am. Oh well, I can sleep when I’m dead.

Amar “The Hammer”, just before his infamous face plant. He might not know how to ride yet, but he sure knows how to put together a good looking ensemble.

The crew gets ready to ride. That’s the other guide, Marc, on the right.

Henry and Grant ( I hope I got the right name with the face) are setting the pace on the roll out. Henry was really funny this trip. Cody only rode with us one day, as did a few others who had to go to a scouting camp for hockey. Based on this kids stamina and strength, I would think that he’ll go pretty early in the draft if the NHL ever gets its act together. That guy beat the crap outta me all day.

The first 10km or so of this ride kind of sucked. Lots of loose gravel and sand to contend with, and boring scenery. This trestle was where things began to get more interesting.

Even though the ride was still a bit sluggish after the trestle, the scenery improved, and we got a rhythm established. Just past the first tunnel we stopped for food and a little lesson on “trundling.”

Now things got really interesting. The hockey boys kicked up a few more notches. I was having a hard time hanging on. Pretty much all I could do was draft and hope. The 50km/h headwind wasn’t helping.

I started to pick landmarks and making them sprint, sorth of like with the city limits signs. A ha! Competetive little blighters, I see. I sense that I have a tool to control them now. Dance, puppets…..

‘Shanks comes in on the sprint with a gap after the main peleton has rolled through. Nice effort, Jamie.

My favourite shot of the day. Clancy and Graydon hamming it up. 130 km on DH bikes. And you thought private school was for the smart kids…..

St. George’s Bike Trip

Posted on by Smoke

**If you were on this trip, EMAIL ME for info about pictures.

Interesting how the karma comes back to you. I did a bunch of youth work for nothing and next to nothing in the early 90’s. Mostly with disadvantaged kids in North Van (there were more of them than now).

Well, an old room-mate and legendary multiple bike shop ex-employee, Mitch Diem, hooked me up with a guiding gig for St George’s School this month. 5 days on the KVR with 30 boys aged 15 or so.

Yikes.

Then again, having an eagle parked over the van while you are pulling out might just be a good omen. I’m beginning to think that I might just have a totem spirit looking over me, I see so many eagles these days.

This would also be the first time I’ve ever driven a school bus. I thought the van was big, but a yellow school bus is huge. Imagine four hours of this in your rear view:

Which didn’t lead to any real bright work at the far end of hte trip. Having fun with the tent, boys?

Good thing it only rained a little bit that night……

Big Trees of BC

Posted on by Smoke

…Because some days are just for us. Most of the Bush Pilot clients don’t like to climb, or if they have the XC fitness they don’t have the technical bike skills. That makes days like yesterday all the more sweet.

I can’t tell you where this trail is. It’s near Vancouver is all I’m going to say. It’s a real bitch to get into. It was a 3 hour run, what with the semi-wet conditions we ran into. It’s truly epic. It’s one of the sweetest, flowiest lines I’ve ever seen on the coast.

And it’s covered in huge trees.

Here’s Dub being swallowed by the forest.

If you can’t see the image below, you may have to get the latest Flash Player or try reloading the page. You can scroll around by draggin the mouse. If you drag your cursor up or down from the Bush Pilot logo, it will also zoom in and out. P-Dub is in there somewhere.

…and here’s good old Barb riding the log.