Oh, Canadia!

After talking with John and Carol, we decided to cut our day of riding a little short and stop in Radium Hot Springs instead of pushing on to Lake Louise. We are really glad we made that decision! It was beautiful weather and we had a great day of riding, with a 6k round trip hike to the hot springs. Fantastic!

Our first stop of the day, however, was in Creston BC. We stopped at the Columbia Brewery, home of Kokanee beer. They weren't doing tours, but they had a virtual tour and samples if we wanted. We had fun talking with the girl who was running the gear shop. Canadians really are nice. Oh wait, she was from Chicago. Seriously, our first chat with someone in Canada, and she was only there because she married a Canadian dude and moved there.

Our second stop was Kicking Horse Coffee. They were sponsors of the Banff Mountain Film Fest World Tour and sent samples along for anyone who saw the films. We got a couple of mornings out of those samples and it was dang good coffee. So we stopped in Invermere, BC to have a cup and pick up a pound for the rest of our trip. The girl who served us also ran into the back to get me some stickers for the motorcycle when she heard our story. Btw, the coffee we love from them is called Kick Ass Coffee and I also like the Half Ass Coffee (with 1/2 the caffeine).

Next stop, Radium Hot Springs. As it turns out, our first weekend in Canadia is a holiday weekend. It is called May Long Weekend--apparently celebrates the birthday of Queen Victoria. We camped at Redstreak campground. 242 full sites when we pulled up. It was huge! But it had hot springs pools at the end of the trail, so that is all we cared about. Oh yeah, it also had hot showers, cooking huts with wood burning stoves, and free firewood. The Canadians know how to do it right!

Okay, here is the part where I talk about the picture situation. We have 2 cameras, two phones, the iPad, and the iPod. There are pictures on all of them, but only ones on the iPod or iPad make it to this blog. Sadly, until we make it out of Canadia and back into the states, it will stay that way. I'll try to do better in the next posts.