Hope to Penticton..........

So I followed the swarm of Christians (actually they only went over the first pass) over the Hope to Princeton highway. An amazing ride which consists of two passes, 1400m and 1200m, and 140km of breathtaking scenery. It's through Manning provincial park and the traffic is minimal. It was great just to really let it all out. Sometimes people ask me why I want to ride my bike like this. There are, of course, many reasons, but one them is because of days like this one. I can only describe it as perfection, being completely alive, aware........happy. To finish off this day I roll into the west side of Princeton at around 8:30pm and feel like grabbing a bite to eat. I see the restaurant at one of the cheap chain hotels is open and decide to check it out. To my surprise it's operated by a Greek couple and I end up having some of the best hummus ever! But even better, was this American truck driver I met and had dinner with, a large, intelligent looking man, maybe sixty and clean cut. He had this calmness about him and these penetrating eyes. We spoke for at least two hours. It was surreal the deepness and sincerity of the conversation. I look back now and wonder if that really happened. Was I really in a small BC town, eating hummus, talking philosophy with this truck driver?

By the time I left the restaurant it was late, so I rode back a bit and camped in the ditch. From Princeton I was going to take the trans Canada trail(TCT) to penticton. I got a map from the Princeton info center and headed out. Here the TCT is old railbed, so the grade never exceeds 2%, thus the first day was up at an almost unnoticable rate and the second day was downhill at a nice cruising speed. A nice ride. I ended up getting to Penticton on Friday, I think. I was supposed to meet Alison there on Sunday and then we'd continue on TCT from there. Being that it was Friday I had to find a place to camp. An abandoned paintball field on the south side of town became my weekend getaway.

After going out with Alison and her friends on Saturday night, we said goodbye to them on Sunday morning and headed northwest out on the TCT along the Okanagan lake........