Mechanical (Mental?) Meltdowns

Here’s an interesting twist to the journey. I’m back where I was 15 days ago, in the Northwest Territories, taking in the spectacular sights, sounds, and people of Yellowknife. Even stranger, is that I’m here without my bicycle! I did mention before in an earlier post that I somehow forgot to make it to the Legislative Building to do a head stand in the Caucus room, so I came back. Also, there is a festival happening in its 30th year known as Folk on the Rocks, and an airshow in the upcoming weeks. That’s what I’m telling myself, but I’ll cut the bullshit. I met someone who’s company I rather enjoyed the last time I was here, and decided to come back for another 2 weeks. Saying yes to things I normally wouldn’t, keeping things interesting is what this journey is about, and I’ll make it to my destination when I get there. A few friends of mine are pretty dead set on the fact that I’m not gonna make it out of the city, but honest, I’m heading east!

It does however throw some urgency on making it across Canada to beat the weather. I have made plans based on 100km days (rounding to the next 100) that will see me across Canada before mid November. It’s going to be cold, and the weather is surely going to not go well in my favor, but at this stage it seems right.

So, for those looking to meet, come riding, or hang out

• Fly back to Edmonton August 3rd
• Regina by August 15th
• Winnipeg sees me on August 22nd
• Toronto September 16
• Ottawa shortly after on the 23rd
• Montreal on the 27th of September
• Quebec city on the 2nd of October
• Fredericton on October 10th
• Finally, North Sydney, Nova Scotia will be a late October 18th
• After that – I’ll cut over to Newfoundland, and then circle back and hit Halifax and PEI simply to beat some of the harsher far east weather.

It’s all possible, with rest breaks dispersed in between those dates, and some stays in the above cities for at least a day, some much more. I’ve got to really sort out the rain issue, and some increasingly problematic moisture problems with my Hilleberg Nallo GT 2 tent, and plan on spending this next two weeks in Yellowknife researching, ordering new parts and creating multiple what-if scenarios.

I flew from Edmonton, making it there by Friday July 16th as planned, but not without major issues. Glad I took another rest day in Jasper, it was spent discussing long distance cycling with my host Jahan, the fellow I met who was riding Jasper -> Lake Louise in one go a couple of days earlier. I told him about the BC5000, an insane 380+km a day bike ride all around BC, and about the randoneurs, and helping him plan a goal on crossing the entire province of Saskatchewan in one go. Jahan had also run into a cyclist I met while staying in Banff, who has toured off and on since 1983 with a staggering 930,000km toured, surely one of the longest tourers on this earth, well ahead of Heinz Stucke, who I previously wrote about . His story was a bit like mine, he was stressed, had some injuries in his life and decided to take up riding a bike, eventually being accompanied by his wife for 450,000km until she passed away unexpectedly. He took this as a sign to keep going, and showed me his route from New York to Banff in a little over a month, with plans to make it all the way up to Alaska, and then back down through BC before his 3 month visa expired. At 63 years old, this born in Italy but residing in Germany man mystified me with his courage, strength and determination. He’s not computer savvy, so asked me to email his son and let him know that his Dad was alright. Done and Done. The day with Jahan, and the other encounters gave me  the oomph nd fire to move forward, so I left Jasper early in the morning Tuesday with only minor threats of rain throughout the day, ready to ride 125km where I knew a rest stop would be a great stopping point. 3 km in I was on the side of the road, as my rear shifting cable and housing exploded turning me around having to get emergency repairs done from the friendly folk at Freewheel Cycle. The diagnosis, not good. My derailleur is bent, due to my flat tire issue a few days before, and my shifter is on its last legs. They sorted me out, and said “you’ll make it to Edmonton”. I lost 14 of my gears, but I was able to pedal away 4 hours later than expected.

The first half of the ride was mostly downhill, the weather cooperating and I knew there was a good source for food in Hinton 75km away. I made it there in a little less than 3 hours beaming that I had my speed and power back, something that has been sapped away from me from the mountainous climbs. Stopping for food I came up with the idea that perhaps I should try to do 160km that day, and make my last day into Edmonton a bit easier, where a good friend was waiting for me. I ran the idea past a friend via text messaging, and went for it – somehow along the way further altering my goal to break my long distance record in one day before of 203km. A bit insane, but I felt it was easily attainable, ending the day with 211.47km in a small rural area known as Carrot Creek. I found a little cubbyhole off the side of the road at 10:30pm and setup my tent, soaked from the past 3 days of moisture, and tried to get a good sleep. I was exhausted and didn’t get much dinner in me, other than a few nibbles, and drank the unopened beer I found on the side of the road.

A few hours later, I heard a rumbling of a truck, tried to ignore it, but heard its reverse beeper going, coming closer. Scared, I scrambled out of my tent to see a big food truck being backed into the spot where I was camping! I quickly grabbed my bike, and threw it aside, and ran out to get the drivers attention, bare foot, naked and all. The poor man was a bit shocked to see a big hairy Sasquatch waving his appendages everywhere telling him to stop and I saved myself from being squished. This upset my sleep dearly and I lied awake for a few hours afterwords, hearing sounds jolting me up from a light slumber.

Ready to get back on the road the next day at 8;30am, I noticed I had a flat tire, in the rear again. Cursing that I had to deal with flat repair at the start of the day, I came to the stark realization that I didn’t have any patches OR a spare tube to get me fixed up. Even worse, I had thrown my bike haphazardly in the earlier nights scare and did further damage to my derailleur, and noticed that I had cracked my rear hub assembly, with grease pouring out, already contaminated from the unrelentless thunder showers coming and going throughout the night. With 155km to make it to Edmonton, I put on my game face and rode forward, tire unable to keep solid pressure for more than 10km, frequently deflating to about 15psi. With adjusted arrival plans that I was going to make it to Edmonton a day early, my host prepared a gathering for me expecting me in late afternoon based on the previous days performance. 4 hours later I was only 47km in, dodging thunderstorms, muscles aching, and unable to eat food. So I had a bright idea, drink an energy drink! Better yet, have another one! You know what happens next.

Accelerated mind, with aching body, riding down the busy Highway 16 with little to no water, a stomach ache, average speed of 11km an hou with a soft back tire that felt like it was going to slide out from underneath me caused a bit of insanity in my head wanting to meet my goal, forcing myself to do things I wasn’t physically capable of doing. One spoke broke with a twang, and 3 others followed shortly there after. Worse, I had to go to the bathroom,and I was out of toilet paper, and eventually got creative by emptying out porridge packages and using that! I then proceeded to try to hitch a ride into the city, only 60km away – No one stopped. Even trying multiple times. It’s not like there isn’t a shortage of trucks in the area either – 8 out of 10 are big gas guzzling diesel suckers. The rest of the day was ugly, slow going, and resulted in me collapsing on the side of the road, eventually throwing up from the poisons running through my body, throwing in the towel 30km away from Edmonton stealth camping behind a church in the town of Stony Plain. Thunderstorms still coming and going, I was exhausted, miserable, and being pestered by bugs making my twilight dinner unimpressive. Sad that I wasn’t going to make a grand entrance to see my friend on Thursday night, I lied awake from the amphetamine rush until 4:30am and waged a battle through busy West Edmonton traffic, stopping along the way at Costco to look at laptops, MEC for some replacement parts and a few other errands, finally arriving at my friend Sarah Jane’s house at 3:30pm.

I so needed the day with the long distance and good weather, as I have been carrying a big string of bad riding days with me it seems ever since I made it back to Cranbrook, and glad I was able to have a boost of positivity before the ensuing breakdowns. I’m not sure I would be able to form proper sentences, or without adding explecitives every 2 words when I was speaking. The short stay in Edmonton was therapeutic, meeting a whole crew of solid people, and I look forward to revisiting them shortly in 2 weeks. I will head over to one of the Bicycle Co-Ops and do some well needed maintenance on my bike, and hire a professional to try to straighten out my derailleur. I also took the opportunity to order some Schwalbe Marathon XR tires from Wiggle in the United Kingdom, at the amazing price of $45 each, and they should be waiting for me upon my return. The tires have been discontinued for over a year and are regarded as the be all end all touring tire, impervious to glass, thorns, and other road junk. They’re over $90 a piece in Canada so it’s worth the wait.

I’ve had it with crappy parts, and do plan on doing some replacements with my gear, moving to a butterfly handlebar system, and biting the bullet and buying a Click – Stand, talked about in a previous Wishlist post. The damage that I’ve caused to components NOT having one is 10x the amount of a simple stand, and it’s absurd for me to continue putting unneccessary stresses on the bike.

Out of it all, I’ve learned a few things, and need to commit to them in the future for success:

• No more energy drinks. It masks what my body is trying to tell me
• Stop cheaping out on mandatory parts, it’ll result in disasters like I went through
• Sort out my rain gear issue once and for all – Soggy tent and sleeping pads are terrible to sleep on
• Quit being a macho asshole and trying to set records – the damage afterwords is tough to shake

I’m only human, but writing some of this down grounds me a bit and I can let the world know what I’m doing so that I they can wave their finger at me and remind me if my head gets stuck up my ass again in the future. I knew all this stuff already, but sometimes get caught in the loop.

I do plan on writing a lot in the next 2 weeks, however it is unlikely they will be published till well after I start riding again. I plan on writing an article on Food (the whats good the whats bad), Equipment Reviews (Since I’ve hit 10,000km and over 100 days with my gear it’s enough time for me to know the goods and bads of what I’m carrying) of the Hilleberg Nallo GT 2, MSR Cookware, Exped Synmat mattress, MSR Dragonfly stove, and the Surly Long Haul trucker. But first, I need to catch up some sleep, see ya!

Distance Chart