Our new friend Burt was not the most
practical mode of transport we had used to date. Far from it.
As we had no means of tieing down the bags in the rear flat bed, we had
to use the cabin space to store our luggage and it took a couple of tries
before we had a system that was “approved”.
However, we were soon on the road, with me at the wheel and Julia in
co-pilot position.
As we wound our way up the first stretch of
mountain highway, British Columbia turned up the volume on the nature
scale. Canada was showing off. This drive was incredible. I tried to let Julia sleep, but at one point
we passed a snowfield over to our left (a long way over) and I had to point it
out to her. Mind you, I almost missed
some of the views because my eyes were really struggling to stay open.
By the time we pulled into Whistler I was
spent. The drive had finished me off and
parking the behemoth Burt in the underground garage was almost more than my
patience could take. But before we could
properly relax, we had to book ourselves in for a cycle lesson tomorrow. After all, when in Whistler in Summer….you go
downhill mountain biking.
Imagine a ski resort. Now picture a really beautifully set-up, landscaped
and manicured ski resort. Mountain
slopes all around, pine trees and clean air.
Scatter some well-heeled families and adrenalin junkies amongst the
streets. Place the sun in the blue sky
and change the setting to summer…..a hot day.
Mountain bikers, dusty in their armour are wandering the streets with
their steel steeds between their hands.
Grim faced and drained from a day of careering down trails most people
would have trouble walking down.
This is Whistler.
It’s kind of like a modern Chamonix. Or perhaps a more civilized Queenstown. In short, Whistler is just quality. I liked it…..or could you tell already?!
Having had a meal that I was really not
expecting to be good turn out to be great, we followed up with a lovely ice
cream and a gentle saunter back to our hotel room. During dinner we had witnessed a man propose
to his lady in the town square and cheered with the rest of the crowd as they
kissed. Life our here was turning into a
postcard of itself!
The next day started a little
stressfully. Between wanting a good
breakfast and not knowing where to go for the lesson, we arrived a few minutes
late. Then it took an age to get kitted
out in our armour. Julia’s face and
whole demeanour brightened up when we finally had on our protection. It seems she had always wanted to dress up
like this for a sport that required it…..you learn something new everyday. Then it was out onto the slopes with our
instructor and his 2 other charges; a pair of teenagers who had been doing this
a while.
Our first run was……..ridiculous. Our Scottish instructor thought it would be fine to take us down an intermediate run to test us out. We survived. Just about. Julia took a flight over her handlebars in slow motion and somehow came away unscathed. Unfortunately I was in front of her so we have no video record of this. I had a moment of confused emotions. After waiting for her for a few minutes, I had put my bike down and begun to walk back up the trail, avoiding the other cyclists hairing past me. Obviously something had gone wrong and I was worried. Then she came out of the forest and pulled up next to us. She explained what had happened and how all was well and then in a total u-turn of emotions I felt a surge of pride and happiness! I wasn’t the first to fall off. How absurd!
Anyway, by the time we got to the bottom of
the mountain our guide had radioed ahead and asked for us to be taken over by
someone else. Up popped this young,
tanned, little guy who took one look at us and peppered us with questions about
our abilities. Unimpressed by our
stories of valour on the roads of South East Asia and the rocks of Moab, he
took us up to the nursery for a bit of a lesson.
Thank God!
We spent what seemed an age, unlearning how
to steer and re-learning how to steer on a downhill mountain bike. Then we did the most terribly childish thing
we had done on our trip yet…..a slow race.
A race to the bottom of the hill using your brakes the whole way. Last one at the bottom wins. Julia won.
Of course.
What we didn’t realize was how useful these
exercises would be and how especially important it was to be able to control
the pressure on our fantastically capable brakes. They were full on professional grade brakes and
if you applied too much pressure you would hit the bottom of the mountain
before your bike did. On top of that, we
soon understood that you had to be on your brakes almost the whole time;
feathering them slightly, sometimes letting them go a little, others applying
more force….never slamming on them hard.
We also learned that you had to use your front brakes more than your
back brakes.
That was a real head-spinner, but simple
physics really. If you want to stop, use
the front brakes. As a child you’re
taught this is bad as you will fly over the handle bars. What we SHOULD be taught is how to apply
brakes properly so you use the front brakes correctly and stop faster without doing a front flip
dismount. Once we had both mastered the
60/40 front/rear brake usage we both felt a lot more comfortable.
Our first runs were easy enough and we very
quickly realized how lucky we had been to make it down the very first
intermediate run. Teacher Boy took us
faster and faster down the easy runs and soon we upgraded. Wow.
What a difference. We re-did our
first run of the day, this time with a modicum of skill and experience. A completely different feeling. It was amazing. The buzz of hitting those banked curves
correctly, pushing your bike out beneath you and feeling the centrifugal force
push your wheels into the dirt, then pedaling out and onto the straight, over
the rocks and tree roots before you hit another switchback….it was like nothing
else.
Gradually I overcame my fear of the
downhill. After falling off my bike at
speed in Vietnam, I have had a problem with going fast downshill. To me, our trip in Moab was terrifying. Now, with our little bit of training, I
wanted to do more and more.
In the end we graduated fully to the
technical intermediate tracks and though we didn’t do any of the jumps, we
fully enjoyed those runs without the fear of being out of control. For a laugh, our guide took us down a small
section of a technical black run, just so we could say we have actually done a
black run
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By the time we had stopped, at 5.30pm, our
hands felt like the claws of stone gargoyles and our bodies were drained of
energy. Then we found out our guide was
only 17! Gutted! He had been the very model of
professionalism, applying everything he had learned in guide school in almost
text book fashion, but he did it all in a way that was engaging – not
boring. When I found out his age, I
groaned. No wonder he hadn’t quite “got”
all the sarcasm and irony and Christ I must seem like an ancient to him. Urgh.
The worst part of all that was the way we
discovered his age. I asked him if he
wanted to join us for a beer.
“No, thank you,” he said, “I’m too young to
drink.”
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