Things went pretty fast after my days in Kelowna.  The daily journals stopped because I just didn’t have any time to write them.

On Monday I said goodbye to my family and I left Kelowna for the Kootenays via the Vernon- Needles highway.  It was my third time on this highway and it’s such a great way to get from the north Okanagan to the middle of the Kootenays.  The ferry ride, as usual, was breathtaking.  You just can’t beat those vistas from the middle of the lake.

I continued on past Nakusp, New Denver, and south through the Slocan Valley.  My final destination was Kaslo, so I could have just rode straight there from New Denver, but I wanted to soak up as much of the Kootenays as I possibly could.  I ended up going south from Nelson to Ymir, where I stopped to cool off with a cold pint at the Ymir Hotel.

After Ymir I continued south and headed over the Kootenay Pass into Creston, and then north on my favourite highway to the Kootenay Bay Ferry.  It was getting to be pretty late in the day by this point and the sun was setting.  When the ferry landed at Balfour it was pitch black out and I enjoyed a twisty ride between the mountains and Kootenay Lake.  Loved every minute of it.  As is my custom, I arrived quite late at the Kaslo Motel but my hosts always leave me a way in.

The next day I was on the road by 10am and headed back west through New Denver, north to the ferry at Galena Bay, and then further north to reach the TransCanada Hwy #1 at Revelstoke. I then rode the #1 all the way back to Canmore where I stayed at my

friends’ Laura & Matt’s place again before getting up at the crack of dawn and heading home the next day.

…………….

This tour was a clear delineation from the previous three.  I was officially out of provincial politics after resigning the previous winter and with that went the stress associated with it. By this time I was doing contract work for our tourism marketing agency back home and life in general was pretty great.  I remember feeling the freedom I used to feel back on those early tours.

At 20 days, this was one of the longer tours in terms of duration and was by far the longest in terms of distance:  a whopping 5800km!  I travelled all of my favourite roads, spent time with many friends and family, drank some great wine, ate some good food…it was thoroughly enjoyable and satisfying.  I came home feeling great.  Tired, but great.