Day 233 – The Old Barn

233/365 (August 21, 2011) – I spent most summers in the Shuswap at my grandparents, and one of my favourite places was the barn at Granny and Grandad’s farm. I loved milking the cows with Grandad, but I also just loved climbing into the hay loft and nestling in amongst the bales. To this day the smell of hay and straw takes me back to my childhood.

We were going to ride up to Whistler for lunch today but at the last moment we remembered that the Squamish Live Festival was on this weekend and the thought of the traffic turned us off. So we decided to head out towards Hemlock Valley instead. We stopped off at Inch Creek Salmon Hatchery since Kirk had never been and I thought he might like to meet the two sturgeon that live in the effluent pond. We had a visit with one of the staff, cooled off over a cold drink with her, and then headed on up the road. We passed Chehalis Hatchery and then turned up the road to Hemlock Valley rec area. That didn’t work out quite as we’d hoped. The road is a series of crazy switch backs (no big deal there) with every corner loaded with loose gravel (BIG issue there). So a slow and challenging ride and right where it started to look good, it turned into a totally gravel road. End of the trail for us. Back down we went. On up past Weaver Creek where the road again turned to dirt. We turned around again, frustrated buy the fact that every decent corner was loaded with loose pea gravel. At the point we said to heck with it all and headed for Harrison Lake where we parked, stripped down to shorts and t-shirts, bought an ice cream, and found some shade. It was a hot ride in full gear.

Along the road to Harrison this old barn caught my eye and we pulled off on the way out to snap a few shots. Then home to wash the bikes and relax after putting another 300 km on them today.

All in all a hot, sticky, sweaty ride, but a good ride.