Day 1 of the Bike Trip

by Serena Beck

Colin and I left Edmonton at 12:30 PM and stopped for gas ($10.00) by West Ed at the Mac's store by Rachel's house. We drove a long two hours to Edson. I experienced the bike's vibrations on my feet at the full highway speed. My left foot fell asleeps a few times and the saddlebag was so overloaded it was pressing into my left ankle. Colin and I both took a few rocks to the knees (darn gravel trucks that passed us). Our butts fell asleep and we constantly shifted our backs and arms to stretch. We drove through two tiny rain showers even though the sun was still out most of the time and there were no rain clouds when we left. However, a first day isn't a first day without a little rain.

We arrived at Tim Hortons in Edson straving and cramped. Colin spotted Reto and Lynette in the parking lot. They were on there way back from Jasper with their friends from Switzerland. Talk about incredible timing. We enjoyed a Wendy's-Tim Hortons lunch with them and caught up on our travels. They took a picture of us on the bike, but I wasn't thinking and should have got a picture of us with them (Colin is going to revoke my camera priviledges). We got gas at shell ($10.91) and hit the road.

Now, I know I sound like I complained about our first leg, but as we suspected the second leg went much faster. We drove to Hinton in what felt like an instance. We saw a fawn at the side of the road. We saw lots of other bikers who we both waved too. It reminded me of when I was little girl on family vacations in B.C. and I would wave to other boaters in uncle Terry's boat. It's such a cool thing because no matter who we are we share that common thread of driving a bike. It's like we're in this little secret club with these other people driving bikes. In Hinton, we stopped at Petro and drank juiceboxes and ate granola bars for about 15 minutes.

Next, we headed to Jasper and payed our hefty daily park pass of $17.80. We saw a moose on the side of the road (thank God he wasn't crossing). We drove thorugh an insanely gusty valley and I learned that things that are strapped onto the top of the saddlebag do not stay there in 100 km/h wind gusts. I looked down to see my purse had slipped through one strap and the other strap was letting go just as I reached down to grab it. Colin felt the weight shift in the bike as my arm flew bag holding onto my purse. He thought I had fallen asleep (I am proud to report no sleeping on the first day).

We stopped at the Jasper airway to pose for pictures with a few planes in the field. We spoke to some Swedish grandparents and their grandaughter who were also admiring the planes. Due to the high winds, Colin's license plate had ripped off both the screws at the top and we had to turn it upside down to prevent it from falling off (good luck to us explaining this one if we're pulled over by the cops).

We finished our ride to Jasper and checked into the Whistler Inn at 7:00 PM. We enjoyed a well deserved hot tub on the roof, slurpees and then went for an Italian dinner. It was an adventurous and fun first day.