(294 miles driving in a shuttle + 20.8 miles biking)
After 37 hours of driving in our family van Laura, Michelle and I finally arrived at the Whitefish Bike Retreat at 3:10am mountain time. We crashed for about 4 hours before catching a shuttle to Banff.
Morning arrived too quickly. We awoke and by 7:50 had made our way the retreat office where a shuttle van was waiting to take us, our bikes and our packs to Banff. Cricket the owner of the retreat greeted us warmly with complementary coffee and cinnamon cake. We were happy to have her as our driver.
It is about a 6 hour drive to Banff from Whitefish. In that time Cricket was very helpful answering all my, yet unanswered, questions about the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route. As it turns out she knew the route first hand having traveled and raced the route several times. Apparently she was the top woman racer in 2009.
As Cricket was explaining all about the route, its dangers and all the proper precautions Laura was devouring all the cinnamon cake.
When we arrived in Banff at about 2pm Cricket was kind enough to drive us to a few shops in town to pick up a few things I had forgotten; duct tape, an extra jersey, a compression bag and a camping towel. Then we finally set off on our way down the path behind the old Banff hotel.
Just like it had been reported, not 200 meters from the big old hotel the trail leads to a wilderness. The trail was wide but hilly. It took a bit getting used to with our fully loaded bikes.
We arrived at Spray Lake Campground late in the afternoon. All the sites were full so we found a spot in the overflow area beside the lake (not a particularly nice spot), pitched the tents and cooked a quick supper before dark.
What a blessing to have the top woman racer of 2009 as your guide!!! I laughed out loud at the part about Laura devouring the cinnamon cake. The mountains look unreal! So excited that this journey has finally begun 😀
Sorry to have missed the beginning of your trip. I will be doing “catch up”. So far… sounds scary and harrowing!