Despite briefly waking up around 3:00AM (I was freezing my buns off - just tucked down into my sleeping bag and went back to sleep all comfy), I slept very well. No bears, no screaming, and no car races interrupted my sleep. I woke up for the day at about 7:30AM and enjoyed the sounds of the birds waking up before getting up and starting my day.
I opened the tent door and was greeted with this view:
Man, what a great way to start the day. Refreshed after a good sleep, and the first things I see when I look outside are the KLR (was nice to see it wasn't lying on its side), the trees, and, of course, Mount Bruticus.
There's just something about sleeping outdoors - I find that a good sleep outdoors is just that much more invigorating. I did notice that it was still cool, however, so I took some time to set up my portable weather station to get some readings:
Considering it was 31C the previous day, it was a bit of a change.
I had a delightful breakfast of one very, very hard power bar and some cherry juice, and then spent a little more time than normal going over the KLR. I was going to be doing the up-and-down-the-mountain thing today and wanted to make sure everything was in good shape. Everything was great - I couldn't even find a single loose fairing bolt. Weird.
Oh, and I suppose now is as good a time as any to mention my great invention:
While I was in Brandon on Day 1, my dad came up with a solution to a problem I was having with the bike. You see, I have two sidestands. When I bought the bike, I had it lowered due to my little stubby legs. The folks at the dealership cut about an inch and a half off the sidestand so the bike wouldn't fall over. Last year, however, my confidence and comfort on the KLR was such that I had the bike raised back up to stock height... which made the shortened sidestand too small. I ordered a new stock sidestand and that fixed the problem.
Then, for some reason, I decided to go on a trip, so I loaded the bike down with all kinds of stuff. The bike got lower and lower as the suspension compressed... and then almost fell over. The stock sidestand was too long again, so the old, short sidestand went back on. Unfortunately, this still meant that the bike was leaned over quite far, and it would sink into the ground quite quickly.
Now, again, due to my little stubby legs, I get on the bike like someone gets on a horse. I put my left foot on the left peg, stand on it, and then swing my right leg up and over the seat (and any other stuff that's strapped on or bolted to the bike) before I sit down. This, unfortunately, means I need to keep the sidestand down.
Anyway, so my dad gave me a piece of plywood that served two purposes - it raised the sidestand a little bit, which lessened the angle that the bike leaned at, and it also kept the sidestand from sinking into the ground, particularly in sand or gravel when I was getting on the bike.
I did, however, still have a problem - if I wanted to use this piece of wood while I got on the bike, I had no way to retrieve it from the ground. Fortunately, I was carrying a bunch of extra cord and the plywood had a hole in one end.
Presto - easily retrievable sidestand rest thing. If I'd had more time (and some red paint), I would've painted it red, but it still did the job quite well. I'm thinking of patenting it and selling it to the millions of other people who have short legs and two sidestands - one that's too short and one that's too long.
Anyway, that was an awful lot of typing for a piece of wood with some string attached. Moving on...
As I was checking over the bike, I did notice two things. Firstly, my trusty Joe Rocket jacket was starting to smell, and bad. Secondly, the realization that I could actually smell my Joe Rocket jacket led me to the conclusion that... THERE WAS NO WIND!!!
Finally! A day with no buffetting! No stopping to get the dust out of my eyes! No holding the throttle open so far that the gas tank sounded like a draining bathtub!
I walked back to the lodge, said good morning to the staff and retrieved my food, and packed up Camp KLR. A short while later I was headed back up Hwy 40, and thoroughly enjoying the view, the road, and the smells once again. If you're ever in the Canmore/Kananaskis area, I'd highly recommend spending at least some time on that road!
I rode past Canmore and then turned north towards Banff and Jasper. All the way, the scenery was stunning:
I found myself pulling over quite often to get more pictures (and spending more time waiting for the RVs and tour buses to get out of the frame):
I planned to get gas in Banff, and saw my first sign a short while later. It didn't have gas listed amongst the service icons, and immediately after there was another sign saying Banff was ahead, so I kept going.
Of course, the next "Banff" sign didn't show gas in its rather short list of services, either.
No worries. I still had a fair amount of gas. These must've been campgrounds or something, so I just needed to keep going until I got to the real Banff.
A little while later, I realized that yep, I'd missed Banff.. and gas. Not knowing where the next stop was (and hoping it wasn't Jasper), I figured I'd best take a photo of the situation:
Fortunately, only a short while later there was a sign for Castle Mountain Chalets... and it had a gas icon on it! I was saved, and it was easy to find, too:
It was a nice little place with an old-looking gas pump (53.1MPG) and the staff was very friendly. Mind you, wouldn't you be friendly if you worked at a place like this:
and knew that every day when you went to work, you'd see Mount Murgatroyd if you looked out across the parking lot?
I would.
As I was sitting on the bike and putting my gloves on to leave, I couldn't help but notice that motorcycle after motorcycle was riding by. All types, too - Goldwings, big cruisers, sport bikes... probably more bikes than I'd ever seen in one place. It was pretty much constant.
Just as three bikes pulled off the road and started rolling towards me, I dropped one of my gloves. Not wanting to hold anyone up at the single pump, I started the bike and rode about 20 feet to get out of the way. As I was getting off the bike to go and retrieve my glove, the lead rider had already stopped his bike at the pump and was holding my glove up.
I didn't care about the glove, though - all three of them were riding KLRs!
I walked over and greeted them with, "NICE BIKES!"
They looked at me strangely for a second and said, "Thanks."
I took my glove and thanked the lead rider for picking it up for me, and then the four of us started to chat while they got gas. The three of them were from Montana and were riding to Alaska, taking an adventure together as the three of them had recently retired. Despite riding older KLRs, and having been riding for quite some time, I couldn't help but notice how much cleaner their bikes looked than mine...
Anyway, they were hungry and I wanted to get back on the road so after a short chat we wished each other good rides and I hit the road.
I quickly started to feel overwhelmed. I wanted to take pictures of everything - there was so much to see and so many convenient pull-outs to take pictures from. This was supposed to be a relatively short day but it was much longer than I'd expected due to all the stops. I couldn't be blamed for some of them, though - anyone who's in the area needs to get a picture of Mount Pufnstuf:
Every kilometre of road had gorgeous views. Diplodocus Peak stood silently and majestically:
At some point while I was standing on the side of the road, staring agog at the scenery and taking pictures, the three KLR riders rode by, with waves all around. I think it was right around when I was taking this picture of Mount Larry and Mount Darryl (the other Mount Darryl was off to the right):
I believe Mounts Larry, Darryl, and Darryl are part of the Ghas Range, which was easy to see if I turned around a bit:
Before I left, Dad said, "Make sure you get some pictures with you in them!" Here you go, Dad - here's me standing in front of Apocalypse Peak:
After riding for a while longer, I noticed my GPS was saying I was riding at an elevation of 1918 metres. So, not only had I travelled 1500km west from Winnipeg, I'd also travelled almost 1.7km up!
Another thing that really surprised me was the colour of the rivers and lakes. Where I come from, they're usually... well, brown. There's Clear Lake, which is pretty clear, but yeah, most of them are brown or occasionally greeny-yellow. Sometimes they're blue-green too, but the scientists tell us to stay away from them when that happens. They're never this colour, though:
I'm no animal behaviour specialist, but when a bird this big walks right by you, despite you yelling and waving your arms at it, it's either deaf, not afraid of humans, or waiting for food:
It picked up a stray french fry that was sitting by the bear-proof garbage bin and casually walked away with it.
I rode for a little while longer and suddenly I saw a familiar sight - three KLRs sitting in a small recreational area (I think it was Bow Lake). I pulled in and started chatting again with the same fellows from the Castle Mountain Chalets! We talked for a little while and then another rider pulled in - a V-strom rider from (get this) Maui. He'd quit his job, shipped his bike over, and was riding around and having a good time before settling down to a new job. The five of us talked for a while before I dashed out and grabbed a photo:
The view was extraordinary, and the five of us took turns gawking at the scenery and rejoining the conversation.
While we were talking, a little friend stopped by to say hello:
As soon as they were sure the bird wasn't going to claw or bite through his luggage, one of the guys tossed a little piece of food at the bird, which flew up and caught it in mid-air. It then landed on his brand-spanking-new GoPro camera:
To reduce the chance the bird would use the camera as its own private urinal, he tossed another bit, which the bird caught again and then landed on the ground. It obviously figured out the game by then, because it simply waddled towards any additional food and didn't catch it in the air.
After a great long talk, we all decided it was time to head out. The other guys left first and I hung behind them for a while before it was time to take more pictures. There was so much that caught my eye. This sign, for instance, was wrong:
It should have said:
... and it looked like this. The photo doesn't do it justice, but it's basically a giant wall of rock. It's not as tall as a bunch of the other mountains and it doesn't have snow at its peak, but it's really close and crane-your-neck big:
I know I keep repeating myself, but everywhere I looked, there was something else awesome or incredible to take a picture of:
The road headed upwards as it started to climb a mountain. I was trapped in what felt like a sea of RV's, camper trailers, and tour buses, and we were doing about 60kph which was just fine with me. The road wound around and around until finally we were at the top. There was a pullout that was packed with people who all wanted to get pictures. I was particularly struck by the waterfall cutting through the trees on its way down from Mount Coldheart:
... and by looking back down the road that led to this point:
I was feeling particularly proud of myself for making it this far and seeing things I'd never seen before. Proud enough for a self-serving thumbs-up:
We then headed back down the mountain. I put the bike into fourth gear and let engine braking do the work for me. I was behind an RV called "The Princess", and I stayed a healthy distance behind Her Majesty, just in case. I'd never let engine braking do the work for quite that long before, I was pretty sure I'd spent around ten minutes with the engine doing 3500RPM with no throttle. It was kind of weird.
Suddenly, I smelled something. Something bad. Something that made me immediately worry about the KLR. At the next pullout, I got off the road and stopped the bike. I hopped off and ran around it, looking for melting or burning parts. I couldn't find any, and strangely enough, the KLR didn't smell weird anymore. A couple of seconds later, another RV rolled by, and I caught another whiff of the smell. Another RV, and the smell again.
I've smelled hot brakes before, but I've never smelled burning brakes. Like, "let's cook dinner on the rotors" type of brakes, but that's what was happening. The Princess and her oversized, underengined and underbraked bretheren were cooking off their brake pads as tribute to the mountain gods.
Relieved in some ways (the KLR wasn't on fire), but nervous in others, (I might get run down by a giant motorhome with failed brakes), I got back on the road and despite the smell, got back down the mountain with no problems.
Next stop was Moose Lake. "Idyllic" pretty much sums it up:
Now, I'm not sure, but I'm going to take a shot in the dark here and call this Mount Robson. The sign on the road said something like, "Now Leaving Mount Robson Park" or something like that, and besides, this kind of looks like something I'd call Mount Robson:
I was having such a good time I missed the British Columbia provincial marker. Whoops.
I did, however, notice a difference almost immediately after entering BC. I've probably written it here already, but where the Alberta Rockies are like a tall, square-jawed lumberjack with two days' worth of stubble and a flannel shirt, the BC Rockies are like a graceful ballerina who smells of pinecones and cinnamon. Rugged rock faces versus rolling tree-covered mountains.
Unfortunately, as soon as I got into BC, I was stuck behind a truck that I named "Smelly". Smelly would coast whenever there was a double solid line or oncoming traffic, and then gun it whenever I had an opportunity to pass, leaving the air fouled with exhaust that reeked of burning oil:
I was on Hwy 16 for a little while and then, much to my dismay, there was something going on ahead. What looked like police cars and construction workers were at the intersection of Highways 16 and 5. It was quite warm at this point, and the line of stopped traffic was very long. Both the KLR and I started to melt as the line crept forward so very slowly. Occasionally, the KLR would show its displeasure by belching a stream of hot air onto my left leg - hot enough that I would look down to make sure my pant leg wasn't on fire.
Eventually, I got to the front of the line, and lo and behold:
It was the one, the only - Barry!
"WHERE ARE YOU GOING?" asked Barry.
"I'm headed to Valemount," I replied.
"GOOD, BECAUSE IF YOU CAN'T GO MUCH FURTHER!" said Barry.
"Okay, thanks - have a good day," I said.
"YOU HAVE A GOOD DAY TOO!" said Barry.
He turned his sign from STOP to SLOW and I turned south on Hwy 5.
Eventually, I got to my destination - iRVin's RV Campground:
I signed in and the lady at the desk asked which campsite I had booked. I hadn't booked any specific site, so she told me to just go out and pick one. As you can see, I wasn't under any particular pressure:
One of the tent sites was right up against kind of a berm. Since there were no trees or privacy between the tent sites, I figured I'd back my stuff up against the berm and at least give the illusion of privacy on one side. It was only after I finished setting up Camp KLR that I realized the mistake I'd made:
While I was unpacking the bike, two kids came by on their bicycles and started to chat. They helped me put up my tent and asked me all kinds of questions about the bike. They were cousins and there with their families, but their RV had broken down and they were stuck there... and very, very bored. We talked for a while and then they went off for supper and it was time for me to make mine. Oh, yeah - grilled chicken and mashed potatoes. I bought some extra supplies from the campground store:
And as I was getting everything together, the view overtop of the campground pavillion caught my eye. Nothing like a sunbeam over Mount Badenov:
It was a good day. I was completely overwhelmed by the scenery - there was just too much to look at - if I'd tried to take a picture of everything I wanted to, I'd still be there, standing in a pile of dead batteries.
Just before I got ready for bed, I went and sat down at one of the tables in the pavillion to jot down my notes from the day. One other fellow was there, he was trying to get to Clearwater but had been turned back, apparently the reason for the traffic stop at Hwy 16 and 5 was there was a big accident and chemical spill of some sort so nothing was getting through. We talked for a while - he was on a trip with his daughter to see all of the national parks in Canada and the US.
I left the pavillion a little before I was done my notes, because I'd finally run into a problem I'd never had up to this point - mosquitoes. And by mosquitoes, I mean holy crap - huge clouds of the little bloodsuckers. I beat a hasty retreat back to my tent, went on a mosquito squishing spree, wished the KLR a good night, and got into my sleeping bag.
A few seconds later, I heard a weird sound:
"eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
Followed about 30 seconds later with:
"eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
It kept repeating every 30 seconds or so. I lay in bed with my eyes wide open, trying to figure out what kind of insect it could possibly be, and how large it probably was.
Another one joined in, and as darkness fell, more and more, until it sounded like I was surrounded by a plague of locusts, all of which were carrying little violins. I'd never heard anything like it before. Loud, too.
I waited a little while, and satisfied I wouldn't be found as a polished while skeleton in the morning, I turned on my mp3 player and drifted off to sleep.
Safe riding!
Odometer reading at the end of Day 4: 12612.9km
Distance so far this trip: 2048.9km
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