Browsed by
Category: British Columbia

Home for a visit

Home for a visit

We had a wonderful three weeks in Canada seeing friends and family. Of course, there’s never enough time to see everyone or do everything that we’d like to do while we’re there, but we did the best we could and enjoyed ourselves immensely. Of course, my major regrets were that I couldn’t have sushi or the lovely microbrewed beer as I’m pregnant again, but I’ll just have to wait until next visit. The first week we spent time with my…

Read More Read More

Shakedown cruise shaken up

Shakedown cruise shaken up

A weekend with a zero percent chance of precipitation and no social plans seemed a perfect time to introduce DutchBoy to the joys of motorcycle touring before our trip to California. And to really test it we should also ride in the heat, which made a trip through the Okanagan make perfect sense. The plan was to ride to Oroville over the Hope-Princeton on Saturday, spend the night, and return through Winthrop, which is the number 1 Destination Highway in…

Read More Read More

Toy Run

Toy Run

The last ride for me of the season was my very first Toy Run. I was excited to see what this major day of bikes was all about. The day dawned and it was cloudy but not raining, so we decided it was a go. I was taking one of my sisters on the back – she can’t ride (or drive) because of a vision thing, but is an experienced passenger and loves bikes. The day turned out well despite…

Read More Read More

Gabriola

Gabriola

A few years back I had the idea that my ex and I, my sister and her husband and my mother and stepfather should all buy a piece of property on Gabriola. I set it up, got the ‘rents in touch with a realtor, and we went as a group to look at properties. I had in mind a cheap piece of vacant land. At the end of the day, my mum and step-dad decided that they would buy a…

Read More Read More

Taking a Passenger

Taking a Passenger

Anyone who was reading my European travelogue closely might have noticed that I spent close to three weeks in the Netherlands with a Dutch guy I’d met in St. Petersburg. The more curious might have wondered if it was entirely platonic. Well, it wasn’t, but at the time we thought it was a vacation romance. However, as time went on, and after some drama, we came to believe that the connection we had was deeper than that. So, on July…

Read More Read More

Julia’s Funeral

Julia’s Funeral

With the death of Julia Sit, the riding community lost one of its most involved members. It seemed an especially unnecessary tragedy since she herself had lost her partner in a riding accident almost exactly a year previously, and now her loss was being felt by her new fiance and almost everyone in the riding community. It seemed like even people who’d never met her felt like they knew her. She’d run a coffee shop for her parents, the Flying…

Read More Read More

A well-Merritted trip

A well-Merritted trip

This ride, the Merritt loop via Princeton, started wet, continued grey, turned brilliant, but involved some loss and searching, and ended with good proof that my luck hasn’t run out yet.In preparation for this ride, 6EChick came over and spent the night with me – including gamely going out to a bar with strangers. In the morning, she got to accompany me on my cookie deliveries to my team in Kits (in the rain) and then out to Burnaby Kawasaki…

Read More Read More

Duffy Lake

Duffy Lake

Duffy Lake road is one of the long loops available from Vancouver. It’s got some great scenery – going from coast to mountains to the desert on the other side – and is very twisty. But it’s also well known for the quality, or rather lack thereof, of the pavement. I’d been wanting to do it for a long time, but unfortunately, at the beginning of the day at least, my head wasn’t quite in it (hangover and hormones –…

Read More Read More

SpeedyBikeGirls do Squamish

SpeedyBikeGirls do Squamish

Last night, I arranged a group ride to get to know some of the women on the website we hadn’t ridden with yet. And, after telling everyone to be there at 5:30, gassed up and ready to go, I got stuck in traffic getting out of Richmond and was late myself. And it was hot. And I was in full gear, and sweat was running down my legs and pooling in my boots by the time I got there. And…

Read More Read More

Supper in Squamish

Supper in Squamish

The SpeedyBikeGirls got together after work for a quick jaunt up to Squamish for dinner at a pub (it’s funny how this becomes a normal idea on a bike). Despite getting, um, misdirected a couple times in the search for gas, it was a great ride. The construction area was a little rough, but it didn’t slow up traffic too badly. It was the first time that several of the girls had been up to Squamish. It was a little…

Read More Read More

River Road Again

River Road Again

I’m so loving riding. Of course, sometimes it takes me a lot longer to get home, especially when I decide to circumnavigate Richmond (municipality where I work – it neighbours Vancouver) on my way home. I can’t help it – River Road keeps calling me – it’s so tranquil and soul calming. Last night I hade to run an errand out that way, and I came home west along it as the sun was setting, turning the water pink and…

Read More Read More

Familiarization Ride

Familiarization Ride

Took a slow and gentle ride out to see my parents today. It’s nice to be able to go and see them – they live too far away to get to by transit, and it didn’t seem fair to always make them come in. Couldn’t stay long because after dark is still cold, but it was nice to drop in. My stepdad showed me his latest paintings and I think I’ve put dibs on a couple. And I’m working on…

Read More Read More