I've always wanted to cycle across Canada, but figured I'd have to wait patiently until I was retired before I'd have enough time to actually do it. But some days it seems like I'll be working forever (which seems like a very long time indeed!) so I've decided that instead of waiting and waiting and waiting, I'll just break the trip into smaller chunks and do what I can during the vacation I get now.
My plan is to ride to Oliphant, Ontario this summer. I want to be there a few days before Regatta for some well earned R&R before I'll have to fly back to Vancouver. The timing to do a big chunk of Canada this summer works well for 2 reasons. First, this is the last year I can carry vacation days over at work so I've decided to carry over 2 weeks vacation from 2008 into 2009 which will give me a large chunk of vacation time available in 2009.
I really didn't want to do this ride alone, but it's one of those adventures where it's a little hard to find takers. Fortunately for me, I was able to convince Susan to join me on this big adventure. It's not all one sided though - I have joined Susan's Ride to Conquer Cancer tour, which is a 2 day, 250 km ride from Vancouver to Seattle to raise money for the BC Cancer Agency. More on that on a later blog.
I have most of the equipment I'll need already since I've already done a fair amount of bike touring and camping, but I will be purchasing a few new things especially for this trip. Ideas and suggestions of essentials are most welcome! Right now I've got a set of maps from CAA for each province that I'll be riding through and am starting to plan a route. I'd like to avoid Highway 1 where possible, but it seems the most direct and due to time constraints I may have to go this way. I hear the Red Coat Trail in Saskatchewan is an option to avoid Hwy 1 at least for that province. Anyone have any suggestions?
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