It was bloody cold in the morning and foggy too. It didn’t put me in the best mood for the day, but I was soon feeling lifted as I drove away from camp and head south on the highway towards the town of Banff. The clouds over the mountain parted and blue skies appeared while in my rear view mirror, all I could see was grey. I was heading in the right direction!
The highway was dual lane all the way with big forested bridges over each roadway to provide passage for animals to cross safely between the sections of forest. I wonder how many bears got nailed before they thought of that one. Thanks to my sleeping troubles, I got into Banff around 8am when it was still quiet. The streets of the small town were narrow and pretty with flowers lining them, I could just imagine how it would get crazy. I drove through on Tunnel Mountain Rd looking for a mountain biking trailhead. I was surprised to see a castle-looking building nestled in the forest across the valley and stopped for a closer look. I was at the Surprise Viewpoint with only a couple of other people. Unfortunately none of the signs explained what the building was, but that didn’t matter, it was pretty.
As I got back to the car, a bus pulled up and a whole load piled out, obviously on their first sight seeing stop of the day. A short way away, I parked outside a lodge where my trailhead was. I got my bike off the roof and donned shorts and a light shirt since it had warmed up quite nicely. Ready to ride, I rode across the yellow meadow. It was a beautiful view with two mountains standing before me, whisps of cloud surrounding one of them.
The “Topp Notch” trail I was looking for was the number 1 rated trail in all of Alberta so I was excited! Being only a few kilometres long, I was hoping it would be sweet and short. As a warm up, I got going on “Star Wars” first since Trailforks recommended that it was the easier out of the two downhill runs. I tend to struggle with getting onto downhill trails without a good half hour of riding to find my balance and it showed as I tried jumping on the first bridge obstacle. I barely made it a bike length before meandering off the straight log. I went back and tried again, having better luck and getting going on the trail properly.
There were jumps and timber bridges galore, each of them leading the way around tight berms. All of the bridges were generously wide so I was comfy hitting all of them.
It was really a bit too steep for my liking, especially without a warm up and I was on my brakes the entire 1.5km length of trail. By the end, I was thinking I might have another go at it, but I soon changed my mind while climbing back up. It wasn’t technically difficult, just constant. I managed to make it up clean easy enough, but I was panting big time when I got back to the top. Now, for the real deal. I was a little intimidated by “Topp Notch’s” black diamond rating since “Star Wars” was only blue, but there was a technical feature at the head of the trail designed to weed out anyone that couldn’t get over it. It was a short rocky incline followed by two sections of bridge. It was fine for me, so I carried on.
This was a gorgeous trail, running narrowly through moss covered ground and rocks with the trees whizzing by my handlebars. It wasn’t just a downhill trail, it meandered up and down, up and down and I enjoyed every bit of it. I was navigating my front wheel through rocks one minute, doing a u-turn on a bridge the next, then sliding on loose shale as I ripped downhill. I was warmed up now and having a lot of fun.
Each bridge section had a small caution sign to go with it which was a nice touch and I nailed most of them. Topp Notch was more natural as well, the bridge features seemingly built to bridge the gaps of unrideable terrain, but in a super fun way. I scared myself plenty of times, which made it that much better, especially since none of those scares ended in a stack. Much longer than Star Wars, I started to think if it would ever end, but after 4km, I came out on the up track and started my climb upwards after yelling out to the forest in joy of the ride.
On my way up, I passed a couple of guys on super fancy bikes struggling on the climb. This is a pet hate of mine when I come across people who are willing to spend many thousands of dollars on a fancy bike when they don’t have the fitness to make the most of it. Hoping they were locals, I waited for them when I got back to the meadow. I was going to ask them about other trails in the area, but they were tourists, so we just talked a bit about bikes and where we’d all ridden before I went back across the meadow and packed away. It wasn’t even 10am yet, I was feeling great.
I drove into town where I met the crowds. When I saw a park near the visitor’s centre, I took it and walked around the corner into the building that was set up for crowds with ropes set up for queues at the information desks. I asked about the “Stoney Squaw” trail that ran through an down the ski slopes, hoping there’d be a shuttle to take me to the top so I didn’t have to ride up the road. There was! After checking in at another desk about whether I was alloved to ride along the highway to get back to my starting point, I was right to go. Now I’d be riding the second-highest rated trail in Alberta. Cool!
At the base of the hill leading up to the Norquary ski mountain, I stashed my bike lock at the hotel where the bus would pick up at (the bus doesn’t take bikes). I then drove up to the top of the mountain where the chairlift left from, had myself a snack and got kitted up to ride again. It sure is nice just getting my bike off the roof and riding away, she’s been performing super well since our last repair session!
A short ways down the road, I was at the trailhead to “Upper Stoney Squaw”. I was on for a climb now, 2km of it, to get around Snow Peak. It was constant and the trail report had said it was a hard one to get clean and they were right. Each section of the trail was doable, it was just linking it all together that was the difficult bit. I loved it and went a bit hard in the earlier climbing sections, pumping it over hundreds of roots with my chin almost touching the bars. As a result, I didn’t quite have the oomph towards the top so I did a bit of walking. I passed a few hikers, the most comical of which were a couple of Japanese ladies who seemed astounded to see me, then exclaimed words of surprise that I kind of recognised and interpreted them to mean, “Crazy, isn’t it?”
I helped another group of hikers with directions once I got close to the peak and met a few more at the actual peak. I probably should have stopped for a photo, but according to Trailforks, I still had a few meters of climbing to go so I carried on. Nope, the climbing was done. I was going down some rocky, narrow trail and hadn’t had enough warning to put my seat post down. Whoops. I managed, loving every bit. I punched a tree with my right hand at one stage in a narrow section and had a few scares with my back wheel trying to come to the front of the bike, but overall, it was a great section of track. Totally natural, there wasn’t a single man made feature in sight.
I got glimpses of Snow Peak as I rode, but I could hardly look away from what was in front of me, it was an intense ever-changing piece of track. I descended for 2km, with a few spurts of climbing in there, until coming out onto an open trail. I went fast on this section until I reached “Lower Stoney Squaw”. This would take me all the way to the base of the mountain.
At the trail entrance, there was a sign explaining that riders are more susceptible to have trouble with bears because of how quiet and fast we are. Because of this, the sign suggested three things. 1, travel in groups (whoops); 2, yell out as you ride (done) and; 3, slow down for blind corners (yeah, nah). I whooped and hollered whenever I felt like it as I started tearing down this narrow trail through the forest. Wholly wow, I was in heaven. This trail was an absolute dream. It was the perfect gradient so that I wasn’t consistently hammering my brakes, but the pace was fast and the terrain ever changing.
At one point, my brain found it hard to keep up with processing what was in front of me but the short climbs between bombing downhills were enough of a break to keep me going. Remember, I’m also yelling out to alert bears so naturally felt a bit wild by the time I could hear the traffic of the highway. Near the end, I stopped to look at the view of the mountains and felt special knowing I was the only one on this trail. Here, in Banff, where thousands of holiday makers were milling around, I was alone.
The last few hundred meters went quickly and in a late decision that put me in the middle of commitment and hesitation, I binned in on some gravelly rocks, roughing up my leg a bit, but the bike was ok and I had only a slight graze. Exhilarated, I came to the end of the trail at a creek that ran under the bustling highway. Wow, just brilliant.
Even better, the next bus was only 20 minutes away so my timing was perfect and I hadn’t even been trying. I got through a bear-proof gate and rode on the thankfully wide shoulder of the highway a kilometre back to the bus stop. It was out the front of the hotel and I felt like such a dirtbag in my riding rags when everyone coming and going out of the hotel was dressed in finery. I found my lock, locked my bike to a tree, then sat waiting for my bus. I pilfered some Wifi as I did so and watched the rest of the F1 race. What an ending it was, but nothing would put Ricciardo back in it after his team mate punted him off the track like the hot-headed teenager he is.
When the bus came, I was surprised that it was near empty. We went into town first and dropped off the only other two passengers. The bus driver explained that it was usually busier in the mornings. From the bus window, I could see that town had gone from crazy busy to absolutely insane. I had no desire to be amongst it. By 1pm, I was back at the top of the mountain. I drove down, put my bike on the roof, then contemplated my next move. I was hungry and I needed a swim. Lake Minnewanka then.
It was just outside of town so I hoped maybe the crowds wouldn’t be there. That was a poor assumption. The day use area was a shit show so I continued on the narrow road which crossed right over the beautiful lake and found a small parking area for a lookout point. Yes, this would do just fine. I made myself a huge salad, then carried it and a towel down to the water’s edge. This place was beautiful. There were a few other people down at the water, kids throwing rocks, couples posing for photos, but I found my own spot and stripped down to get in the water. I was the only one and I got some weird looks from people, but I paid them absolutely no mind. I dove into the blue water and felt the familiar needles of cold hit my body. It was brilliant. I scrubbed away at my scratched up leg until the dried blood came off, floated for a minute to enjoy the view, then got out and sat on a rock in the sun to warm up and eat my lunch.
The thought that kept crossing my mind was, “Life is good”. It really was, I’d just ridden four amazing trails in one of the most beautiful places on earth, hadn’t spent a single cent doing it and now I was here, sitting in my underwear in the sun with a gorgeous view in front of me. With my travels coming to an end, I came to realise I am going to miss this.
A stayed a while after I finished my lunch, stretching out on the rocks, letting the sun cool me while cheeky chipmunks tried to get to the remnants of my food while I wasn’t looking. I was happy with my time spent at Banff, but now it was time to get out of the crowds and carry on. I’m just glad I spent a few days in Jasper, which wasn’t as crazy, before I came south.
Unfortunately, I had to stop in town for petrol. Not an easy feat, but eventually I had a full tank and I was on my way. I took the Bow Valley Parkway that ran adjacent to the highway as a quieter option and found it pretty well deserted. I got off at the turn off to Kootenay National Park. There wasn’t much I wanted to really do there, but it was the scenic route west to Revelstoke. When I came to the highway crossing, the road was littered with cones and “road closed” signs. Hmmm. A quick Google revealed there was a forest fire and while an update would be released in the next ten minutes, I thought it unlikely to open any time soon. I perused my map and figured that if I went back to Lake Louise and turned west from there, I’d be missing out on Kootenay and Bugaboo Provincial Park. Since there was nothing really of note in Kootenay and it turns out Bugaboo is pretty limited in terms of self-guided trails, I decided I didn’t mind too much and would head straight west.
I got back onto the parkway and passed hundreds of cars parked on the roadway for Johnston Canyon. Getting a little FOMO, I almost stopped, then decided I didn’t want to do anything with a hundred other people so I carried on driving. Podcast on, I went through the same roadworks in Yoho National Park as I had yesterday and then was on to new territory. I didn’t stop through the park and the mountains slowly disappeared behind me. The valley ahead became hazy thanks to the forest fire, but blue skies opened up again when I reached the town of Golden.
It was 5:30pm and I was keen for camp so I pulled over for a look at the options. There was a genuine freebie just twenty minutes down the road so I aimed for that. After a few u-turns thanks to out-dated maps, I found the Waitabit Creek Recreation Area. This was a genuine, honest, free campsite in Canada! My very first! It was busy with most sites taken, especially the ones right by the creek, but after doing a full tour of the place, I found me a beautiful private spot in amongst the trees. A perfect way to end my day.
As I got out to cook some dinner (since my salad hadn’t kerbed my hunger for long), a guy came over and wanted to make sure his generator wasn’t bothering me. I told him I hadn’t noticed it until he pointed it out and it wouldn’t be a problem. He assured me that if it did start to niggle at me, I should come straight over. How nice of him! He started walking away, then asked if I’d like to join him at a swimming hole that was a five minute drive away. Thanks, but no thanks, since I needed my dinner!
I had a great chat with Mum and Dad while I cooked and ate dinner, then wandered down to the creek for a look. With a mountain peak on the horizon and the blue babbling brook, this was a beautiful spot. I chilled out the rest of the night doing the usual, but missing the ritual of having a fire. I’ve been in fire ban areas now for at least a week and even though it was a warm evening, it would have been a nice touch.