Gremlin's Tall Stories

Today was one of the larger ones, with 380 miles to be covered (around 610km), so the alarm was interrupting my slumber at 6am. Murray was already up, don’t know how he does it.

Took our van bags down to the van and tucked into the complimentary breakfast, which was apricot bran and orange juice. The others were well ahead of me in getting ready, and a chunk of the group left around 7am. I watched them head off, and saw one car pass by the motel completely staring at the gathered bikes. Good thing Lillooet is a tiny town and there were no other vehicles on the main street

I didn’t feel quite so active, so after watching the rest leave, and watching the hotel owner film and watch all the bikes on his iPad I carried on packing. I bet GiJoe thought I was going to go back to sleep, but no, I just took my time packing.

Exiting the hotel at 8am, the owner wants me to say something to the iPad… no thanks. Turned out of hotel the wrong way, so had to backtrack down a side street, and didn’t bother filling up in town, having only done 260km odd since last fill. The air was still cool, around 13-15 degrees, and I found in chunks of shade it was dropping to 9 degrees.

In the next 1.5 hours the temperature started its inexorable climb, already at 18-19 by 9.30am. The first part of the road had been brilliant, staying around 100-120kph consistently, the road flowing from one corner to another. Hitting 97 and 1, the road straightened, but the speed limit increased, so good time was made.

Stopping on the outskirts of Kamloops I had a shock when filling for gas. I pulled out a couple of twenties… and had none left in the wallet. Since arriving in Victoria on Monday night and withdrawing $300 Canadian, I had about $10 left and it was Thursday midday. Canada is an expensive place to holiday, but it’s not like you do it every day, so what the hell, go for it. I was giving the bike a bit of a servo clean and the lady even brought out my change!

It took some time to detour through Kamloops, being surprisingly large, but I finally found a bank (had to check with the people outside, as it was more like, Sovereign Investments, and didn’t look like a bank). Back past the servo and settled into a couple of hundred km.

Passing Vavenby I was surprised to see it was larger than expected. Looked back at the road and a blasted bird was flying from my left to right, right in front of me. I was going to miss it, at least, direct on. Instead, it hit my right mirror. My blasted right mirror I’d just set properly the previous day. Now it was loose again.

Avola was just up the road, and I had already calculated that it would be in the right location time and distance wise for some lunch, so hopefully it would have something and not be just a trading post. Luck was on my side, heading towards the gas station (they’re on the main road, the town is usually off to one side), I saw a sign for world famous burgers.

Couldn’t resist that, so I followed the signs that promised burgers, and lucked across what could be one of the finds of the trip. It was a biker friendly bar, that was going to have a party that evening, and some of our group had only arrived minutes before (heheh, 30-60min of lead gone ). We gave the pub an unscheduled rush hour, with so many burgers needed, they fired up the BBQ to get them all done, with some of the locals even lending the ladies a hand. The chief lady appeared to be one by the name of Tammy, and boy, was she entertaining.

Some of the ladies left her a poem, to follow up one some other kiwi girls had left a few weeks prior (we get around eh?) She showed us all sorts of pictures, stories and a joke.

Q: What does the perfect man and a sasquatch have in common?
A: They’re both talked about, but are seldom seen.

I’ve definitely rate her a must stop in the area for a feed, just so entertaining she be, and she also had a note wall, where people had pinned a note from their own currency, to add some decoration. I eventually pulled myself away (she wanted me to come back and enjoy the company of rednecks some more) and set off after the group, who’d had their burgers before me.

I never did catch the guys, as we entered even more scenic lands. Mount Robson was the next park to pass through, featuring none other than Mount Robson itself, at 3954m. Unfortunately low cloud meant you could see an impressive base, but no peak.

The mountains towered over you, the trees closed in from both sides, and occasionally you got a break from that with an almost dead calm lake of beautiful shades of blue. See the pics, drool, get envious Entering the Jasper National Park there are queues of cars. What on earth for? It’s the middle of nowhere?

Turns out it’s the middle of somewhere. A toll booth. Where it costs you to look at mountains, trees and rivers. Almost $35 canadian later, I have a pass for 3 days. It constantly seems I hand over two twenties and not a lot comes back. Still, the pretty girl was helpful, asking how long I would be in the park, and not having a clue, simply repeated, one night in Jasper, two in Banff, several times over. I didn’t know exactly how long I would be in the park, as I don’t know the size of the park, and certainly didn’t expect a toll booth.

I was one of the last to check into Jasper, around 4.30pm, including 1 hour lost due to the time zone jumping forward one hour. Checking in we were provided with a cloth each, as part of the deal, as there was a hose around the corner we could wash our bikes with. Took the gear off the bike, and as I went to take the bike around the corner, I received a cheer for not throwing it on its side… cheers guys

Took my time with that (first time I think I have cleaned it since purchase mid-January – even the shop cleaned it during one service) and she turned out quite a treat. One of the guys asked to check his tyre pressures, so I ended up checking everyone’s, with one about 6 PSI out, both ends. Stuck an AdvDesigns sticker on the front of the bike, so you’ll start to see that in pictures.

Headed back to the room, organised the day’s pictures and uploaded, then the guys were hollering about dinner. Got 10 guys into the 7 seat van, and after much debate split into two groups for dinner in town. I went with some to a small pizza/pasta type place, rather cramped with so many people in it, but scrounged enough chairs and had a delicious lasagne.

With dinner over and the rain in full swing, we decided to find an ice-cream place, and evil Dave walked us a couple of shops over, into Candy Bear Lair (http://www.candybear.ca/) which had ice cream, fudge and numerous other treats. Double scoop ice-cream, of mint and cookies and cream, couldn’t resist 250-300 grams of fudge for about $9, so bought a block of mint choc fudge.

Ernie offered to run us half group home first, as the rest were still busy in a restaurant finishing their meal (but they did try to steal my fudge). I caught up with Mark and Gerry (hey, let’s plug their blog: http://kiwisridefar.blogspot.com/ - read it for a second perspective… yes, they’re on a Harley, but it’s a hire bike) and then we all buggered off for sleep.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/SMNcinDXpQtyjWCD6