The mileage for today's ride was fairly short. Less than 45 miles total, plus two ferry rides. Pretty simple, hun? From the motel in Cowichan to the ferry in Crofton. Fourteen miles in just over an hour. A short ferry ride to Vesuvius Bay on Saltspring Island then 25 miles to Fulford Harbor and another ferry ride to Swartz Bay and finally a short 4 mile ride to the hotel. How easy could that be?
It turns out that if the route on Saltspring Island has numerous 18% grades, then the ride can be pretty challenging. Looking at the second GPS recording below, you will note that the route takes a large fish hook around the north side of the island. The road is shaped this way because the it's trying to avoid the large chunk of rock in the following photo in the middle of Saltspring Island. The photo was taken from our hotel across the bay as we were biking to the first ferry this morning.
We arrived at Saltspring Island and biked across the gangplank and boom!! A 18% grade was waiting for us. Eighteen percent grade simply means that for every 100 feet you move forward, you ascend 18 feet in height. A 3 or 4 percent grade is noticeable. Six percent is a maximum design grade of a highway and 18 percent means that, if you can, you shift down to your lowest gear and stand on your peddles and make each stroke as if you were climbing a set of stairs for multiple flights of stairs, you finally make it to the top and zoom downhill only to be confronted with and another 16, 17 or even 18% grade at the bottom.
Slowly, ever so slowly each of us slowly climbed our way up each hill. Our destination? Small town of Ganges where we'll stop for lunch. Ganges is a tourist town that has many shops and restaurants scattered about. Our group exchanged group messages between each other as we announced where we were stopping for lunch. Before long, it was time to catch the second ferry of the day to Swartz Bay. To catch the ferry, the largest climb of the day was in front of us. We had a small group of 4 riders and near the top and picked up 2 more along the way.
We had a ferry to catch and needed to be at the ferry landing by 3PM. Gotta keep moving. After the last bit of climb, we zoomed down to the landing, with minutes to spare for the 3 PM meet up, only to see the ferry pulling away. Turns out that the schedule had changed and therefore had to wait for the next ferry in about 90 minutes.
We hung out at the general store, munching on ice cream, soda and snacks. Not a bad way to spend our time waiting. We discovered a water mister near the landing that was thoughtfully set up where you could trigger a mist of water for 30 seconds or so. I the hot afternoon Sun, it felt sooo go.
The ferry soon arrived and we boarded it. The ride was about 30 minutes and we were seated on the upper deck and watched the world go by as we cruised past the beautiful scenery.
Upon docking, the ride to the hotel was a fairly quick and flat and only 4 miles.
Another day to remember
Brian
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