July 4th, 2015

What happened…

Andrew writes:Barb and Eric were great! Yesterday, they let us just chill out at their house until we were ready to go out on a tour of the town. Amanda and I have been through Kelowna a number of times in the car, but never have we stopped to play tourist. Yet our hosts were gracious enough to take us to the top of Kelowna Mountain in the south, and then all the way through town to the northern viewpoint on Knox Mountain. Then we went for a walk on the boardwalk in town and even stop for a quick dip in Okanogan Lake. What a great way to spend the day!

So now here we are, back on our bikes heading towards Vernon. Wait…we encountered a slight delay from the get-go, as Amanda’s front rack broke again. The bolt that holds the rack on, snapped off inside of her fork. This isn’t the first time this happened; I experienced something similar on our first day of riding in Inuvik last summer, and then Amanda had it happen while we were in Cuba. We were able to use some wire to secure the rack for the day, but we will need to get it looked at in Vernon.

Right, so where was I? Oh yes, here we are, back on our bikes, heading towards Vernon – for real this time! Barb and Eric had mapped out a route for us to get out of Kelowna and onto the highway, which is really nice of them. Usually I don’t like to take directions from other people because they tend to suck; these directions were awesome! The ride itself was pretty awesome all in all actually. We stopped for lunch in Winfield and shared a sandwich and juice. Rant: Why is it that people think that it’s OK to just pull up in front of the store and just sit there with their truck engine idling exhaust? Especially when there are plenty of parking spots…and two cyclists trying to enjoy lunch with an exhaust pipe stuck in their face??? End rant.

I think there was only one crappy section of riding on the busy highway 97, up a steep hill, with a very narrow shoulder. For the most part, there was always a road that ran parallel to the highway, usually along the shores of one of the many lakes in the aptly named “Lake country”. We saw a few other cyclists while we are riding, and it was nice to take a break to talk to them a little bit. One such cyclist had set off from Esquimalt, on Vancouver Island, a week earlier, and was set on cycling across Canada. Quite the ambitious old codger, he hoped to make the trip in two months. He was really lucky to have his wife driving in a support vehicle behind them. She would stop every kilometre or so to take pictures either of him, or of the scenery. I hope that I’m able to still have the same passion, and ability, to ride when I’m 70 like this guy is.

Easy days like today, are why like to ride bikes. Some ups, some downs, some great views, some great conversations, and little traffic. We got to our friends house (Kyle and Norma) in Vernon where we hope to spend another couple of days just relaxing and taking it easy along the shores of the lake.

Amanda writes:Today was a beautiful ride and relatively easy. I enjoyed the easy pace and beautiful lake views. While my broken rack was annoying I was really left thinking about why it keeps breaking. It must be how it’s mounted because it’s just not right. I know the terrain has been rough, but I lightened my front panniers after the last break. I was just left thinking about it for a lot of the day but not in a bad way. Just curious more.

Arriving at Kyle and Norma’s was glorious. They’re like family and make us feel like it too. I’m looking forward to kicking back with these two for a few days to recharge physically, mentally and sportily (if that’s a word). Kyle and Norma are also huge sports fans and two people that wouldn’t mind watching hours of golf, baseball and football. We’re lucky to have them in our lives.

Today’s Photographs

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