distance: 38 miles
We were up fairly early – we hadn’t adapted to mountain time yet. We had breakfast of oatmeal porridge and mixed nuts, packed up the tents and were on our way.
We traveled in wilderness areas without any stores or stops for the whole day. The paths/roads were all dirt or gravel. Many of them were quite rough as I recall.
We hadn’t yet become accustomed to riding our heavily loaded bikes up the steep ascents. Michelle began to doubt whether she had made the right decision. I insisted that it would get easier as our bodies adapted but this was small comfort. Laura however, who had prepared by biking to work seemed to have little trouble on the steep hills. I had trouble keeping up.
The long winding descents were not a problem which Laura and Michelle took much faster than me.
The gravel roads improved marginally when we entered Peter Lougheed Provincial Park. We stopped at a camp office to get some idea of our bearings and site availability and ended up staying the night at the Lower Lakes Campground with running water.
