Road Trip - Squamish

Road trip Squamish

We had officially made it into Canada and the next leg of our adventure had begun.  In order to avoid further excitement in downtown traffic we opted to go up 15 on the east side which would skirt downtown Vancover to the Transcanada (Hwy 1).  This eventually turns into 99 North, AKA the Sea to Sky Highway and leads to Squamish.  As we turned on to the TransCanada we started to see signs for “last exit before tolls”.  It quickly dawned on us that we did not have any toonies yet, and we took the exit in order to find an ATM.  The missus took us the scenic route via some figure eights as the streets were all similarly numbered, though some were avenues and some were streets depending on direction. 

Soon enough; however, we were back on the sea to sky highway where the cars started to thin out and the driving slowly got less stressful.  Unfortunately the weather was not cooperating as we kept driving through thick, dark clouds that poured nonstop.  The first challenge as we drove north to Squamish was to find lodging.  We realized on our way up that labour day weekend is recognized on the same day in Canada as in the U.S., adding an extra level of complexity to the travel.  I remember a good visitor information center in Squamish from my prior travels.  This was to be our first stop to get local beta for camping and trail conditions.  We settled on an in-town location, Brennan Park/Kinsman Campground.  The big upside was that you could ride to the trailheads from town, and better yet, they had a bike was station at the rec center next door.  We took full advantage of both as we rode to the trailhead later that day, but not before trying out the bike wash. 

We kept waiting for the clouds to clear but they remained stubborn and hovered while emitting a slow drizzle/rain.  We took our chances and got on our bikes to make our way up through town and fireroads, which would eventually lead to our objective of Half Nelson.  I had fond memories of this trail from the BC Bike Race and was anxious to see how that rode in non-race mode.  It did not disappoint as the machine-made trail put an ear-to-ear grin on our faces.  When we got down to the bottom the wifer decided she wanted to do it again, so we climbed the 800 feet of elevation to the top of the trailhead for a repeat smile-a-thon.  At the bottom of the second lap we took a look at the map and tried to figure out how to take as much singletrack back down to town and the trailer.  The maze of trails begged questions that remained unanswered and thusly we took the path of least resistance via fireroads after the trail we chose to descend on, Pseudo Tsuga, ended.  We made our way to the bike was where we washed our bikes off for the second time that day.  We did a quick washdown and retreated back to the campsite where we watched the circus roll into town. 

The circus consisted of our fellow camp neighbors made up of screaming out of control children, barking dogs, firewood-stealing campers- in short, it was a bit of a goat rodeo.  As opposed to staying in the trailer at the campsite we opted to head out for dinner in order to avoid further exposure.  We hit the local brewery/restaurant Howe Sound and ordered a flight of beers and some food.  This is when we realized that living in Bend makes you a bit of a beer snob as we were happy to drink the local beer but kept comparing them to our favorite local counterparts.  After a good meal we made our way back to the campsite where things seemed to have settled down and it was more or less lights out.