Barbara B.'s Adventures: Into the wild

7:30am - The sun is finally out again, yay!! I'm off to go mountain biking in Banff Park. The trail's good at lower elevations, and poor at higher elevations. Hopefully I won't have a non-destination for the third time in a row. Shadow Lake is snowbound, which, if we can get to it, should make for some spectacular scenery photos.

Yesterday I forgot to list my positives for the day:

Lunch out on a deck (in Aviation Park)
Caught up with friends (DAK, K., KK, R)
Worked on conquerinng my fear of being backcountry by myself. Maybe one day I'll progress to being able to sleep in a tent by myself. I miss waking up to that early morning chill and that perfect light across a lake; there's nothing like it.

Like clockwork, I woke up at 3am this morning and lay awake for a good hour. I really wanted to call someone just to get my mind off of things for a few minutes, but didn't think that even those who tell me I can call them any time would have appreciated that. I think DAK is the only person who wouldn't curse me by calling at that time of day (night). Instead, I tried to refocus by doing breathing exercises and thinking about nice things. The last thing I remember is thinking about walking through wet grass. An hour later I woke up from my own screams because I dreamt that I was being charged by a small grizzly. Bear dreams seem to be becoming a recurrent theme for Saturday mornings. Off into the wild I go, but with three people as support.

11:10pm - Shadow Lake was a success. We started under bright blue sky, perfect temperature, and the trail was just wet enough to keep dust away and provide traction. We saw a grizzly right by the trailhead, fresh steamy bear doo-doo on the trail, a raging Redearth Creek (river would be more appropriate), and enjoyed a nice ride up the valley. The pace was slow and steady for the uphill, which worked great for me. After locking up the bikes (at km10.5), we hiked up to Shadow Lake Lodge and Shadow Lake. The view to Mount Ball was incredible - avalanches roared down all afternoon. Then, after thinking we were already lucky to have enjoyed all this for the day, we chose to go for afternoon tea ($15) at the lodge. Here we had the buffet all to ourselves. The cakes were incredible (so, so fresh), the hot chocolate and tea a welcome treat, and we enjoyed a leisurely hour chatting before heading back. The return trip was all downhill, so made for great, quick riding riding and we were back at the cars in an hour.

This trail also gave me a chance to try out the braking on my bike again. I focused more on using the front brake, which prevented the back wheel from locking up and the back wheel from skidding sideways on steeper downhills. I'm happy with it, and I love my bike :-)

Trips stats: 29.0km (21.0km on bike + 8.0km on foot) | 450m elevation gain (335m on bike + 115m on foot) | 6 hours, 20 minutes