day 3: gibsons to seabreeze resort

we rode 56 miles up and down a lot of hills. holy cow it was hard. granted, we barely trained for this bike tour, but our book listed this section as "E" which means "Easy," but it is actually more like "we needed an Elevator" hard. i'm scared of what the medium (M) and difficult (D) days will hold. 

(these sustain us. yes, they are peanut m&m's.)

i'm sitting in my tent, it's 11:15pm and my belly is full. (we had korean spicy noodles and lots of snacks for dinner.) my back is also achier than yesterday; i wonder if my positioning is not ideal. there is a cacophony of frogs providing the background music to our short lived sleepy time before we crash. the moon is huge and i'm grateful to have had a warm shower and running water tonight. last night, we had neither. let me tell you, it's hard to sleep feeling stickiness and not to mention coyotes howling close by! 

anyway, i have two memories i want to share from today. first was when we hauled ass to get to the ferry by 6:30pm. oh my lord. i truly didn't think we'd make it becuase we kept getting hit with hills. do you know how demoralizing it is to go downhill and then suddenly hit a hill - over and over again? but we miraculously made it with 10 minutes to spare. the other memory was while we were biking from saltery bay on a quiet carless road. the sun was heading home for the night while samuel and i cruised along. i looked at samuel and almost cried. i felt so much love towards him, and felt so grateful to be right there with him. (oh, and it is humid here like the jungles of costa rica!! a giant mosquito landed on my arm and that was reason enough to keep haulin even though i was pooped!) 

(can you find our bikes?)

(this was taken after we climbed a monster hill!) 

tomorrow, i'm looking forward to reaching steph's house south of nanaimo and washing some clothes and taking another shower. i am loving the simple pleasures. 

day 2: university of bc to gibsons

our first 30 miles, a bike chain gone very wrong and renegade camping on private property (because some guys said so). 

we started the morning off at the matthews' place, got all our gear together and we were off. we hit the road and samuel asked me, "did you get the directions?" i said, "no, [mumble]." he said, "i thought i asked you to look them up earlier." uhhhh..i asked him if he would be the directions person after that interaction. that should prevent future mismatched expectation regarding directions. he he

we rode around looking for an outdoor store to buy camp fuel, which got us lost on a street with a store (les amis du frommage) that had a huge selection of cheese and a wonderful patisserie specializing in waffles. oh dear. conte and salami at one and baguettes, mini waffle and mini quiche lorraine at the other. (that would turn out to be lunch and dinner for today.)

after riding up and down along the coast, we finally reached horseshoe bay where we rode a giant ferry to langdale. that was my first time on a ferry where you cycle in and cars drive right on. all i could say was, "wow." the view was spectacular with the mountains speckled with the last bits of snow, and covered with a lush forest showing off their new spring greens. i spoke to simon, a 25yo taiwanese visitor who was headed to bike camp solo for a couple days. he zipped off after the ferry ride, i think eager to buy some groceries before settling into his campsite. i didn't even get to say good bye. 

meanwhile, samuel and i took a wrong turn (which we realized after our sunset evening with a group of guys who own/work at a spin cycle). while cranking up a hill, my chain slipped and got stuck really really bad. like, we took apart almost everything in the rear of my bike to carefully screwdriver it out. i don't know how i got myself into this mess. it took about an hour to fix with the help of a random stranger, who helped us because i walked up to the back of his apartment and knocked on his sliding door and asked to borrow a wrench. his name was john and he ended up giving us the wrench. plus, he said, "you need to convince it to come out" regarding the very stuck chain. haha, i loved that because it was about gentle coaxing, not brute force. so that was that. 

then we hit a hill (the locals call it school hill because it's on school blvd) that was a 21% grade!!!! i wish i took a picture of the sign because i couldn't believe it. the thought, "there must be some percentage conversion because we're in canada," flashed through my mind to justify what we were about to do. needless to say, we walked our haul up that monster. 

well, it's day 2 and i can already say that we've already walked our bikes. my friend alisa said i should have no shame in walking my bike during a bike tour. so there. no shame. 

gosh, from that trecherous hill to me in my sleeping bag on private land writing this post, was the following: hurriedly arriving at a local bike shop, talking to the owner, getting convinced to replace my front crankset because of my chain slippage issue, being shown their secret spot by said owner, his son, and bro-in-law, washing up in a grocery store bathroom and going to bed 25 yards from the road, tucked away in what felt like the wilderness (if it weren't for the sound of cars). 

tonight, i'm thankful for john, and the three guys who opened up "their" spot to us, simon's enthusiasm to live out a worthwhile story to call his life, and a place to rest our homeless heads.

tomorrow, i look forward to breakfast and a place to shower.

day 1: bozeman to vancouver

*note: you'll have to excuse poor writing. i'm typing on my little iphone and it's nearly midnight (1am mst, which i'm still on). but i want to try to blog whenever we have wifi....so here we go. 

we woke up at 4:30am to catch a flight to denver, to catch a flight to vancouver. it was a very roundabout way to arrive at our destination, but we did arrive and so did our bikes! (the guy on the left is one half of the lewtons - new friends of ours. this is austin and samuel after i realized it was too late to take a photo of them carrying in a bike box, hence the blurry photo.)

although we were an hour delayed, we had a game plan to put together one bike at a time and get to west point cycle before 6pm. after we got both bikes to a point of "good enough," we took off like the wind, got lost, and made it with a minute to spare before closing time.

our entrance was a bit dramatic i suppose. two sweaty kids with a lot of gear and our little flags poking out of our bags both speaking out of breath and parched, actually, asking if they could do this and that and this and that. i won't bore you with the details because whenever someone talks about something i don't know anything about, my face contorts. anyway, they said to come back in 45 minutes and we did after an ice blended green tea matcha drink from my cup coffee & tea in kerrisdale. and like magic, our bikes were like (used-)new again. we thanked them profusely for staying an hour and a half after closing time to help our newbie-asses out. we were extremely grateful. 

feeling secure and confident (of our bikes), we pedaled our way to our friends julie and jehaan's home at university housing to be greeted with warm hugs, familiar faces, and a really wonderful meal. it was heart-warming to catch up with friends who too have made a dramatic change in their lives to reset and create space to learn and grow their relationship. 

our stuff is sprawled out everywhere as we occupy the entirety of their living room. eep! but i'm hoping that the jar of wild montana huckleberry jam we brought them will quickly erase the memories of our bike gear chaos. ha! ;-p 

tonight, i'm feeling grateful that samuel and i are here, that we had old friends to connect with, & that we could take a cleansing shower. (it was really warm and humid here, which for this girl meant sweaty everything.) and, i'm going to sleep hoping that little judah will jump on the air mattress tomorrow morning and wake me with a delightful laugh. (i miss being around a little person.)

ps. what the heck. how come no one mentioned that vancouver is like a mini chinatown? i am in multicultural heaven. 

month 7: holy moly, we get to do what?

love, 

i'm sitting on the couch while you vacuum. our bike boxes are packed and each room has been prepared neatly for our departure. we're heading to bozeman in just an hour or so. my adrenaline is starting to pump a little more; i feel it rushing in my veins. if we leave the night before our flight, at least we have a lesser chance of being late, per our usual m.o. 

tomorrow, we'll be in vancouver to start our ride down to the mexican border. wtf. i've never done anything like this before. ever. and i can't imagine anyone else i'd rather do this with. can you? it feels both exhilarating and scary...which only equals one thing: YESYESYES!

i feel like this month flew by ridiculously fast. how is that possible? we are pacing ourselves at like 10% of how we lived in the bay. :-\ 

the memories we created this month were stellar: hosting candice & matt, dinner and hot tubbing under the clear star-filled sky at judy's, me leaving you at home for two days while i took wilderness first aid and you....you rode your bike around town, ate burgers, and introverted. we took hikes, slept in, cooked, rode our bikes, ran way too many errands in town, and deepened friendships.

what stands out to me in our relationship is that we became better partners this month. we're a better team because we hold each other more loosely. our marriage got infused with more ease, by way of conflict and resolution and i am more in love with you because of it.

i think even up until a month ago...i could still imagine some semblance of life without you. it would be hard, but i could imagine it. but right now, as i sit here reflecting on our relationship, my heart would ache so deeply if you were no longer part of my life. who else would do all the research!!?! kidding! ;-) 

no really, i think it has much to do with this month being a pretty pivotal month of realizing that we can create whatever kind of marriage we want and that that is a wildly beautiful task at hand. i'm grateful for your kindness and patience, your measured risk taking, and every time you spontaneously break out in another accent. 

you are the love of my life and i love that we are creating our marriage by cycling over 1900 miles over 40 days. whoowee! what will that do for us?! i can't wait to see.......be nice!

I LOVE YOU.

  

bike | epa to santa cruz

i'm usually up for physical challenges. 

just thinking about them get my wheels spinning. so when my friends and i decided to watch pickwick in santa cruz, i thought, "why not bike there?" i had never done such a thing and it made me wonder if i could. thanks to the east bay bike campers group chiming in on the route, i decided to ride to the coast and take hwy 1 the rest of the way south. this was my exact route and the ride was just under 70 miles, taking me 7 hours to complete it. 

but, it was daunting to think about. up until the night before, i had secretly hoped that it would rain that day so i'd have a legitimate excuse to cancel the ride. i was feeling scared to go at this alone, in case some horrible accident happened and i'd be found splattered down some steep hill. (clearly, my mind likes to make up crazy stories to get out of the unknown!) 

so i woke up on friday, 2/24 and it was a perfectly beautiful day. (damn!) i packed up 2 pb&j's, 3 bars, 2 apples, and electrolyte drinks and set off at 9:30am to spend the next 7 hours in mostly solitude.

the last time i did something solo for 7 hours, i experienced a complete mind shift: from wondering if i could do something, to wondering if there might be an early way out, to believing that i can accomplish what i set out to do. the remnants of that run was so clearly felt during this bike ride. it was a rush to get up to the top of skyline, which meant i'd be going downhill all the way to the coast.

then it'd be up and down the coastal hills for about 35 miles. the first one being a bit of a beast.

at about mile 45, my bottom clearly communicated to me that it was done, but we still had 25 miles to go. when the pain started, i definitely had long moments when i considered contingency plans...."could i flag someone down and load my bike into their car? maybe i can call esther or heather to pick me up. or what if...?"

but i kept going. 

and stopped by pie ranch to rest for a few minutes to enjoy an apple. 

as i approached swanton ranch, i saw a sign that said "pumpkin pie" and without any thought, i pulled a fast left across the hwy and rolled right up for some pie lovin. i devoured the slice within minutes as i gazed at the vast ocean collecting energy and inspiration to keep going.

as with most endings, it was pretty anti-climactic to see the city limit sign. there was, however, a one-person party inside my heart...a little person blowing a small party horn and wearing a sparkly hat. 

i smiled, and road on.