Tripping with Mike

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...

Nine days of very hot riding over 1,000 kilometres and 11,000 metres of climbing across the best riding and scenery in British Columbia. Introduction After finishing my Banff to Penticton bike ride in 2020, I wasn't expecting to do another 10+ day bikepacking ride anytime soon but as the summer of 2021 approached, I found myself signing up for a bikpacking race called the BC Epic 1000. This is a bike race from Merritt, BC through to Fernie BC on the same TransCanada Trail I had ridden the other direction from Banff.   So on June 26 I lined up at the start line with 50-60 other folks ready to ride off into the hills of Merritt. There had been some considerable debate ahead of the race around cancelling or stopping it as the weather was incredibly hot - upwards of 40 celsius - with no end in sight.  It became referred to across BC as the "Heat Dome" of 2021. Despite this, with some careful planning, lots of hydration, riding in the early morning and into the night while avo...