From Hot to Cold – April

In April, we paid for all the warm weather we had in March. Temperatures dropped below seasonal for most of the month of April – at least that’s what it felt like. It also was a bit wetter than May but still not too terrible. Most of our adventures were related to paddling that month, but for one bike ride.

April is the start to the TNR season. It started off with a nice evening on Apr 2 but it got consecutively colder each week. Mind you at least the rain stayed away from Tuesday evenings for the most part . The cold wind was just not nice after getting off the water all wet. Below a few selected pictures.

We spent half of the weekends paddling in Indian Arm. It was mostly hard work and long paddles. And it was cold and wet! Except for the last day of March where we happen to see a river otter play on the rocks. Very cool!

Mar 30 – the sun was still with us

Apr 6 – not so much

Apr 14 – not at all. But we did make it out 🙂

Couple weekends we actually raced.  A new one for us – D’Arcy Island Cash Dash on Vancouver Island near Sidney on Easter Saturday and an oldie we haven’t done in a long time, the Dan Harris in Bellingham, Washington, on Apr 28. Yep another trip into the US! Both of those days were incredibly sunny and mostly calm but what little wind there was was freezing cold!

The D’Arcy Island race didn’t go that well for us. Somehow we got out of sink in the 2nd half and were fair and square beat by Kathleen and Gareth as well as a couple single surfskis. But it was overall a nice event!  And there were cash prizes as well as long as there were at least 3 boats in a class. Unfortunately there were only 2 doubles. Hopefully next year there will be a few more boats from the mainland out. Majority of the paddlers were OCs since it was a Cora race.

On the first ferry in the morning

View Beach Park

Before the race – no race pictures

Back the same day on the afternoon ferry

We had a bit of excitement going on when the big ferry had to stop and check out a deserted raft….

The Dan Harris Challenge went a bit better. Lots of doubles and we came in 4th double overall. There was some tough racing going on. Overall Team Canada did quite well in this first leg of the Think International Surfski Challenge even though we did get beat by the US. The margin was the smallest in years though. And Team Canada actually won at the end because they did better in the Canadian race, the Board the Fjord Race in Deep Cove in early May. Jeff and I missed that one though – May is fishing season (for another post).

Bellingham Bay

3 of the 4 Canadian doubles – ours is on the right.

Team Canada

Cherry blossom time – on the way to the pub 🙂

The first bike ride of the year (other than the daily commute to work that is) up Mount Fromme happened on Apr 27. We meant to go up all the way to the top of Grouse to see the bears but the snow stopped us. So we had to settle with seeing a male Blue Grouse. He tried his hardest to win my heart – dancing and cooing :-). Pretty darn cool! I used my new e-bike for this ride and it was a breeze to get up. Now Jeff is the one trailing behind – which gave me the time to flirt with the grouse. I get the feeling he might be regretting talking me into this new toy :-).

And up we go

First forest creature we meet

Hello Mr Blue Grouse

and bye

Stopped by the snow

View from the “top”

Cherry Blossoms at the bottom

If you want to see more of my friend the Blue Grouse, check out this video:

Last but not least, a few odds and ends pictures from spending weekends mostly at home in April.

From the Balcony: Lily

From the Balcony: Dogwood

From the Balcony: Our heather was brilliant this spring

The sandhill cranes are still hanging out at work

Fraser River ducks

Sifting the mud

searching for Easter eggs 🙂

The colours of spring in the neighborhood

Loppets far and near

After missing out on the Edmonton Loppet this year due to extreme cold we were twice looking forward to the Gatineau Loppet, Feb 16. Although I wasn’t quite sure if I could even ski. We flew into Ottawa on the Thursday. Takes all day to get there. My back was still sore and I wasn’t looking forward to a 5hr flight being stuck in a middle seat. But the nice woman next to me offered me her aisle seat so I could get up when I needed too. But once I was in my seat I felt like nothing would get me out of it again. It wasn’t the most comfortable flight but I survived. Somehow I even managed to get up and out of the plane upon arrival. We had rented a car this time so at least that was easy. The Hyundai Elantra even fit our big ski box. With the help of our antiquated GPS we found the motel Jeff had booked without problem. To my surprise, the roads were in good shape all the way. Ottawa had just gotten 40cm of fresh snow the day before but all highways and major roads were clear. The motel was a bit run down but clean and quiet and had a grocery store and a pizza/pasta place, in easy walking distance. Gabriel’s Pizza even served beer even though it looked more like a family restaurant. Pasta was okay, beer and artichoke dip were very tasty.

We spent most of Friday in the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa. There was more snow/rain in the forecast for the day. We spent time with the butterflies and the live sloth first thing in the morning before doing the rest of the exhibitions. It was a nice way to spent an overcast winter day. By the time we finished, the sun had come out. In the afternoon we picked up our race bibs in Gatineau. My back felt a bit better and I figured I may as well try to ski. I used my phone to find a place to have an early dinner on the Gatineau side. We picked Pacino, a great Italian restaurant. Not the cheapest ever but the food was exceptional. We spent the evening with our former kayak coach and good friend Lynn. We hadn’t seen her in 5 years or so and back in the days she always was a wild one :-). Now she is a mother of a 2 year old, owns a house in Ottawa and teaches Kindergarten. Well, she still coaches but dragon boating now and no longer sprint kayaking. She seems to have good success with it though and is planning to take her team to world in 2020.

Not a bad day to be inside

Butterfly Exhibition – Owl Butterfly

These had nice blue wings when flying but impossible to take a picture off

Matching colous

The butterflies loves Jeff’s shir

Camouflage

Weird shapes

Dinosaurs

Arctic

Canadian Wildlife

Oceans – Blue Whale

Sat Feb 16 – Gatineau Loppet. We got up at 6AM since Jeff’s shuttle would leave the school area/finish line at 7:30AM to be shuttled to the 51km start area. He had signed up for the A wave this time. His race start was at 9AM. My race, 27km, started at 9:02 (B wave) but was leaving from the finish line area. Back felt okay even though bending was still tricky. It would be a lot of striding for me rather than double poling, whereas Jeff was going to double pole the whole race. It was a sunny morning, air temp around -7C but windy which made it feel colder but not too bad. I was fine in my red race coat and my favourite Craft shirt + grey T-shirt. The racing was okay. Snow was slower than last year which also meant more control. I was using my skins and they worked well. Striding was fine, double poling for very short burst okay and only herring boning was bad on the back. The course is fairly flat with only a few short hills and I felt reasonable good at a steady pace. As last year I had people all around me. Unlike last year, they double-poled/glided away from me but I was actually catching them again striding. I had a really good kick and glide that day! It almost made me feel like a skier :-). And without crashing I made it to the finish line in good spirit, 15min slower than last year, finish mid pack! 108 out of 200+ skiers. Nothing hurt too bad, the sun was shining, no 51km skier passed me and like last year they were sampling beer at the finish line :-).

Jeff hoping on the 7:30AM for his start

My Start

Jeff’s finish

51km!!! All double-poling! My arms would fall off.

Sunday was another sunny but much colder day. We bundled up for our stroll through downtown Ottawa taking in the usual sights. We parked right at the edge of Byward Market Hall for $7 all day. That seemed quite cheap compared to Vancouver and there was a host that could (probably wouldn’t) keep an eye on our car since all our gear was already in it. We had breakfast near the Byward Market and looked at the ice carvings on York Street – Winter Festival in Ottawa. We walked over to the locks, than down to onto Rideau Canal – again no skating. It was really busy and I wasn’t sure I wanted to do that to my back, which by the way felt fine. But my legs were very sore from all the striding the day before – I guess I used muscles I hadn’t used in a while. Sometimes a sore back forces you to use proper technique more than strength :-). We walked through downtown to do some ring toss and back via Parliament Building to have lunch at Byward Market Hall again. Jeff had been looking forward for a year to eat at this small Mexican place inside the market :-). It was still a bit early to head to the airport for our 5:30PM flight but we were cold enough after walking around Byward Market for another 45min or so. Ottawa Airport is not the worst place to hang out to wait for your flight home :-).

Ice Sculptures – Winter Festival

This is what 40cm of fresh snow do to your parks. ALL the walkways were cleared though!!! Impressive.

The locks

Last year we were able to sit in those

Rideau Canal

Ring toss

Parliament Building

Notre-Dame Cathedral (not quite like the original in Paris)

Side streets show the snow disaster they had a bit more

The Monday (Family Day Feb 18) was supposed to be a paddle day but it was too cold in town. So we went to WOP for another ski instead. My legs were still quite sore, I think I seriously pulled a muscle on the inside of my left leg, but it was a nice sunny day and would have been a shame to waste it away at home.

The following weekend, Feb 23, was our local loppet at WOP. The P’ayakentsut was sponsored by our good friend Bob’s store, Coast Outdoors, this year for the first time. Jeff the crazy guy signed up for the 50km classic, while I smartly choose the 30km classic. Most people skate this loppet but since I haven’t done any skating this year yet I didn’t want to kill me. It was a great day for it. They just had 25cm of fresh snow the day before which made for a bit slower race but also better control on the downhills. Except for one corner where the snow had piled up and I took out a 50km skater who tried to pass me on the 2nd lap, the course was in great shape. They had put in 2 classic tracks this time so the most right one did not get shewed up by skaters as a much as usual. My leg muscle was still in pain and I had a pretty slow race but was not last 🙂 All in all a good ski and we well deserved the food and beer afterwards at the Shady Tree!

The 50km race start

Jeff and Bruno – both did the 50km classic

Jeff is now thinking about a Loppet in the Yukon in March…..

Payback

Feb 2nd was another loppet day at Manning – the Cascade Cup. I know the course so well that I was actually looking forward to it. It wasn’t cold at all and the sun was out. The only problem, it had rained the day before and the tracks were pretty slick in some areas and had fresh snow in them in others. I used my trusted skins and for the first time EVER I had issues with grip going up North Gibsons. Now Peter was the one laughing since his skies worked great and he had an awesome race. Payback for the Bash :-). On the 2nd lap I went outside the tracks and that helped a lot. Although John said, also using skins, that the grip was better the 2nd time around but he also was at least 30-45min ahead of me. Anyhow, the downhills were pretty nice and overall I had a good ski. Didn’t finish last either :-). Jeff had an awesome race finishing 2nd overall. He double-poled the whole race – not sure how he does it. The person that beat him though also double-poled it. But he had Norwegian blood in him, that must count for something :-). There were quite a few more people this year than the last 2 and organizer Jo was very happy. She deserves this loppet to take off given all the work she has put into making Manning a cross country ski destination again!

Jeff warming up

Nice morning at Lightning Lake

The start

Peter lining up next to me but he was out of sight in minutes….I couldn’t even stay with him off the start double poling.

 

The day after it got cold – for us at least. The eastern part of Canada had been under the influence of the polar vortex for a some time while in BC the first flowers started to show. But that changed on Feb 3. There was no way I could have gotten Jeff out in a boat and all we did was go for a long walk along the river. Our hummingbird Chatter also started hanging out close to the feeder again that day. All of Jan we hardly saw him but on Feb 3, he was in our tree on the closets branch all day. He knew the weather was taking a turn for the worst. I tried to get a good picture of him but my camera lens kept fogging up in the cold wet.

Our Helebore had been flowering for weeks

Foggy Chatter guarding the feeder up close

 

 

 

Summing up January

Too busy at work and too tired in the evenings once I finally get home at night to spent time blogging in January.  With the company I work for, Alpha Technologies, being bought by a big American publicly traded cooperation, EnerSys, in December the day’s workload changed quite a bit. Not knowing who your future boss will be added to the fun. Well I now know that my new boss sits in Reading, Pennsylvania. I have met him once – he seems nice enough. Like my best friend he is a Cross Fit nut case :-). But going from privately owned, midsize company where you know everyone and everything to corporate, where all that counts is the stock price, will be interesting to say the least. There isn’t a comprehensive plan on what is going to happen and how everything will fit together in the future. It’s a bit frustrating currently since it feels like I am working 2 jobs – one for Alpha and one for EnerSys. And that seems to be true for most people I work with and it is getting harder and harder to get things done every day. But we are all in the same boat and I am intend to see where we hit land eventually. At least for now. On top of all that I volunteered to do another Alpha Talk at work – not sure why I did this since I hate public speaking but my buddy Carlos was desperate to have a speaker for January. At least one can pick any topic you want and I decided to just talk about my passion of taking pictures of animals. But even though I have tons of content, to fit the content into a 30min presentation was still a lot of work!

Back to more fun stuff – weekend adventures. We were having quite a mild winter in January compared to last year. And it seemed to rain less too, at least during the week. Most weekends were taken up with skiing but we also got some paddling in.

Jan 5/6. We skied Manning on the Saturday. My right knee was just starting to get better and even though it felt a bit unstable, I was able to finish my usual loop of 26km (Strawberry Flats – South Gibson – Campground Loop – North Gibsons and return). But it felt slow and awkward and my kilometers are down compared to where I was last year at this time. Soaking it in the hot tub after the ski and grease it with some beer in the pub did wonders though :-). The Sunday, we meant to drive up Seymour Mountain for some snow showing. But we didn’t get going till after 10AM in the morning – I am a sucker for sleeping in one day a week. We only made it a kilometer up the road until traffic stopped – no way we would sit here and wait! So I had to come up with a back up plan and quickly since it was my fault that we got going so late! Cypress would be no better. On weekends the parking lot there usually fills up by 10AM. Most other areas are too low and had no snow. Only choice was to drive to Squamish and take the Sea to Sky Gondola up to snowshoe up there. And that’s what we did. It was a bit soggy down below but as we took the gondola up we could see some glimpses of blue sky. We decided to do Al Habrich’s trail. It was a well used trail for the first bit but a good workout. We had to cross a creek at the beginning which was a bit tricky since it was still flowing strong. Damn this warm weather – well not really. Then the trail winds it’s way up a slope in the trees before you hit a ridge with nice views over the valley below – if not for the clouds below. But by then we entered the sunshine above us and it was really nice. We crossed over onto another ridge and to the lookout. Here the clouds broke a bit and we actually got some views. Most people turned around here but we continued on. It wasn’t an obvious trail and we worked our way up through deep powder. It was awesome. Climbed even higher and found the trail markers again but nobody had gone there yet. Undisturbed snow and sunshine and more awesome views with a rainbow. Can’t get any better than that. But unfortunately days are pretty short in early January and we soon had to head back down. The well used trail down after the lookout was quite steep in sections. I slipped twice and jammed my right knee yet again. It still bother me today (Feb 9) and I can’t fully bent it without pain. RATS! Anyways, the trip was worth it. Jeff wasn’t quite so enthusiastic about it mind you :-).

Creek crossing to start

Up the slope

Into the sun

Well mix of sun and clouds

First ridge views

Crossing over to the next ridge

The Lookout

Some views of Howe Sound

Squamish

and beyond

We keep going up

And back down

Slippery in sections…

Views from the viewing area at the Gondola station

The rain hits us on the way down

Driving along Howe Sound is always a beautiful drive

 

Jan 12/13. Manning weekend! It was a beautiful sunny weekend, not too cold either. Saturday we did a “warm up” ski around the upper trails (same as the previous weekend). We spent the night at the Lodge since Sunday was the Blackwall Bash – the 16km uphill race. Few too many beers at the pub on Saturday night and a restless night with John snoring quite a bit may not have been the best prep for it. It was another sunny day and despite it being cold in the morning, the sun warmed everything up in no time. I used my skin skis of course and they worked well. I dressed quite light (red racing coat and craft shirt) which was good because I still got to hot. I knew after the first 500m that this is going to be a tough race. I felt tired and hot. And I thought that Peter who I race in this race every year and I beat every year was ahead of me this time … out of sight! Well, he definitely is a much better skier than I and the only reason I can stay ahead in this particular one is because it is all up hill. He is quite a bit older than I. So I was pretty deflated early on and it took forever to get to Cascade lookout which is the half way point but also the steeper portion of the race. I could have quit as the other person did I traded places with on the way up (he was faster striding but had to stop to rest more often) but I figured it is too nice of a day to not ski! A couple minutes later, I got passed by a 2nd wave classic skier who had started 30min after me. Last year it wasn’t till kilometer 13 that I was passed by the 2nd wave :-(. This should have really piped me up but it didn’t. Another couple kilometers later, I think at km 13, Jeff passed me who also started in wave 2. Last year I managed to finish just before him. Another blow to my ego but I trotted on. Someone had to be last. I made it to the finish line enjoying the sunshine! My knees held up reasonably well and I am not sure they were the reason for me being much slower than the previous year. I am just in even worse shape this year. Turned out I wasn’t last either. Peter had been behind me the whole time. He had no grip which is the worst thing that can happen on a 16km uphill race and I was amazed he even finished. The ski down was harder on my knees and I stopped frequently to take pictures.

Jeff finishing many minutes ahead of me…

But I finally made it too

Bobcat tracks

Peter coming in

Group shot – some had already left

The ride down!

Cascade Lookout

Jan 19/20. Another loppet, Reino Keski Salmi at Larch Hills near Salmon Arm. Every year I battle with the decision of doing the 34km race course vs the 30km recreational race. My skill level definitely fits the recreational category much better but my ego just wants to do the longer distance. And every year I start regretting the decision at the start line. This year was no different and I had an extremely slow start being passed by all the 60+ year olds on the first slight downhill. My skis definitely had less glide than most others around me. Worst of all, those people double-poled away from me. That should not have happened. Jeff had the same happen to him. Anyhow, with everyone being out of sight pretty early I settled in into my own pace and once my heart rate came down to a sustainable level I actually felt quite good. On the big uphill I caught sight of the gang ahead again but they disappeared on the downhill. I am also convinced most of them did the 17km only. When I started lap 2 I had caught up to one of the older guys (+70 I am sure) and finally made my way past him only to be caught again on the flats/slight downhills. I gave it all on the climb up the big hill toward the halfway point and managed to get ahead quite a bit when the unthinkable happened. My always awesome trusted skins iced up! And I could not kick the ice off it. I was hoping I could ski it off on the downhill but all I did was crash which of course irritated my right knee again. Rats. Off course I got caught lying in the snow. I was just about to take my ski off to clean the skins when the guy I was racing stopped and did it for me while I was on the ground. That was so very nice of him and help me to cheer up again! It took me a while to catch up with him again but I managed to finish just ahead of the guy. I know I should have let him beat me for his kind act but…. He didn’t mind :-). By the time the two of us finished most of the food was gone. Jeff, who had waited for me for a good hour also went without. Larch Hills had just build a new cabin this summer which was awesome and big enough to sit inside. They still had some soup for us which did the trick. It was a pretty nice day and I felt better this year than the previous two year. John said this was the first time he saw me smile finishing this race – I think it was because of the sunshine :-).

The new cabin

Start

Finish

We drove home that very same day rather than staying a night in Kamloops as we usually do. But because of the warm weather, Overlander at Stake Lake, did not have enough snow to make it worthwhile for us to stop in. And that’s why we went for a paddle in our double surfski on Sunday on a mostly sunny and +5C day. I got more sore and tired at the end of our 2hr paddle than I should have! But it was nice to be in a boat again and Indian Arm never disappoints. The big even of the day though was the lunar eclipse that evening. I waited till almost full coverage before I went outside but it was a nice one. Next time though I should really bring my tripod.

Strathcona Launch – nice sunshine!

Lunar Eclipse

Bit blurry but the plane crossing right infront of the red moons surprised me 🙂

Jan 26/27. A loppet free weekend. We skied Manning on Saturday and paddled Indian Arm on Sunday. Just a normal winter weekend for us :-). I believe is was sunny both days too!

 

Ladner Fall Classics

Well, last Sunday should have been a fishing day but we decided to do a short kayak race in Ladner instead. The water levels at Jeff’s favourite Coho spot were really low and the nice bright sun seems to spook the fish. We did the Ladner race, put of by fellow paddlers Matt and Chris, before but that was in January – it was cold and wet and just plain miserable. Given that this race was held on Oct 21st it should have been cold and wet and plain miserable but it wasn’t. Bright sunshine and perfect temps around 15C.

But the race was not till the afternoon and so Jeff decided why not do a “quick” mountain bike ride up Grouse Mountain following the access road. How hard can that be? And we get to watch the bears at the top. I was actually thinking this could be fun. Well, we told super biking fit buddy John about our idea. He had been up there many times and said it was easy and he knew a good spot to meet somewhere at a mall since there is no parking near the top. Unfortunately that mall was at the bottom of a big hill up Mountain Highway. So by the time we made it to the start of the back road I was already sweating bullets. And all those cars with mountain bikes drove by us while I was struggling up that big hill! Turns out there was a perfectly fine parking lot! It was full by the time we got there but given the amount of cars that had past me grinding up the road that wasn’t a surprise. I am sure we would have gotten a spot if we drove right up rather than riding up and adding another 20min to our ride. Anyhow, I made it, but I was grumpy. So the guys, who were must faster than I anyhow, took off and said – see you at the top. I had just enough time to yell that I would turn around at the 2hr mark … before I lost sight of them. I know Jeff was hoping that when I see bears my grumpiness would go away … he knew I’d be grumpy all the way up. The trail, well gravel road, through the forest wasn’t steep but it goes up the whole time. I actually thought I can do this no problem as I got to the top of Mount Fromme. I even passed a few people slower than I – downhill bikers, what can I say. It went almost flat for a bit but when I turned the corner I saw Grouse way above me on the other side of this big valley. I was barely half way! Even lost a bit of elevation as the road wound its way along the valley further and further AWAY from the  final destination. Well at least it did not drop too much. Riding up the other side to the top of Grouse almost killed me. Up and up it went and each turn I thought I got to be almost there … but nope. I was ready to turn around but still had 10 min to go before the 2hrs were up.  Now, I did not want to be a quitter and I told myself to at least ride up for two hours before turning around. I made it to the top with a minute to spare. Jeff was wrong, I was still grumpy even when I saw the bears. Jeff was smart, he stayed away for a few more minutes while poor John got the worst of my venting. Sorry John! Only got to watched the bears for about 5min before it was time to head back down so that we could get ready for our afternoon race. What on earth had I been thinking….! The way down of course was much faster but my wrist got pretty sore. Apparently Mt Fromme has some nice downhill trail for the not so experienced mountain bikers but I just wanted to get off the mountain.

The road up

Lots more up to come when I thought I am almost there

Around the valley

Only stop this one time the whole way up

Coola – just had a swim

Grinder

Size comparison

Look at that belly – ready for winter

Going back down

We had an hour rest before we had to load the boats and drive to Ladner Slough. The usual suspects showed up and we had ourselves a good race with Shane and Chris and Connor in the front pack. But the 10km felt much harder than they should have. Apparently I do use my legs when I paddle since I could feel them complaining after the morning bike ride. Well, Shane and Connor were on their 2nd race of the day too so none of us was going too crazy. Jeff protected the inside line on the last lap almost driving poor Connor into the pleasure boats as we passed the marina. Poor Connor, he is still young and doesn’t yet know all the dirty tricks :-). We won the sprint to the finish line by a hair over Chris and Shane and Connor in 51:34, beating our January time by almost 5min. The nice weather sure helped. The best part thought was the pub afterwards with good food and beer in great company.

Group shot before the race

Launch spot

What a beautiful fall day

Pub time!

Race Day – again

So yesterday was the long awaited, relatively hard trained for Indian Arm Challenge. A 32km course up and down Indian Arm to Granite Falls. Jeff and I had put in quite a few hours in our Double Surfski to be ready for the distance. We had a race plan. Don’t get sucked into people racing off the start – there will be time to catch them when they get tired at the 20km mark. And so it pretty much went for us. It was an overcast day but the rain mostly stayed away. Temperatures with 14-16C were perfect for racing. There were 3 start times to accommodate the different speed of all the human powered water crafts participating – prones, SUPs, sea kayaks, outrigger canoes & surfskis. Unfortunately, there were only two high performance doubles in the race so we didn’t even qualify as a class but our goal was to be first! We were last of the line in the last wave leaving at 9:30AM :-).  As planned, we slowly started to catch up to the single surfskis, first passing TNR regulars like Scott and Andrew and Paul, then catching up to the TNR front pack of Bob, Daryl and Shane (who we usually compete with at TNR) within the first 10km. At that point we only had two more singles, the other double surfski and an OC2 ahead of us. We put in a couple harder pushes on the way up just to judge if we were able to reduce the distance but didn’t kill ourselves to catch anyone – well I would have but Jeff managed our race pace very well. The double was actually a slower design than ours but it took us till past the half way point to finally catch them. Those Kelowna guys are tough! :-). We finally caught them with about 12km to go – taking a bit of a rest on their wash for 5min. we passed them easily but could not completely shake them either. Not until we caught some big motorboat swell and cranked our speed up to 15km/hr for a minute. It’s not cheating! Catching that wash was very hard work! Now there was only one single surfski ahead which was within sight. We started to pass prones and SUPs and surfskis from the 1st and 2nd wave start. At Twin Island, about 5km from the finish we caught up to the last single surfski. He had been pushing the pace for a long time and had nothing left to stay with us. We stayed with him for about 5min – not drafting! – until we pushed the pace a bit and he was gone. I had felt a bit tired after passing the double and racing the boat wake, plus the wind had kicked up a bit making the water bouncy and our stroke less efficient, but after we caught up with Carl my energy came back and we pushed towards the finish thinking we FINALLY meet our goal of being first across the line. All the training having paid off! It didn’t even cross my mind that there still was an OC2 ahead of us. Then disaster struck. Our rudder cable snapped with 2kms to go. Jeff was furious since we just had fixed it a couple weeks ago. It was tough to keep the big double straight. Our stroke was totally out of sink, because we had to alternate between sweeping on one side to straighten the boat and paddle on both sides. We still averaged between 10-11km an hour, mind you, but it was not enough to keep Carl in his single surfski from passing us again. SIGH! Shane and Daryl came in a minute behind us. So we came in 3rd overall, 2nd surfski, 1st double – and the knowledge that we had 2nd place in the bag if not for the malfunctioning rudder. Carl admitted as much – he knew something was up when he saw our stroke get off sink, he didn’t even have to push that hard. The OC2 beat us fair and square to win the overall! Oh well, guess we have to try again for another year. I don’t mind, but Jeff is for sure looking for a break to kayak racing and to start the loppet season on his skis :-).

People getting ready for the 2nd wave

Off they go

Us at Granite Falls – everything still looks good

Just before Jug – our rudder cable just snapped! RATS!

Mike and Karly doing awards

Group shot! Hope we see more doubles out next year.

Today was a rest day. Like a real rest day. All we did is sleep, eat, drink and shop. It was a pretty wet day anyhow! We are planning to go on a kayak camping trip mid next week and had to replace some of our equipment that finally packed it in after ~20yrs of use. We needed a new VHF radio – the one essential electronic gear to take! Our old ICOM has kept us out of trouble a few times knowing what the weather will be like for the next 24hrs. Hence we bought another ICOM again. We’ll see if it will last another 20yrs. We went to MEC to get a few more dry bags and 10L water storage bladders – neither were in stock. Luckily we were able to order them and hopefully they will get here before we leave. We still ended up spending money at MEC :-). We went for lunch at Martinis across from MEC on Broadway – best calamari in town and washed them down with some beer. Now I am staring at the food stuff to get organized for 7 days on the water :-). I am very much looking forward to it, the trip not preparing for it that is. I have been drying veggies and fruit for the past week already…only 3 more sleeps! I better get back to packing/organizing/…