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October 16, 2008
Adventures in the hills
With the cold weather arriving my adventures in the hillls around Jasper (at least of the biking nature) have dwindled of late. Now I won't use this as some metaphor for changes in my life or anything close to being poetic. Instead, I will tell a tale of some time spent on the trails... shit, that was poetic.
Back when I was riding three to four times a week, I decided to put my life in Jay's hands and follow him on a ride around the Saturday Night Loop. In retrospect, I'm glad I did it but I should have realized at the time that it was going to be a rough one given Jay's sadomasochistic affection for roots and rocks and muddy trails.
We left town around 11am and headed off into the wild. I was already cursing when Jay led the way up a trail north of town. Jasper sits at an elevation of around 1070m. North of town, there is an area called the Pyramid bench which is the starting point and location of some of the best trails in the Jasper area. Unfortunately, the bench lies at an elevation of around 1200m. That means that the start of most mountain biking treks is a decent climb in a short time. Once I'd finished cursing we headed up past Mina Lake and towards the start of the Loop. Now I didin't realize it at the time but the first half of the Loop is all climb. High Lake at the halfway point sits at an elevation of around 1500m and it certainly felt like that if not more. At one point several hours into the trip I found myself so exhausted that I stopped in the middle of a hill, sat down and ate a banana and a cereal bar. I eventually caught up with Jay, who was enjoying a nice long break at the time. Through some hard work and perseverance I did make finally up to High Lake which provided some excellent views and a serenity rarely found in Jasper's tourist season.
The trek back to town was much easier with the majority of it being downhill. That said, I was still struggling to keep up with Jay who has and addiction to speed as only an ex-bike courier can enjoy. There were a few moments where I found myself looking skywards and asking the treetops where I went wrong and whether my bike was still rideable but in the end we made it back to town....myself the worse for wear.
The whole trip had lasted around 4.5h, covered 30km roundtrip and included a climb in elevation of nearly 500m. The only unfortunate part of the day was returning to town and realizing that I barely had an hour to wind down and prepare for work that night. Needless to say, it was a slightly stiff and immoblie shift at the restaurant.
Posted by Dr.Unk at October 16, 2008 10:15 AM
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