Day Two, 9-18-05
This was a “fiasco wrapped in a comedy of errors” day. Get a cup of coffee, because this story will be long one. We meet for breakfast around 7:30, and it is in the low 30s – we can see our breath and are fearing a cold day coming. The forecast is for a high of 63, so we are hoping it will warm up by the time we leave. We missed the diner opening up by a few minutes and instead went to McDonalds – not a great choice. Next year, go to the little diner on main street around 8am or so.
As we leave for the bike shop, with Mike and I in our spandex riding shorts and all “biker oriented” gear, here comes Papap in long pants tucked into his white sweat socks, with the riding jersey I bought him well hidden under the red flannel jersey (he says it’s way too “loud” for him to wear). I tell him I want at least one picture with us in our “ride jerseys” before we go – the picture in front of the bike shop says it all:
We get a slight late start, around 10:30, but it has warmed up very nicely, and are already wondering if our 3 top layers and two bottom layers are too much. It’s a beautiful sunny day, the Asian tourists are out in Banff in force, and we are headed to the Banff Springs Hotel to hit the trail head. The hotel is an old castle, and the structure is magnificent. We hit the trails, and from the very first mile are treated with one spectacular view after another.
Within the first half mile, we hit our first “hill” – probably only 4 percent in grade, nothing that would even slow a “regular rider” down, but I turn around and I see Papap walking his bike. Uh oh, if he can’t do this little grade, we are in for a long day. This is the heaviest climbing day, with over 2,000 ft of climbing, and we haven’t hit our first 100 ft. yet. Yikes!
We slow down and try not to get too far ahead. I am stopping a lot to take pictures (took 83 on the first day), so it is working out ok for a while. After about 4 miles or so, we begin to get into the “steady diet” of climbs. Now, these are not steep climbs; very mild grades, but they are rather regular with small periods of recovery in between. The gentle grade notwithstanding, Papap is walking almost every hill. After a pretty slow pace for the next two miles or so, he says he needs to sit and rest a spell. I tell him to take his time, and I’ll go ahead to tell Mike that we are taking a break. By the time I reach Mike (about a half mile ahead) and we get back, we find Papap asleep on the side of the trail.
Now I’m SURE this is going to be a long day. So we roust him up, and I take his camelback which he has already taken off and tied to the front of his bike because it hurts his back. It 10 minutes to convince him to let me take it, but he can’t argue with the facts, and we ride on. We begin to climb each hill and wait for him at the top. It’s slow going, but there’s not much else we can do. After one particular hill, Mike and I are talking for quite a while and realize that it’s way longer than normal in waiting for Papap on this last hill. We decide to go back and make sure he is all right. We ride quite a ways down the hill before we see him on the side of the road… SNOOZING AGAIN!! Double Yikes!! We are in much bigger trouble than I originally thought. We need a “rescue plan”.
We decide to try and get to a place where we have cell reception and call Nate to come and pick up Papap. Unfortunately, while coming back to tell Papap of our plan, I was in a higher gear, and when I turned to climb the hill again, it was too high a gear, and the pressure ended up breaking the chain. Now Mike and I would have to fix the chain – something he has rarely done, something I have never done. We are now really glad that I “insisted” on a spare chain. However, we can’t find it in any of our packs – we now realize it is in Nate’s pack – the first stupid mistake of the day (that one we made before we left Banff).
So, we send Papap on ahead, and Mike and I stay behind to fix the chain. After taking out two links and re-attaching the good links, I should now only be missing a few gears. I get a few feet and shift into the middle ring… slowly and carefully… but nevertheless, it bind up tight. I stop and get off immediately and find out that the derailleur has jumped and jammed into the sprocket. I have to get out my leatherman to unwrench it. I am now only able to ride in the lowest gear on the front sprockets and the final lowest two gears on the back – the lowest two gears on the bike. It’s OK for climbing (not ideal, but OK), but on the flats I can’t generate more than 5 mph – this is now pretty frustrating.
Mike and I finally reach a point where we have cell reception, and we call the lodge at Mt. Engadine. Nate has already checked in, but has gone riding and hiking. I tell the manager of the lodge (who is on the only satellite phone at the lodge) that my 76 yr old father is “not faring so well” and needs a rescue pickup. The manager tells me he will try to find Nate, and if he does, he’ll send him. If not, he will come himself. We are VERY relieved.
Mike and I begin to look at our stats so far. It’s now almost 1:30, and we’ve only gone 8 miles. Our moving average is only 6 mph. That’s slower than I climb most hills in PA. We do the math and realize our only hope of getting to the lodge before dark is to begin riding, and to ride strong. Today’s distance is supposed to be near 40 miles, and we still have a lot of climbing ahead of us. We won’t make it with my broken bike that can’t go more than 5 mph on the flats, but when Nate gets here, I can use his bike and we can put the bad bike in the car. We decide press on without Papap knowing a rescuer is on the way.
My riding is getting increasingly and completely annoying. I can’t wait until we meet up with Nate so I can get a real bike. We finally hear Nate on the 2 way radios (I’m once again relieved that we brought these – they always seem to come in very handy). He initially goes to the wrong parking area, so the radios help guide him to where we are. I tell him we need to switch bikes, and he tells me, he left his bike at the lodge. Crap!! Now it looks like I might not be able to ride the rest of the way to the lodge. This ride is getting all messed up. Since there is only one road to the lodge, Mike and I decide to see how far we can get, and Nate can catch up to us once he has Papap.
The map says that the Smith Dorien is a “dusty” road – boy is that an understatement. We are eating dust in buckets with every passing car, and today is Sunday, apparently a popular day to tour the area. I go about 2 or three miles and realize I can get my speed to 6 or 7 mph in the lowest two gears, but it actually hurts to do so. I reach Mike and ask him for his cell phone. I call the place where we rented the bikes and they agree to bring me out a new bike – a valiant and noble move. I tell Mike to go ahead, since we are fighting the daylight, and I’ll try to catch up. About 45 minutes later, my replacement bike arrives. Hallelujah, I’m riding a normal speeds again (12 to 16 mph), and it shifts like butter (compared to the first bike that shifted badly from the start. I start motoring, and eating more dust. I hear Mike say he is at the dam, and that the road to the left looks shorter. I assume he means that to say he is taking the left side. I go on the left and never see him. He calls me and we realize we are on opposite sides of the reservoir. This is bad, since the side he is on will take an extra hour or more to complete, and we are rapidly running out of daylight. It is now about 5:00 pm.
Before long I see Nate and Papap drive up behind me. They ask where Mike is. I tell him he is on the other side of the dam, but I convinced him to come back so that they could pick him up, as he would not make the lodge by night fall that way. They turn around to get him, and I press on to the lodge. Now, this should have only taken about 20 to 30 minutes, so every hill I come to I’m wondering if it will be the hill where they catch me. I’m wondering this because while I haven’t ridden very much or very hard, I have been out on the road for 7 hours with only a few snacks to re-fuel me. I’m still stopping for pictures though, as the view of the lake with the mountains behind them are breathtaking. Eventually though, I begin to run out of energy and I’m forced to eat my Snickers bar for the needed energy to finish the ride.
I get to the lodge about 6:30pm (that’s 4 hours later than we were supposed to get here). I can’t believe I beat them here, and I’m hoping they show up soon since dinner is set for 7pm, and it’s the only meal we will get tonight.
At around 7:15 I become “officially worried”, and ask the staff for some help. I explain to them that all they had to do was pick up my son, turn around and drive here. Nate had already been here and there are no possible turns or other roads, so it wasn’t possible for them to get lost. The only possible explanation was that they ran out of gas, and were stranded, with no way to reach me. The folks at the lodge were very understanding and one of the situation, and despite the fact that they just started to serve their “big meal” of the day to all their guests, they gave me one person, Julia, to drive me to the dam and see if I could find them.
About 80% of the way to the damn, I was able to raise them on the 2 way radio. Everything was fine and they were coming my way. I saw their car, they stopped and told Julia and I that they were going to RUN out of gas, and so they drove into Canmore to get some first. Yikes! Why didn’t they call??? They tried, but it was not the right number, so they got the number from the reservation place, and then they tried to call the number those folks gave them, but the payphone (I had Mikes cell ph) then asked for $2.50. Nate put in $2.35, and couldn’t find the remaining dime. He then forgot the lodge phone number, and decided to bag the whole call.
Julia and I are very relieved, and we follow them back to the lodge. The day of mishaps and miscues is not over though, they proceed to blow right by the lodge entrance, without even slowing down. Julia is dumbfounded; “They just passed the turn, and their not even slowing down!” I hail them on the radio as Julia speeds up, and they go “Oh, we weren’t watching for it”. Yikes yet again!! Julia wants to know if we should follow them in the remaining 500 feet. I’m exhausted from all this and tell her, they’re on their own now.
As we pull into the lodge, we notice three moose just beyond the lodge deck; a pretty common occurrence apparently back here. I take some blurry pictures (I think my zoom doesn’t hold the focus well or something), and we head in for our showers. It’s now after 8pm, and most everyone is finished with dinner.
The lodge is very quaint, beautifully done, with an outdoor hot tub and indoor sauna. The rooms we are in are small, but their suites are much nicer, with a sitting area and even a wood burning stove. They also have some outdoor cabins that are picture perfect. The staff are amazingly service oriented – as accommodating as any I have experienced in all my many travels. Best of all though, the food was “off the charts”, good all home made, natural ingredients only, outstanding eating. The dinner is now the best part of the day next to the views, and while we had good weather and great views, it was a taxing day to say the least.
Suffice it to say though, following the original plan along the established bike route, and in the time frames allotted should have worked perfectly. It seems that the 5 years since Papap has ridden with us on our last “epic” bike trip has taken a serious toll on his body. At 76, he is starting to feel and respond more like a 76yr old – something that I have never seen before in my 50 years – my dad acting his age J. He has always been strong as an ox, out working and out riding most guys half his age. We will probably be seeing him in the support vehicle for most of the remaining tour. Not to worry though, the surroundings are such that you are truly vacationing on or off the bike.