Neil and I have been receiving Green Earth Organics deliveries for four months. Every Wednesday, we come home to a box of fruit and vegetables for the week’s lunches and dinners. The convenience is unbeatable. The price is quite reasonable. However, the quality and the variety is lacking. It is in our experience that the organics must be consumed within the first few days. Otherwise, mold takes over the fruit and the vegetables become limp and rotten. This is in addition to the often occurrence of bruised fruit. Bruised to the point that it cannot be consumed because of the large mushy dents that turn into rotten holes and mold. We have often received fruit that was past it’s prime ripe period, so it was even on the downward side of quality on the day we opened our box. In addition to the lack of quality, the lack of variety is really starting to wear on us. It’s even worse if we’re not diligent with making substitutions in our order. There are only so many carrots, onions and potatoes that we can eat in a week.
Eating organic has been beneficial for not only our health, but for the flavour that is bursting out of the ripe fruit and vegetables. However, eating organic often meant organic fruit and vegetables shipped into Canada as far down the coast as California, Mexico, or across the ocean, rather than enjoying B.C.’s non-organic fruit. Given that organic fruit and vegetables have a shorter shelf-life, it would be best to shorten their time and distance traveled. With our attempts to live greener lifestyles, shipping organics around the world conflicts with our efforts. We have to outweigh the benefits of eating healthier, organic food over the detriment of shipping organic foods half-way around the world. We’re going to start shopping once again, while trying to add a few more organic choices to our diets.
The car was packed and ready to go Friday evening. I met Neil at home and we headed off to Whistler for a weekend of crankin’ and tubbin’. We were staying on the 10th floor of The Westin Resort and Spa, slope-side. We unloaded the car, stored our bikes and grabbed our bathing suits for the hot tub. The hot tub drained all stress and tension along with our last bits of energy. After watching a bit of Olympic competition, we hit the sack early.
Saturday morning, we slept in until about 9am. One of the great things about the summer season over the winter, is the fact that the lifts stay open until 8pm, as opposed to 3pm, a result of the longer days. It lets us be a little more tardy in the morning, taking our time to wake-up and prepare. There is much less gear to put on and the elements aren’t as harsh in the summer, so it takes a mere 5 minutes of preparation as opposed to the 30 minute gear-up after the 30 minute warm-up. The conditions are typically the same in the morning as they are in the evening on the dirt trails, unlike the winter where the early bird catches the first tracks, so there’s no real advantage to getting up to the top first.
We prepared our bikes, with a few tightened screws here and a few brake adjustments there and loaded our bikes onto the lift to make our way to mid-station. They sky was grey and a little foreboding, but it was nice crisp weather, perfect for biking. Our first run of the season was “Crank It Up”. It was loaded with jump after jump, berm after berm, never a dull moment. A few of the jumps were scary high, but we made our way down the trail cautiously, trying to get a feel for it. We were passed by a few fast riders, but for the most part, we kept up with the flow of traffic. The run was a lot of fun and now that we had one pass over the trail, we could attack it with more speed and more confidence in its sloping and banking. We attacked the jumps and enjoyed a few seconds of air time, getting a feel for the weightlessness and speed. By our third run of the trail, we felt awesome and were passing pretty much everyone on the trail, hearing words of caution from those we passed. The third run was our fastest run and with the biggest air. I was getting so much air, my back wheel was twisting out of alignment, once landing with both wheels out of alignment. It was a little scary, but I managed to land it and made a more conscious effort to try to land the jumps straight to avoid any major wipe-outs. After the third run, we were feeling pretty shaky and ready for some refueling, so we grabbed some lunch at the bottom of the mountain.
After lunch, we decided to head right up to the top, to tackle the big stuff. The upper part of the mountain is for advanced riders only. There are caution signs immediately preceding the lift to thwart inexperienced riders from attempting the sketchy stuff. We unloaded the lift and instead of following the train of riders heading down one black run, we decided to attempt a different black run. It was a bad choice as we were riding down a super steep, rooty, wet run. Thankfully, it was short-lived, but I definitely felt like a bit of a newb walking my bike down the trail and meeting up with the rest of the riders that took the alternate route. We didn’t make that mistake twice. We rode to the top of one of the two blue runs to discover it was closed for rework. Damnit! That meant we were riding the blacks until we could meet up with a blue later on. Ugh! We should have double-checked the trail board to make sure it was open, but we didn’t and there we were, at the top of the black. We took our time and made it through alive, but it wasn’t without a few dismounts to walk my bike down the rougher parts of the trail.
The blue runs at the top of the mountain were really boring. Basically, they followed a ski run down which meant it was crazy rocky, so the vibrations were rattling our brains loose from our spinal cord. The run was too wide and too loose to really enjoy anything about it. We couldn’t bomb it, so there was no thrill of speed nor was there anything technical about it. Basically, we endured it to get to the more interesting black runs. We met up with “Freight Train”, a fun run with drops, rock rolls and tight berms with huge sloping banks that lend themselves to serious lateral corners for the crazy fast riders. There were a few double diamond drops along the way, but I was able to ride around the crazy drops in favour for the steep slopes. We rode the Freight Train one last time having familiarized ourselves with it, so we could ride it with more speed and confidence before meeting up with Crank It Up. I was pretty exhausted by the time we hit Crank It Up, so I pretty much rolled most of the jumps, just tackling the odd jump when I could muster up the strength.
We made our way down the trail and called it a day. We ran three half runs and two full runs, which took us from about 11:30 am until about 5:00 pm, with a break for lunch. We were completely exhausted and couldn’t wait for some food and the hot tub. We spent a couple of hours chatting in the hot tub with a few other riders from San Diego, before heading back to our room to crash. I tried to stay awake to watch a few final Olympic moments and fought it for about an hour before succumbing to Mr. Sandman, completely spent.
The following video pretty much sums it up….
Far better than the very first day (and structure) on my bike three years ago…
I received the following in my Inbox this afternoon:
Good Evening Parents and Families,
Thank you so much for stopping by last night and saying hello. It was great to meet you and your wonderful children. Our class has already shown itself to be full of energy and excitement! On Monday you will get my “formal” welcome letter, but I wanted to send this email as a test of my class email list. If this is not the email address you would like me to use for school communications, please let me know the email address you prefer so I can change it as soon as possible.
If there is anything I can do for you or your child these next few days, or any questions I can answer, please feel free to email me anytime! Enjoy your weekend and I will see you all on Monday. J
Neil and I have been itching to get out on our mountain bikes all summer. Last weekend really reminded us just how much fun we’ve been missing. I’ve been watching the last minute deals on the whistler-blackcomb website all week and I’ve finally scored us a sweet deal. This one last-minute-deal grabber lets users enter their dates of arrival and departure with search results returning varying ranges and room size in mystery hotels. It sounds like a game! And who doesn’t love a good game? They post rooms with star ratings from anywhere as low as 3 stars up to 5 stars. The catch is that you have to book before knowing the hotel. It might be in Creekside, Whistler Village, Blackcomb Base, or perhaps even across the highway. It’s a risk, but sometimes the risk pays off. This time, it paid off for us! For $119/night, we’re staying at The Westin Resort and Spa (typically $169-$289/night for the same studio room). It’s a small room and we can’t afford to shop or eat in the hotel, but we can certainly love its luxury the same, if not more! I particularly love pulling up to the round-about driveway where the 6-foot, gorgeous valets in their long coats and Ushankas open the doors to our ghettomobile to let us out, take our luggage and then park our car. This time, we’ll look particularly ghetto with our missing driver-side mirror (with its electrical wire hanging out of the door). I’m so excited to get up on the mountain. I just hope these old bones aren’t too rusty. It’s been a while, but at least we don’t have to ride up the mountain for every run. They bring the bikes up the gondola just ahead of our chair.
Neil and I were up relatively early Saturday morning to meet up with friends for a day of camping, followed by a day of cycling. We were camping at Birkenhead Lake, north of Pemberton valley (just north of Whistler). The location was absolutely beautiful with a long sandy beach and relatively warm glacial-fed water that had a greenish tinge, a result of the silt. We wasted no time inflating our air mattresses and carrying them to the lake for some fun in the water.
The water was decently warm, considering every body of water in BC is glacial fed and typically freezing. The water of Birkenhead Lake had a distinct temperature difference between the upper few feet of warmer water and the lower depths of freezing cold water. The air mattresses were great for catching a few rays, enjoying a beverage and taking the occasional dip when our skin was too warm from the sunshine. There is no better way to spend a lazy, crazy, hazy day of summer. As the sun was disappearing behind the mountains, we chased its rays for as long as we could handle it, until defeated, we paddled our way back to shore. By this time, I was starting to shiver quite violently and couldn’t wait to get into some warm, dry clothes and to relax by the fire. During the drive to the campground, we stopped to fill up our trunk with super thin, dry pieces of cedar that had been made available by a lumber yard to passers by. The wood burned easily and filled the air with the sweet smell of cedar. Before long, we were sticky with roasted marshmallows and maxed out on sugar. The night ended early, as we had an early morning and a day of biking to prepare for.
Sunday morning, we were up early to pack up and get ready to participate in the Slow Food Cycle Sunday. Thousands of cyclists took to the streets to enjoy some good eats and treats. The Slow Food Cycle is a yearly event that invites
all growers, nature-lovers, weather-watchers, green-thumbs, gardeners, naturalists, stewards, hunters, farmers, foragers and lovers of the land to help protect what belongs to us all, to our collective commons. Fresh water, clean air, seeds, know-how, habitat, the pleasure of growing your own food.
The day started off quite chilly and I was actually contemplating wearing pants and a hoodie. I changed into shorts and a t-shirt, hoping not to regret the decision particularly as a few drops started to fall just as we set off. The first stop was the Pemberton Valley Coffee Company. The stop included sustainable coffee, a necessary wake-me-up for the coffee lovers on our journey. I opted for the hand-made frozen yoghourt treat as the sun had already started to rear its glorious rays and was warming my skin. We sat and enjoyed the soulful, funky music of the talented Papa Josh. Papa Josh is a one-man show, during which he plays and records each layer, building it up into the complete sound of a full band. It was great to watch him record a loop and just keep adding to it with percussion, vocals and guitar.
The next stop was the Riverlands Farm, where they sold a garden plate of veggies, hummus and pesto. I wasn’t quite ready for the roughage, so I wanted waited until the next stop for a bite, but I was nearly convinced after one cyclist exclaimed that it was the “best pesto I’ve ever had”.
We mounted our bikes and continued along our trek to Across the Creek Organics, where we sampled their Yukon Gold, German Butter and Red (Russet?) Potatoes with their Blackberry Vinaigrette and Sweet Ginger Curry sauces - delicious! I typically don’t eat cooked potatoes with anything other than butter & salt, but these sauces have opened me up to a whole new world of potatoes! Now they won’t sit and collect in our cupboard for weeks until they start growing eyes and we have to throw them out. They were served at room (by room, I mean out-door air) temperature.
Next on the map was Helmer’s Organic Farm, where we spent a fair bit of time wondering its grounds. This was by far, the largest and most established venue. Thankfully, most of it was shaded. We enjoyed samples of potato cakes on a bed of tomatoes, topped with what tasted like really tart basil leaves, but I couldn’t identify the herb. There was plenty of gelato to enjoy as well, so we sampled their Mango and White Chocolate flavours. They mixed well the tartness of the Mango and the succulent sweet flavour of the White Chocolate (it tasted like Vanilla).
After some time, the crew reassembled and hit the open road. The next stop was the Pemberton Meadows Natural Beef; our primary destination. We were saving room in our stomachs specifically for this stop, but when we arrived and saw the extreme line-up the majority wanted to keep riding thinking that we would catch it on the way back. We made one more stop 5km up the road at Shaw Creek Farm. There was one photographer showing his photos that were quite impressive. I guessed that he had some sort of amazing telephoto lens having captured detail in the face of a grizzly bear and black bear. My favaourite photo was one of a hummingbird frozen in mid-air. That couldn’t have been easy, by any means. It was a spectacular display of colour and motion frozen in time. Wow. If only.
After a cool-down in the shade, we ventured back to the Pemberton Meadows Natural Beef, but disappointedly, it was shut down. They had ran out of burgers after serving 600 of them to hungry bikers. We took a run through the sprinkler to cool off, before making our way back onto the road for the final leg of the race - the ride back to our vehicles.
The trek back was just over 13km and we made it back in amazing time. There were six of us forming a long train of cyclists, drafting the first rider the entire way back. Thankfully, the men took turns leading the pack to spare us women the burden of the head wind. I wouldn’t have been able to keep up for so long at that pace had it not been for drafting. I haven’t ridden that hard in a really long time and it was great to expel that last bit of energy. The last 500 m or so, the first two riders took off to burn their last bit of energy. I know we held them back in order to be able to draft them, but working together let us all get there sooner, rather than later. It was a fun ride and I’m already looking forward to next year’s ride. Having learned a few tips from this year’s ride, we’ll be better prepared for next year’s, including sunscreen that is more protective than SPF15.
I’ve really been missing my mountain bike this summer. We’ve yet to take it out after such a busy summer. We made a quick stop into Whistler on our trip up to Birkenhead Lake. It was the week of Crankworx, a mountain bike festival held in Whistler every year. We’ve gone to watch the events for the past two years, but we hadn’t been paying enough attention and missed out this summer. We used to ride Thursday nights with the John Henry bike club during the summer season, but since the club lost its support last summer, we haven’t been keeping in touch with any of the riders or the riding events of the summer. We’ll have to get out there and make the most of the final dog days of summer.
