Crossing Canada

22 August 2024

Writing from the airport departure lounge in Vancouver, I find myself reflecting on the week just gone, and the two months preceding it. It turns out that nine weeks away riding a bike is quite a long time! Starting in Nova Scotia, the rugged terrain of Newfoundland and Labrador is a distant memory. It’s bound to feel like that at this point – obviously the most recent miles will be freshest in my mind but I know from experience that as time passes the whole trip will cohere and all the separate elements will assume their place in the whole.

Whistler was a bit of a culture shock. In fact, I noted previously that we rode 120 km from Watson Lake before we found somewhere for coffee; since landing on Vancouver Island it has seemed remarkable that one is never more than a few minutes from a cafe or deli, or from a petrol station. Crazy that this should feel weird. Nonetheless, a few days in a bustling tourist town was just so relaxing – it felt that I was on holiday. And no, the previous 8 weeks had not been a holiday!

Whistler was also the place that Dave, Chris and I rejoined together as a group. We had all booked flights back to the UK, but not for another week. Although we had ridden the far away roads that had enticed us to come here, there were more areas in southern BC that I had had a hankering to visit since my days living in Seattle more than 30 years ago, and the others needed no persuasion to explore.

The road going northwest from Whistler is gorgeous, and a foretaste of what was to come in the next few days. After so many thousands of miles on mainly straight roads squaring off the tyres on our bikes, this was a heavenly change. Bends, some fast and sweeping, others tight and focused, all joyful in the midst of increasingly dramatic scenery with soaring mountains rising in steep cliffs from the road, or deep valleys so steep I could not see the valley floor from the saddle. Lillooet is a lovely little town amongst many. And on to Kamloops (relatively uninteresting I thought, with a name that sounds like a breakfast cereal). Next day just outside Sorrento en route to Revelstoke, in the most unlikely place next to nowhere we passed a sign advertising a motorcycle museum and cafe. Out of curiosity and in need of a coffee we stopped. What we found would have made it a destination on its own, worthy of a specific trip or a big city. Various interesting bikes outside including a Ducati Multistrada, another Ducati inside and a fabulous collection of rarities in the museum. The owner Paul runs a bike tour business, both on road and off, all over southern BC, and he showed me several roads on the map that we added to our plans. Paul comes to the motorcycle show at the NEC in Birmingham every year to drum up business – I look forward to seeing him there later this year.

Revelstoke is one of those places that resonates – I have heard the name for decades as a destination for heli-skiing for the wealthy, with a reputation for wonderfully reliable deep powder. I was told it was also a traditional ski resort, but the resort is 11 km out of the town and not on the route we were to take. The town however is rather lovely – it was built as the Canadian Pacific railway continued its march across the country, becoming an important terminus. The project was understandably expensive and the company nearly went bust, it was rescued by Lord Revelstoke, chairman of the UK Barings Bank, and in gratitude that town was renamed after him. A modern and well curated museum provides an excellent insight into the unbelievable amount of work and ingenuity required to create this resource linking the eastern hubs with the Pacific; enormous volumes of freight continue to cross the country on the same tracks even today.

It’s been a feature of my travels that there are always people doing things far more adventurous than I am, and in Revelstoke we met Bill, near the beginning of his ride around the world on a Royal Enfield Himalayan. Total respect!

Another day of truly fun riding took Chris and I southwards, with two ferry chossings of the mighty Columbia River before the second best biking road in BC – according to Paul. And I have no reason to doubt him!

Another couple of days, taking in the Okanagan Valley which I have long wanted to see, brought us finally back to Vancouver, and to the end of our ride. It has been nine weeks since we started back in Nova Scotia, And it rather feels like it. It’s a long way, Canada is huge. It is also very varied, although its sheer size means that one can ride for days on end with little change, but it’s that which emphasises the vastness. For me, that made it worthwhile in itself, because so much of it is empty of people and nature seems to have the upper hand. Of course, that is an illusion as we see the effects of climate change that we have wrought, from the plague of wildfires to floods and receding glaciers. We have ridden through fabulous scenery from endless plains to towering mountains, on roads varying from immaculate blacktop to barely being roads at all. We have had unfortunate events, a medical emergency resulting in one of us having to truncate his ride and go home early, but no mechanical problems other than a couple of punctures. The bikes have all coped admirably, maybe not surprisingly for the BMW and the Honda, but the Ducati was right up there with the best, brilliant as always on the tarmac but seemingly totally in its element on the dirt and rocky gravel roads. At times it felt like abuse, but the bike just ate it up. I loved it.

At the end of more than 12500 miles, my tyres still have (a little) life left in them, albeit they have rather lost their rounded profile!

Perhaps the best part is that we have met some wonderful people, learned a lot from them and been inspired by them. And we have ended our trip as firm friends amongst ourselves, and with some new friends as well. Thank you Pascal for your hospitality, and thanks also to all the other wonderful people who made our ride so special. Maybe more visits to Alaska and Canada are called for!

If anyone has any comments or questions please message me via this site, or alternatively email me at philbayly1@gmail.com.

Thanks for accompanying me on the journey!

PB