cycling Thalia to Hope B.C.

Aug 1, 2019 – day 23

Day 1 | 2 | 3 | 4-5 | 6-7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12-13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | info | video

Toughest day of the trip.

I was up before dawn anticipating a long day ahead. Then managed to get lost. Twice!

It cost me perhaps 3 hours.

Click PLAY or watch me getting lost on YouTube.

Oops. Seems I ALSO accidentally turned off the Relive app after only 65km. The day was actually at least twice as long.

My navigation skills are poor. But in this case the confusion was mostly due to missing roads on the Maps.me app.

There was nobody to ask.

Also, there are very few road direction signs in this remote area.

Merde.

Another problem. One of my saddle bags broke. Luckily I’m a mechanical genius and quickly hacked a fix.

On the bright side I did see a LOT of wildlife this day. Fox. Coyote. Skunk. Marmot. My 5th bear.

Fewer cyclists cover this section. Some trail is in rough shape. Some rockslides never cleared.

The Great Trail gets complicated when it reaches the Coquihala highway.

All the cyclists I spoke with took the highway when they couldn’t find the trail. As I did.

The Coquihala wasn’t as bad as I feared. And as I was cycling downhill, my average speed was probably 30km / hour.

Happily, whomever added these white painted arrows did a good job. These pointed the best route.

One excellent section of the Great Trail required sliding the bike under these barriers.

There was some superb scenery on the way to Hope.

A British cyclist reminded me how lucky we were to have the chance to cycle in paradise.

Wondering about the time all day, I was happy to reach the Coquihalla Canyon Provincial Park before it closed at dark. Fantastic. And I’d never been before.

In the Coquihalla Gorge – the river cut a 300 foot deep channel of solid granite. A straight line of tunnels were built through it which are known now as the Othello Tunnels. …

This park highlights the Kettle Valley Railway grade that passes through the canyon and 5 tunnels which were built in 1914.