Day 40 - Christina lake to Castlegar

The campsite quieted down around 11pm which is quite surprising considering that it was a Saturday and July 4th. Some folks had brought very loud explosive fireworks which gave Marge and I a surprise as we had retired about 8:30pm and were sound asleep at the time. We had decided that due to the high mid afternoon temperatures around here, its best to finish biking early. We had to do Bonanza pass (1534m) which is an elevation change from the lake of nearly 1100m.


We were up and on the road before 7am riding by the side of the lake in peace and cool and after 10km, the climb started in earnest. We stopped for a break after an hour and were overtaken by Iain Reid, a New Zealander who has made Canada his home for about 20 years. He runs a blog with photos of the region which is well worth a visit.



He disappeared into the wide blue yonder and we headed up for another hour when we were joined by a group from Calgary. After a good chat, we all moved off and they also disappeared quickly into the distance.

We crossed the Paulson Bridge, and entered a section of road that was not pleasant to ride. There were cliffs on one side, a rough road surface and no shoulder. It was also one of the steepest, hence slowest parts of the ride. The traffic was light and careful so there was no issue, but we were glad to out of there and onto wider roadway once more. All things come to an end and eventually we passed the sign for Paulson Summit (1534m). With the name change though, we were not sure whether we had done all the major climbing, and the road started to descend pretty quickly.

It soon became apparent everything was downhill from here and we sat on the bike for 90 minutes going at 30 to 50 kph barely pedaling, or braking. Finally we got into Castlegar where it was very hot and so we dove into an A&W for a burger and a couple of steins of their root beer, then found a self catering motel room. It’s a short day tomorrow, 45km, and there are showers threatened for tonight. We chose the Flamingo, and after a quick telephone call we were given free reign of the Motel's cherry treethe use of a very pleasant gazebo. We had steak one more time for supper. I like this travelling, I don't get to eat too much ice cream, but dinner time is always a blow out. {8>)


Margie’s Observations: there are 3 food stores and 6 liquor stores in town, and folks don’t seem so openly friendly here. There, that’s all the news that fit to print for today, Night, night.

Pictures

15.2kph average

Distance: 78km
Total Distance: 2824km
Alt change: 1175m
Total Alt change: 18924m

*Still no altitude measuring device, but this one was easy to estimate as it was essentially all up, then all down.