June 2020 Pentincton, BC
The Kettle Valley Rail Trail elegantly sneaks out of town, after all the rail was here before all the suburbs
The area is popular for wine and a wine-loving cyclist is guaranteed to leave town a little buzzed on free wine tours, if it wasn’t a time of covid (although most of them are actually open!)
Dominic was hiking on foot on the KVR and the cyclist was at the end of a long ride. he had just crashed and I gave him some hand sanitizer and use of my first aid kit for a bandage or two.
it felt odd refusing to shake hands but I’m determined to follow the guidelines and ensure a safe summer both for me and people I interact with
The trail continued and at times one can really admire the amount of effort and money that goes into restoring and maintaining this trail
and if you are wondering if DJI fixed their software for the mavic mini, they havent. The only saving grace is that compass calibration is not flight-preventing.
Got smoked by a bunch of cyclists, matching jerseys and all.
I usually spend the first few hours of the day wondering if there would have been a better camp site and barely 10min down the trail there was a perfect shelter which would have been great for the overnight downpour
The Princeton mill was a surprise and I stood a bit mesmerized at how little the logging trucks appeared here.
lights, signs and a straight line, you can only have 2 of the 3.
I love the graphic representation, you must not let go of the leash when you are picking up!
Tulameen/Otter Lake was fairly busy but I was glad to be on the quiet side of the lake
The road was rough and dangerous filled with rock slides and unsafe bridges.
#liability
even Cthulhu is sick and tired of these cattle gates
The trail continued nicely until its termination at the Coquihalla highway where I was able to take alternative roads to Merritt.
It rained and it poured in town. I went to the tim hortons drive through for a coffee and few doughnuts. The paper bag was already soaked and I munched 2 wet honey crullers and along with a coffee I was buzzing down the highway.
It was a tough balance between wearing the rain jacket and trying to keep cool.
I reached the Thompson River and that would take me down to the Fraser. The train tracks run on both sides of the valley in a magnificent and precarious ways along some of the steep cliffs. One day when trains become obsolete maybe there would be a rail trail here but until then
Being so close to a major highway brought some wonders about my camping options but I spotted an old-cut roadbed beside the highway and the sun decided to show up for a few minutes
The river was full from all the rain and the shoulder was good but riding besides so much water was a bit unsettling. Ever since I learned to packraft I look at every river trying to imagine being there.
At Lytton I finally have the option to get off pavement but the cable ferry was still closed due to the rain and high water levels. There was a railway bridge further back that I could take
The Fraser River
Crossing the bridge I got to meet with Owen who had seen many of my videos and had himself done a fair bit of travel. He rides his bike almost everyday to town
The Fraser river makes the Thompson feel like a little stream and the road runs sometimes steeply along the western wall of the canyon.
bah, just 1 off from the jackpot :(
In the post office they handed me my food package just for spelling my last name. “nobody can make this up”, I agree.
next town: Bella Coola.