Day 29 - Lagunitas to San Francisco

Distance - 1250 miles! WE DID IT!!!
(Today was 29 miles to SF, then another 10 touring around)

This morning we woke up and packed our tent just like we've done each day this month. We loaded our bikes, and snuck in a few more laughs with our friends before departing.
As we climb on to our bikes for the start of the final day we have mixed feelings.  We want to stay in the forest forever, but we are so close to our final destination!
As we exit the campground we are treated yet again to a winding road through a redwood forest with a river running through it. Then we head up the first of several climbs today. California isn't finished with us yet!

As we get closer to the city, we see more and more cyclists. Dropping down into Fairfax, the cyclists come in droves. Most of the towns we've been through this month have had a population of 100-400 people - Fairfax has 8000!

We find a cafe along the bike route in San Anselmo and are assured by the many cyclists out front that it's the place to be! We are slightly overwhelmed by the number of people around, though we are only 20 miles away from the city! We go to grab a table, and a man butts in with his order number in hand,  puts it down on the table, says 'have you ordered yet?' and proceeds to sit down. How rude! Thankfully, we then meet a handful of other cyclists and locals who are very kind, and we share a table and some stories with them.
It's nice and sunny outside, and the cyclists who started in the city say the fog hasn't cleared yet and to stay in the sunshine a little more. We take their advice and go for a tour of the nearby Donut Alley in Larkspur! The smell of the donut shop is amazing, and the donuts are pretty good too.

We head out of Larkspur along Cape Madiera. We should know by now that cape is a four letter word for hill! These towns lulled us into thinking we would have a nice flat ride to the city! We happily enjoy a little more wilderness and the break from all the people. Best to be eased back into reality.

From there we take an awesome shared path  along the water into Sausalito, where we get our first view of the Bay Bridge! We are almost there! Of course we are riding right on the water.. so we aren't about to get to the Golden Gate without at least one more hill.

We reach the Golden Gate bridge and join the throngs of tourists taking photos. It is unreal. For the last month we have been telling people we are going to San Fransisco, but it doesn't really mean anything up until this point. We just biked 1200 miles to get here, and it's the coolest thing I have ever done. Get out of your car and on your bike! Now!

After a few touristy mistakes we find our way to the staircase we didn't know we were looking for. We have to carry our fully loaded bikes down a staircase, under the bridge, and up another one to get to the proper side of the bridge for riding!

Once we are on the proper side, we roll onto the bridge. There is a hilarious mix of road cyclists, tourists on rented bikes, touring cyclists and construction as we go. We are very used to the crosswinds on bridges now, but the tourists are not! At least there aren't pedestrians in the mix too!

Once across the bridge we escape the tourist insanity as fast as possible - there are WAYY too many people around for our liking. San Francisco has a population of over 800,000, and it feels like they all at this end of the bridge!

We head out along the coast and ride out to Land's End, Seal Rock, and past the Cliff House. We tour down the beach and through Golden Gate Park. The park is wonderful, there are loads of people out enjoying their Saturday having a picnic, playing games, and sailing toy boats across the ponds!

We exit the park and take the wiggle, a bike route that wiggles through several blocks of the city. We're never without other cyclists here and it's a really fun ride! We stop for a quick bite along the wiggle, and then head straight down Market Street through downtown to meet our friends and take the ferry over to Oakland. Riding Market Street through downtown is awesome. It's pride weekend and the street is alive with people! There's music playing everywhere, trolleys that run through the middle of the road, and a full lane for bikes where we happily cruise with many other cyclists. We arrive at the ferry terminal and meet up with our friends David and Tyler.
We made it!!!

We head for dinner at the brewery that's dangerously close to their place. The pizza is delicious, even the one with alligator tail (it tastes kind of like chicken?)!
We proceed to cover their apartment in our laundry (don't worry, it's clean now), and tell them we may never leave. Friends are amazing, thanks guys!!

Tomorrow we will take in the city and the pride parade, and Monday we will reluctantly get on a plane as our adventure comes to an end.

Day 1 East Van - Victoria

Distance - 49.8mi / 80.1km

Today's fun started at 02:30 when we woke to our elderly neighbours fire alarm blaring! Chris reluctantly got out of bed to investigate. Turns out it was a false alarm, and our neighbour was fine if a bit shaken by it!

At 11:30 Chris arrived home from his exam, and the real fun began! By 12:05 we were out the door and on the road.

We had two ferry options out of Tsawwassen, the 3 and 5 pm. Google said it would take 3 hours to get from our place to the ferry. Are we faster than Google?!

We arrive at the Alex Fraser bridge to find the sidewalk is closed and a detour route that points us further up the on-ramp. We head forward only to find another sign that says lane closed. We can't turn around and go the wrong way down the on ramp - so we choose to brave the bridge traffic. Luckily it wasn't too busy mid day on a Saturday - but still not something I recommend! 

We reassess after the bridge and decide if we push to the ferry we might just sneak on the 3pm. Off we go! The moment I decide it's not worth pushing and I'm too hungry to make it, Chris pulls a coffee crisp out of his pannier and makes it all seem worth it!

We hit the ferry at 2:45 - take that Google!

Heading out of Swartz bay we take the Lochside trail - it's amazing!! Its takes us all the way to Victoria through farm lands, nicely packed trails, and we'll paved separated paths and rural roads. I would ride it all day everyday! There's even pigs basking in the mud!

 

We're on the final stretch into Victoria, and we make the mistake of using Google maps to take us THE HILLIEST route possible. Of course there is a flat route, I guess we should have looked that up before we got here!
We arrive at my cousin's place in Victoria, and they have dinner cooked for us - thanks Adam and Liz, you are amazing!

Tomorrow we have the day off as Chris is helping with Ironman medical (the reason we chose the Victoria route).

Monday we will jump on a ferry to Port Angeles where the real touring will start!

Follow us - Cycling Van to San Fran!

We're back!

The last year came with a whirlwind of changes. Starting a new job gave me an opportunity to bike to work, which led to buying a new bike, which led to a whole new world of adventures! I even named my beautiful bike Magic Carpet (MC) because it can show me the world!
We did our first 100k ride in April, and haven't looked back since! We rode to bellingham for deep dish pizza, to Chilliwack for Indian Food, and to Steveston for fish and chips. We should probably put a sign on our bikes that says "Will ride anywhere for food!"

We didn't do it all for the food. We did it in preparation for our next adventure - bike touring the West Coast!! We leave tomorrow!

We're going to attempt to blog as we go, so you can follow along instead of the usual suspense of waiting until we get around to writing about it 3 months later....

Enjoying the forest roads on our recent trip to Saturna Island

Here's the plan:
May 31: We're almost all packed. Chris is packing the last of our gear while I sit on the couch writing into the abyss (typical).
June 1: WE RIDE. Oh wait. Chris has an 8 am exam. THEN WE RIDE (Intended to be read as if we're headed into battle, I've been reading the Red Riding Trilogy... Read it!). Day 1 - Vancouver to Victoria
June 2: Chris volunteers at the Victoria Ironman.... why is he so high maintenance? I just want to go already!
June 3: Ferry from Victoria to Port Angeles
June 3 - 30: Bike, Eat, Sleep, Explore, Eat, Bike, Sleep, Explore - WAHOOOOO!
July 1 - Hope we have made it to San Fran to we can fly back to Van! Arrive in Van around 10 PM. Hope we can put our bikes back together and make it home to get some sleep.
July 2 - I go to work. Chris has the week off. Life isn't always fair.

WE ALSO HAVE MASCOTS! STAY TUNED.

Kayaking Haida Gwaii - Planning Details (Part 2)

Gwaii Haanas park passes

This may be the first roadblock to going on a self-guided Haida Gwaii adventure. You need a park pass to go into Gwaii Haanas National Park, and these do sell out especially in the summer months (June, July). Lucky for us May is quiet and we had no problem getting our passes. However, we did book them in December as we had heard they sold out. Moral: book early and for your whole group, since you may not be able to add more people to your trip later on if the passes are sold out.

The park pass costs about $117 for an annual pass (cheaper than by the day for 2 weeks), so remember to factor this in.

There is a mandatory orientation prior to your trip for all members of your party. This can be completed in Skidegate at the heritage center by the ferry terminal, or in advance (February or March sometime) in Vancouver or Victoria. We chose to attend the meeting in Vancouver. This worked out really well as it gave us an idea of what to expect and how to prepare. We would highly recommend this option for the benefit to planning your trip, though the heritage center is supposedly amazing.

Camping in the mossy meadows at Hutton Inlet

Booking the Ferry

Apparently it is necessary to book the ferry in advance, but May was rather quiet and we probably could have booked this last minute. Still smart to book well in advance if you're driving on or if you want a cabin as space is limited. Either way, BC Ferries does appreciate knowing if they're having kayaks walk on, so good to let them know when you call to book. (Yes, you will need to call for the Inside Passage/Northern Routes, at least we did this past year)

The ferry dates dictated the dates we could go as much as anything. The ferries only run certain days of the week, especially in the off and shoulder seasons. For us we wanted to leave on the Friday due to work schedules, so on the way up our schedule looked like this:

Arrive at Horseshoe Bay	Fri, May 11	By 6pm
Leave Horseshoe	Fri, May 11	6:35 PM
Stay overnight in Bowser
Drive Bowser to Port Hardy	Sat, May 12	3.5 hours
Arrive at Port Hardy	Sat, May 12	By 2pm
Leave Port Hardy	Sat, May 12	6:00 PM
Arrive Prince Rupert	Sun, May 13	4:00 PM
Leave Prince Rupert	Sun, May 13	10:00 PM
Arrive Skidegate	Mon, May 14	6:00 AM

For both of the legs of the ferry on the way up we booked a cabin. This was kind of nice to have, but many of the frequent travelers just slept on the main passenger decks in sleeping bags - definitely a viable option to save a bit of money. On the way back we only booked a cabin for the second leg of the trip, as the first was during the daytime.

Leave Skidegate	Tue, May 29	10:00 AM
Arrive Prince Rupert	Tue, May 29	4:30 PM
Leave Prince Rupert	Tue, May 29	8:00 PM
Arrive Port Hardy	Wed, May 30	1:45 PM
Drive back to Nanaimo	Wed, May 30	4hours
Leave Nanaimo	Wed, May 30	8:00 PM
Arrive Vancouver	Wed, May 30	9:40 PM

Walking kayaks onto the Inside Passage Ferry
Yes it is possible!
BC Ferries does charge a small fee to walk or wheel your kayak onto the ferry ($10 or $20), but it is much less than if you were to bring a vehicle on.
We used kayak wheels for two of the kayaks that were loaded with all the gear and I pulled both of them. The third kayak went (nearly) empty and J and N carried that onto the ferry. I don't know if we could have carried them with all the gear the whole way onto the ferry down the loading ramp if not for the wheels! We also took advantage of the walk-on passenger luggage service that is available, so we were able to ditch a bit of weight.
We received some mixed messages when it came to bringing camp fuel onto the ferry. The land folks said to have it out so it can be 'safely stowed', but the ferry personnel were quick to tell us to stow it in our kayak hatches. We still don't know what we're supposed to do.


Water Taxi into Gwaii Haanas
The main company that will take you and your kayak into Gwaii Haanas is Moresby Explorers. They only do runs on certain days, unless you have a group >5-6 people and their boats aren't in use for something else. They release the list of dates in November or December.

The cost is dependent on where you want to go/get picked up from. We got dropped off at Murchison Island by Hotspring Island ($210 per person), and picked up at Raspbarry Cove by Rose Harbour ($283.50 per person). They require a 25% deposit when you book, and full payment >1 month out.

Moresby Explorers will also rent double or single kayaks if needed. Two of our group rented a double for $834.30 for the two weeks.

These are the coldest boat rides ever. Do not underestimate this. (Much more detail to follow in the narrative version of our adventure)

Food Planning
First, do you enjoy dehydrating food? Like really, truly enjoy it? Yes? Good, that will soon change.
Just kidding!
Though it is important to warn you: dehydrating food for 2 weeks for 5 or more people will take a lot of time. You may wish you opted for the prepackaged $10 per meal tasteless bags of dehydrated food from MEC, but I assure you all the hard work is worth it.

We learned that it is possible to dehydrate just about anything! Mac and cheese with ham, check. Veggie and egg scramble, check. Even turkey dinner, check.
Everything in the following menu was dehydrated except for the fresh fruit and veggies, the cheese (freeze dried from ThriveLife) and the fresh foods in the first few days. We also had 2 tea bags for every day (varying flavours), and hot chocolate or apple cider mix for most of the days. In the end our menu looked like this:



Gear Planning
After reading all over the place about what to pack and what not to pack, this is what we came up with. If you bring everything on the list and are smart about having a set of clothes for paddling and a dry set for land, you should be well equipped - we were, but your mileage may vary. Also, most of the clothing fit in two 10L dry bags (one for dry land clothes and one for paddling clothes), plus a smaller one especially for down jackets. Rain pants, rain jackets, paddling jackets and neoprene were all kept separate though since it didn't matter too much if they got wet.


Route Planning
Our proposed route was north to south, starting near Hotspring Island, working out way down to Ninstints/Skang Gwaii then back up to Raspberry Cove. Having done the trip, our proposed plan had a few flaws, and we made some changes along the way. Map on the left is our pre-planned route. The map on the right is our actual route based on GPS tracking while paddling.

Planned kayaking route (marker in miles for some reason)

Actual kayaking route (click for Google map of each leg)

While traveling up there we became concerned the crossing from Ramsay Island over to Newberry Cove was too long or would be too wavy/challenging. Consequently, we entertained the idea of using one of our extra days to start at Murchison go to Bishop Islands on to Hutton Inlet, then the next day go Hutton to Newberry. As a result we got dropped at Murchison with this plan in mind. On further discussion (having already been dropped at Murchison) we decided to cross straight to Hutton Inlet as the winds/waves looked favourable and it would be a shorter day than going to Bishop Islands first, though longer single crossing, and it would be a shorter day overall then Ramsay to Newberry would have been. In doing so we traded a day from later in the trip. Specifically we took out the day we planned to go out and back from Swan Islands to Poole Point in search of the sea cave.

The plan was to stay on the north end of Burnaby Narrows by Dolomite Point. However, when we got there we couldn't find the area to camp, and the stream was inaccessible to get water, plus we had already paddled 16km and the group was getting tired. As a result we paddled down toward Burnaby Narrows and found a flat area to camp. Only problem is you're not supposed to camp there, oops! We did try radioing the park rangers to talk to them about it, but they didn't respond, so we just tried to be as careful as possible to not disturb anything and to not have a fire. Our recommendation would by to try a different island on the north end of the narrows (and not have paddled quite so far so you can actually explore and find a good camp site) or add in a couple days and go into Island Bay as there are supposedly waterfalls to be found.

Something to keep in mind: in Burnaby Narrows, generally the tide floods from south to north, and falls from north to south, and since you want to go through the narrows when it is the lowest tide you'll need to carefully time your passage and trip to/from the narrows to avoid too much current.

The out and back at Swan Islands was necessary to refill water. Everywhere was so dry, even in May! Keep this in mind and bring lots with you as you paddle. (This applies to your first day too as there may not be much right where you're dropped off)
We took out the trip up to Poole Point as we weren't sure exactly where the sea cave was and it was going to be a rather exposed paddle.


We used one of the contingency days in Ikeda Cove as the weather had turned and it was quite rainy and windy (we also needed a break!). I believe that Ikeda Cove may be prone to wet weather though as it is surrounded by mountains and it seemed to be much clearer outside the cove when we left.


The whole last leg out from Raspberry Cove to Ninstints/Skang Gwaii had to be altered. We made an attempt early in the morning to paddle out prior to the forecast gale-force storm, but the currents were not in our favour (we basically didn't move for almost an hour of paddling) and it was raining on us. We returned to Raspberry Cove and were able to raise someone on the radio that was willing to take us out to Ninstints/Skang Gwaii in their zodiac.
After that the next 2 days were spent in a lean-to we built bracing ourselves from the rain and winds, so no kayaking was had those last days.

When we did go out in the zodiac the swells/waves appeared quite large, so I'm not sure how much fun it would have been to paddle out that direction anyway. Nonetheless, plan several extra days for this section and stick to the protected shore coves. Or book a zodiac ahead of time! (expect to pay ~$100 per person though)

Final Costs
If you have your own kayaks it is cheaper to ferry and bring your own. If you do not own your own then it is cheaper to fly to Sandspit and rent a double from Moresby Explorers. If renting a single, I think it comes out about equal, though having done the trip, I wouldn't advise using any single kayaks if possible.
The values below are the lower end of costs for a 2 week trip. In addition to having a lot of the gear already we did make some purchases specifically for the trip, like more dry bags and rope to hang food.
I have not included the VHF radio in the tally as we had bought one ourselves to use at other times. If you don't have one you can rent it from Moresby Explorers for ~$60. A VHF radio is required to communicate with the water taxi, and strongly encouraged for weather/safety.
This also does not include the $100 per person we ended up paying for the zodiac out to Ninstints/Skang Gwaii.

Kayaking Haida Gwaii - No Guides Necessary (Part 1)

So you want to kayak Haida Gwaii... but you don't want to have someone give you a nice tour around the islands and cook all of your meals for you...
Or perhaps you do, but you don't want to pay them the MILLIONS (not an exaggeration) of dollars of your hard earned money to do it.

You, my friend, are in the right place!

In this post we'll give you the run down on how we prepared for our two week trip in Gwaii Hanaas, how we brought our own kayaks, where we went, and provide a chronicle of our adventures and lessons learned along the way!

Preparing the kayaks to walk on at Port Hardy Ferry Terminal

  In short:
-Get irrationally excited about kayaking Haida Gwaii, search the interweb for best routes to kayak in May, base route on typical guided tours of the area
-Spend MONTHS dehydrating food, and buying all the gear including a fancy pressure cooker to make it delicious!
-Drive from Vancouver to Port Hardy, park the car, unload the kayaks, and take them on a ferry adventure to Prince Rupert, and then another one over to Haida Gwaii!
-Take our kayaks on a 2+ hr boat ride into Gwaii Hanaas
-Go on a two week kayaking adventure
-Come home alive!

In long:

I had been wanting to do a Haida Gwaii kayaking trip for a few years. I’m not sure where I first got the idea, but two years ago while at MEC I saw they had a map with info and campgrounds on it so I picked that up, quite excited to plan a trip (https://www.mec.ca/en/product/5045-114/Haida-Gwaii-BC-Waterproof-Map)

Unfortunately, it turned out we didn’t have time to go for a while so it was put on the back shelf… until August 2017 when I (Chris) was running FatDog with Tim (our friend from North Van) and a fellow from Arizona who was asking about our favorite places in BC. Turns out Tim actually lived there for a few years and he suggested that May is a really good time to go since weather is alright and it’s shoulder season so no one else goes then. That was convenient because my summer break was in May/first week of June this year. So that got me thinking about the trip again.

He also said that we could walk our kayaks onto the ferry (true) and that there was somewhere to camp in the bay once we got there (partly true, I’ll get to that), and that we should spend as much time there as possible, “5 weeks would be good”. The part he failed to mention was how logistically ridiculous/challenging it is to plan such a journey. So, with that omission, I set about researching and planning a trip. The timeframe of the trip was constrained by the vacation time available for those we wanted to invite ~2-3 weeks, and the exact dates were constrained by the ferry schedule and the water taxi availability (to take us into the national park). We also knew we wanted to bring our own kayaks since we have them and to save some $$$. We also didn’t want to drive our car on as it was expensive and unnecessary – didn’t have time and therefore no use for it when we were there – so we were looking to walk our kayaks onto the ferry.

Googling for “walking kayaks onto Port Hardy ferry” (or something similar) returned one blog post written about 100 years ago from westcoastdave.ca, the link to which no longer works… So I had just one report to tell me that it was indeed possible to roll/walk kayaks onto a ferry. Basically, you pull up to the ferry terminal, talk to the staff about where to unload, and get to work, not too hard.

The ferry up the inside passage was super cool, but also very long. I probably wouldn’t do it a second time to be honest. Many more details on this to follow.

As for planning our trip, we figured we could do it without a guide, since we’ve done other multi-day kayak trips. Plus, we didn’t want to spend an extra $4000 per person to have someone prep/cook our meals and show us around. Doing all this did turn out to be quite a task, so be sure to thoughtfully consider whether you’re up for the challenge of planning all your own food and not getting lost. Because if you’re not sure, then it might be smarter to book a guided tour… from the sounds of it, they’re pretty plush. Almost all the food is brought in fresh by boat every few days and you have lots of time to explore because they prep the meals, or you can go for the one where you can sleep in a cabin for some of the nights! Conversely, doing it ourselves we spent a great deal of time planning and dehydrating meals beforehand, then the actual cooking of them takes time out of every day.

If you’ve decided you’re capable of the challenge, then probably good to get a map like the one I listed above and start looking at routes you want to do/places to see. We decided we wanted to see both Hotspring Island (which is now flowing again) as well as the world heritage site Skang Gwaii/Ninstints. This meant our route would be ~120km in 12 days paddling with a couple days for weather delays. If I were to plan it again I would increase the number of days we could stay in one place because taking down/setting up camp got exhausting. Also we had a couple days at the end of our trip where it was gale winds and we had to stay put. All in all, it turned out to be more like an expedition, and less like a leisurely trip (there were many redeeming factors though which I’ll get to).

We had 5 people on the trip; 3 of us went up there on the ferry with our own single kayaks, and 2 flew up and rented a double kayak. The double kayak was markedly faster, even when loaded up much more than the singles. For future trips we decided that we would only bring double kayaks – it made that big of a difference! They also hold a lot more it seems.

Another consideration is who is going on your adventure with you. Make sure you've done other trips with them, give them a packing list etc to make sure they're prepared. You're going to be spending days or weeks with these people so choose your adventure partners wisely.

Food. Plan more calories than you think. We had all our meals measured and packed 3500 calories per person per day. This probably would have been ok, except it tasted so good that some people ate more than they should have given their BMR and activity rate. Next time I would plan more like 4000 per person per day. The majority of our food was dehydrated ahead of time (menu to follow) and then we bought some fresh stuff in Prince Rupert to bring. We found that carrots and apples lasted almost a week, the oranges even longer (10 days?) and that the lettuce and tomatoes for the first night barely made it the 2 days with all the jostling.

The next installment is the nitty gritty details of the planning.

Impromptu Kayaking in Desolation Sound

Cruisin' in calm waters!

Almost a week after the big race we returned home to find ourselves with a bit more free time than initially planned for - so we jumped on a ferry heading towards Powell River for another exciting adventure!

Thursday August 21st. 4:30 PM - We return home from the Okanagan. Jenna is booked on a flight leaving for Calgary for field work at 9:00 am the next morning. 
5:00 PM - We get the call. The field adventure has been cancelled, leaving us with 3 work free days!
6:00 PM - Thinking about adventure to Powell River for the weekend.
8:00 PM - Adventure confirmed, packing commences.
10:00 PM - Backpacks are packed and we're ready to go! Let's hope we didn't forget anything!

Friday August 22nd, 9:40 AM - Missed the first ferry. Next connecting ferry isn't until 5:30 PM.
10:00 AM - Decide to take Monday off work to maximize adventure time.
6:30 PM - Arrive in Powell River

Let the adventure begin! We arrived in Powell River and were immediately whisked off to one of the coolest swimming holes I've ever been too. It came complete with a sketchy looking rope swing, and a rather terrifying cave. Just in case you aren't convinced - Chris will demonstrate (video comes complete with tarzan yelp).

Jason with the Humpback!!!

After a delicious salmon dinner with my cousin Jason we were off and planning the weekend's adventure.
And then we have this brilliant idea - let's go on a three day kayak trip with a couple of hours notice, and be on the water by noon the next day!
I'm not even sure how we did it, but by noon the next day we had all the food and gear packed and we were ready to hit the water. We didn't even forget anything! Well, except for the bug spray - but that's a minor detail.

There's not much I can say that the pictures don't show. It was a beautiful weekend filled with seals, whales, crabs, star fish, sea bacon and sunshine!
Yes, you read that right, sea bacon. Now we were too chicken to try it - but rumor has it if you properly disect and pull the veins out of a sea cucumber it takes just like bacon! I think I'll stick with the traditional kind!

If you're looking for an amazing place to kayak (even paddle-free kayaking) - Desolation Sound is it!
Thanks for being an amazing host Jason!! We owe you!