Getting Schooled

Hart Creek to Yahk and gas was less than 60 km and easy riding. Before Creston is the hamlet of Kitchener and access to the Goat River drainage. Phil's plan is to ride north up the Goat River then head west over Mt. Bohan to get to Hwy 3A and follow it up to Crawford Bay to catch the ferry across Kootenay Lake. I'm just going to cut to the chase right here and say that we spent hours exploring and were unable to find a route. Navigating these roads is so tough because there is a fairly low level of confidence that we are at a spur that we are looking at on the map. We would ride up a spur then look at the route traced out on my GPS, which does not have any of these roads marked, and compare the shape to the road shape on the map. This helped us improve our confidence about where we had been but also gave us the confidence to know that the route we thought would take us over the mountain did not exist.

For me, this part of the trip was about learning how to ride. The conditions were not like the roads that had already passed under our wheels; even though they were roads that were "specialty" roads that would be navigable strictly by 4x4 trucks, these were roads meant only for the heaviest duty trucks - with larger rocks, steeper inclines, culverts that had been removed so that all that remained were deep, sharp impressions in the roads and drop-offs over the edge that dared me to look but I was unable. I had bought a skid plate before the trip and it was probably the most important piece of gear I owned: baseball sized rocks were flying up hitting the skid plate, which likely would have ended my trip  early were it not for that extra piece of hardware. This is where I learned a couple of important lessons, courtesy of Phil: to stand on the pegs (foot rests) on the bike and allow the bike to roll into the ghost culverts and take the compression in the front shocks. This would keep the bike from bucking me off as it came out the other side. And to not hold the hand grips too tight and allow the bike to choose it's own way in large part or not fight where it wanted to go. This may sound counter-intuitive to have a relaxed grip on one of the scariest parts of the ride, the part where it would be reasonable to anticipate holding on for dear life but by not fighting the bike, there was a much better chance to stay upright. The other important thing was a technique known to all motorcyclists though I was unaware of how to use it in this circumstance: slip clutch. This is for making slow speed maneuvers by riding the foot brake and simultaneously holding the clutch handle in slightly and keeping the revs high. What Phil told me was that this was how to negotiate around the trickier, rocky bits. It would not have occurred to me that this would be acceptable on a steep incline in either first or second gear, sometimes while standing on the pegs. It is a complex set of variables. But it was also good training for what was coming.