Day 5 The Climb

The night before Aviam and I decided we would head out in the morning together. Around 6 a.m. I peeled myself out of my tent, packed things up a bit and then headed out to see if Aviam was alive yet. Turns out he didn't actually get a very good sleep under his blanket he brought with him (temps get a wee chilly in the mountains at night) and spent most of the night shivering. I, on the other hand, had a decent sleep in my warm, comfy MEC sleeping bag....

After some breakfast we headed out. I was a bit concerned that I had a leak in my back tire as it seemd to have lost air. However, after pumping it up it seemed to hold. It may have been a combination of altitude and temperature that brought the tire pressure down.




Things warm up quickly when you are riding with 40+ pounds of gear.














Not a bad way to spend a day.....





The first bit of the ride this morning would mean completeing the climb up to the Bow Summit. It is a 40 km climb, which turned out to be pretty painless. When Aviam and I got there we were quite surprised that was all. We were expecting a bit more of an ass kicking than that. I did know what lay ahead. I had driven it a few times in the past and knew that many vehicles disliked the the ascent up to the Columbia Icefields. Constant reminders to Aviam of what we were to face usually resulted in 'Bring it on...". Little did he know.