Kettle Valley Railway trail, Midway to Penticton
Page 5
| Our third day on the KVR and it's as varied as each of the first two days. We are no longer steadily climbing and spend most of the day between 1230 and 1290 m.a.s.l. but perhaps we've traded a sloping KVR for one that has less ability to drain itself. Today is the day of puddles and mud |
| The KVR crosses the access road into the new McCulloch lake resort on Hydraulic Lake. The quaint little cabins of the old resort are being replaced by $1.2 million dollar lakefront homes, $1 million dollar lakeview homes, and a string of cheaper $945,000 homes along the line of the KVR |
| Past the resort the KVR gets a bit boggy, with plastic culverts crossing the trail, and more puddles. Yesterday, cyclists going the other way told us about a big puddle near Myra Canyon with water over our axles, so with each new puddle we ride through it wondering if this is the one |
| The KVR crosses a corner of Hydraulic Lake on a man-made causeway |
| There's lots of blowdown along this stretch, but it's all been cut and pushed aside by some nice people |
| There is no doubt that this is the big puddle |
| Pauline goes for it, after listening to a gabble of advice about the best path through the water, hollered at her by the rest of us who've already crossed |
| At kilometer 135.3 this cattle guard stops vagrant cattle from wandering on to the Myra Canyon trestles. While we take an extended break to change wet socks, Ann decides to practice her cattle guard crossing skills, although from her facial expression she is not quite comfortable with them yet |
| We finally start the much anticipated Myra Canyon stretch, with it's new trestles only recently reopened after the 2003 Kelowna fire destroyed 12 of the wooden trestles completely, and the decking from 2 steel trestles |
| Aside from KVR cyclists, Myra Canyon is easily accessible from both ends using Forest Service roads, so lots of non-cyclists are walking the KVR and we get one of them to snap our picture. In the background you can see four trestles that we will eventually get to as we circumnavigate the horseshoe-shaped Myra Canyon |
| A beautiful example of Shrubby Penstemon |
| The new trestles really stand out in the fire-ravaged landscape |
| Below one of the rebuilt trestles are the charred timbers of its predecessor |
| Our first tunnel, at kilometer 137.9. We walked it without using lights, although water drips from the ceiling in places |
| No of course this isn't a posed shot. ("Click the picture Bill, so I can veer away from the puddle!") |
| This trestle at kilometer 138.2 is the summit of the Carmi subdivision, at 1274 m.a.s.l. Yay, it's all downhill from here |
| Five years after the 2003 fire the grey patches are striking, but the returning green is even more amazing |
