Great Divide 2023 - Banff to Butte
Twelve days on the Great Divide from Banff to Butte. Great riding, sunny, blazing hot days, amazing scenery and tired legs setting up an ongoing adventure for the next 3 years. Introduction On July 24, 2023 I set off to ride the Great Divide from Banff to Antelope Wells. I am a reasonably experienced bikepacker having done multiple 10+ day bikepacking trips including a 1,000 km route from Banff to Penticton on the Great Trail in 2020, the BC Epic 1000, a 1,000 km gravel bike race in 2021 and the 1,000 km Tree to Sea gravel bike loop on North Vancouver Island in 2022. In comparison, this would be my first ride planned to be longer than 2 weeks and if completed upwards of 4,500 km. To cut a long story short, I made it to Butte, Montana in 12 days, over 1,200 km of riding and 16,000 metres of climbing and decided to stop the ride early. While I had physically prepared reasonably well for the ride with regular mountain bike riding, multiple 100+ km rides fully loaded on my gravel bike...