I Should Know Better

Even though I feel like I handled our Kettle Valley Railway bikepacking trip in the best shape ever, my daughter reminded me that not everything was a piece of cake.  Oh, the bike riding part of our trip was no problem (I've bikepacked this part of the trail three times now).  It was the camping part that was sometimes a challenge.

After a long day in the saddle, I like to have a beer as soon as I get to camp.  We'd ridden our bikes from Beaverdell and after 70 kilometers, we were looking forward to meeting my wife Janet at the camp in McCullough.  My throat was dry and I calculated that we'd each done 33,000 pedal strokes to reach our prescribed goal for the day.

When we showed up at the Forestry campground, Janet had everything set up - the huge mansion sized tent for the two of us stood in a clearing, she had left space for Jackie's tent, arrangements had been made for firewood and Janet was hunched over the picnic table busily chopping and slicing up fresh vegetables soon to be roasted over the fire for supper.

It was an idylic scene and a welcome sight after pedaling uphill all day.  As I approached the cooler in the SAG wagon, Janet stopped me in my tracks to inform me that she hadn't been able to stop at a beer store but she had a stash of Pusser's Navy Rum hidden in her carpet bag in the trunk.  My heart was set on a cold beer.  However, a tot of British Navy Rum might hit the spot.  Maybe even a couple of tots would be acceptable.

That fine elixir

The first glug of the amber hooch warmed my insides and it was only a few minutes later when I tried to disengage my panniers from their perch on the rear rack that I felt the first effects of that devil's brew.  I knew I was in trouble when I couldn't remember the simple three number combination of the padlock to lock the bikes to a nearby spruce tree.

The locking system

It was while I was preparing a second dose of Caribbean rum that Janet suggested the bed of red hot coals in the firepit had reached the ideal temperature and that it was time to place the roasting rack full of vegetables onto the grill. Through some fluke of nature, the slick handle of the grilling rack slid from my hands as she passed it to me and the whole contraption slammed into the side of the steel firepit base strewing diced celery, frenched beans, shredded carrot, chopped peppers and a host of carefully prepared vegetables onto the gravel and dirt that made up the floor of our campsite.

Not for us

My daughter the vegan and my wife to cook were not impressed in the least.  You can imagine everyone's chagrin - no supper of nutritious food and no beer to wash down the tidbits of grilled vegetables that survived the bashing.  My jest about having tossed salad for dinner fell on deaf ears.  They didn't like my pun "Instead of a stir-fry, it's a dirt fry!" either.