July 15, 2015 Rails to Trails

Coming through a tunnel
Coming through a tunnel
A bike ride is in order today.  We are definitely not “mountain bikers”.  I do not like steep hillsides, roots, heights, or hairpin curves.  I like it wide and flat and preferably paved. A restaurant at the end would also be nice. That is why the Rails to Trails seems to suit us.  These are paths, often in the mountains, that are abandoned rail ways that have been converted to bike or hiking trails.
The one we rode today was 24 Km (by the way, I am getting good at converting Km to miles) or about 14.5  miles. It had 36 trestles and 4 tunnels.  It was a nice ride, unfortunately the area had sustained a large wild fire about 10 years earlier and the devastation remained evident.  The good folks of Kelwona volunteered many many hours to replace burnt trestles and make the area rideable.
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To get here you had to take a fire road that was about 5 miles long and just gravel and dirt.  Even with our Jeep in 4 wheel drive and Doug at the wheel, we were fish tailing.  I was sure we would die before we got to the trailhead.  I was also sure that no one else would be there.  To my surprise, the parking lot was full.  My bad….we even found that a small RV had traversed that road…..it was still there when we left.  They were with either really slow or got back to town some other way or died of fright…I didn’t look to check.
Our shadows
Our shadows