Harry's 2025 Bike Trip

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The 2025 October Bike Trip: Intro Thoughts

I decided during Christmas 2024 that I wanted to follow through on fulfilling my half-formed plans of riding, surfing and snowboarding in ‘dream’ locations. The catalyst was certainly the two exceptional days that I spent at Whitewater, a ski resort located near Nelson, British Columbia, sliding around in the perfect powder, re-connecting with the Kootenays.

Truth be told, I wasn’t sure what my vibe on this bike trip was going to be; unsure how much I would rely on the adrenaline brought on by “gnarly” moments, or whether the satisfaction would be in some way deeper. It had been a while since I had gone on a mountain bike vacation. By the end of the trip, I was enjoying the sends, but I found immense peace too. These days of riding have really meant something to me. Pedalling though the trees, breathing the air, looking at the cedars; it is an honest and deep affection I have for the Kootenays and I tapped into this, letting the memories wash over, while making new ones.

Thoughts on the HB916

I mentioned to Josh on a couple of occasions that I remembered Nelson BC being fairly rowdy, with a few key memories of being “the passenger”. And don’t get me wrong, I was the passenger at times (steep sections on The Monster of Kaslo & Secret Stash left exit) but I mostly felt in supreme control.

The bike has a solid feel and I almost always felt confident picking a line and being able to hold it. Some of this is inevitably attributable to 35mm bars, a Fox 38 and a short, 35mm stem. There are obviously a great deal of opinions flying about regarding the benefits/drawbacks of these new, stiffer cockpits, but I am a huge fan of being able to muscle the bike back on line when things get dicey.

The high-pivot magic really shone through on my favourite segments of trails, when visibility allowed for a quickening of pace, and I could lean back a little, letting the bike pick up speed. The suspension performed really well in the rough, providing a planted and stable platform through the roots, rocks and other trail obstacles but also has a poised and predictable nature on bigger hits. Certainly the most capable bike I’ve ever taken to ride the Kootenays.

Thoughts on Loam

A selection of riding memories from different trails, all from the Nelson area, will inevitably blur together as time passes. These are the ‘Loam Memories’. Each Nelson trail has some loamy goodness and it was always a trail highlight to pop out into a whoop-filled loam section or a steep loam-filled chute. Leaning back and pushing through the chunder, feeling the softness of the forest floor under the wheels.

Damp, with a lightly “matted” top layer, reds and browns on the surface from the decomposing cedars but churned by the wheels such that the dark browns of the soil beneath get exposed. A perfect section will consist of a handful of ‘whoops’ or bumps, created by the intricate root networks of the forest, and ideally a corner or two with some support. These sections would regularly occur, especially around Nelson, which seems to be a little damper that the Rossland area, and when they did, and the line of sight opened up to 30+ meters, I was always compelled to let off the brakes and maximise the experience. The spongy nature of riding like this provides a confidence that is borderline irresponsible, especially when compared with the timid, slow-paced approach applied to the majority to Nelson’s steeper trails. But I could rarely help myself and attacked the loamy lumps at pace simply to elevate the experience.

If I pushed just right through the bike into a compression or a turn my reward was often the sound of loam showering the leaves of the undergrowth. I witnessed Josh doing this with his stylish Scandi’s, his rear wheel left hanging for a moment in time before he whipped it round, the undergrowth pitter-pattering under a shower of brown pow.

The Kootenays: A Love Letter

These things are usually started with a statement like “where to begin…”. Well, I know exactly when my relationship with the Koots began: In 2004 with a group of Grade 9 boys who had just graduated from Junior High. The father of a riding buddy, Ryan Barnes, agreed to take a group of us on a celebratory biking trip. I was the honorary member being in Grade 8 at the time. We hit Fernie and rode some jumps at the base of the ski hill in the rain. We rode the bike park the next day in the rain too. I remember it being one of my first real mountain bike rides in wet and muddy conditions and there were a lot of crashes! Then we drove to Nelson. Ryan’s dad would shuttle us up Giveout Creek FSR and we rode The Gimp and Bedframe. I recall hitting some decent drops and encountering steep, granite rock roll-downs for the first time. It was formative.

Trips to bike, trips to snowboard, I’ve made it back a whole bunch of times since and the area never ceases to inspire and ‘ground’ me. I get so excited about being there but actually being between the cedars, larches and other trees, smelling the dirt, it is very calming. Good for my soul.

The mountain biking involves a lot of sustained steep and technical riding. The most difficult sections come in the form of stunts, steep rock faces, or long, very steep lengths of loose trail. The stunts and many of the roll downs are optional but the steep bits are not and had me hanging off the back and appreciating my mullet setup on more than one occasion (I have short legs). Almost everything is well built, unless it is a relic from the earliest days of mountain biking’s development in the Nelson area, when big North Shore style drops and stunts were in vogue. I, and many friends, have stumbled across builds from the early New World Disorder films hidden amongst the trees after taking wrong turns off of popular trails. The Kootenays were a major contributor to those early freeride films with riders such as Robbie Bourdon, Joe Schwartz and others.

So my roots with the area run deep and the history of the sport deeper still. I recall on that inaugural trip tracking down the house that Robbie Bourdon hucked in NWD 1 and then being introduced to his Mum who had all of us grubby teenagers round to watch more films with him in. She was undoubtedly his biggest fan!

The riding between the gnarly bits can be mostly summed up as ‘heaven’. Loamy, rooty, rocky (but rarely sharp) and all through a selection of landscapes that I affectionately refer to as the “BC Dank”, at least when it has rained recently. Groves of cedars shading the forest floor with the damp smells of decomposition offer the finest sections; nature’s loam factories churning out the goods.

Trail by Trail

Whiskey/Whiskey on the Rocks

This was the only crash I managed to inflict upon myself all trip and it occurred on the climb-track of all places. There are numerous excuses I could leverage but it was simply bad judgement and then some good luck. I caught a pedal on a rocky outcrop while trying to pedal up and over it and stalled, losing my balance. In my attempt to jump clear of the bike, I went a considerable vertical distance down a steep trail-side hill and was lucky not to have caught my ankle weirdly.

One of many hypothetical excuses was a fair amount of snow. Josh and I embarked on this trip very late in the season (Mid-to-late October) and were rewarded with snow that threatened the entire trip just before our arrival into the Kootenays. This snow limited the number of features we were able to ride on our first trail and yet we still had a blast on the lower sections where the snow had melted away.

Grandiflorum

The next day, armed with advice from a local friend, we drove off to Castlegar to ride a south-facing aspect with some highly recommended trails. On this day we rode Grandiflorum, a long and varied track in a fairly dry climactic zone. Again there was a little snow right near the top but the sunny slopes meant we had achieved a much higher elevation than the day prior and enjoyed a brilliant first proper descent.

Mention must be made to the climb track and uphill infrastructure generally. The climb tracks in Castlegar were splendid. Single-track, well built, and a beautiful way to spend time in the hills, it is no exaggeration that Josh and I probably enjoyed going up on most days as much as we enjoyed descending. I am a huge fan of meandering through the beautiful landscape(s) at a steady pace, all while knowing that the best is yet to come. Easy to motivate oneself!

Captain Kangaroo

We enjoyed Castlegar so much that we returned the following day for another lap, this time on the other side of the valley. A little more snow but Captain Kangaroo was another splendid trail. This one begins from a neat sub-summit providing panoramic views of the surrounding area. Being a little damper generally, some of the dirt on CK was all-time after the recent rain/snow.

Curated Rossland Day

Jane, our host and guide for the Rossland area, was then able to curate our Saturday ride and we took in a selection of the finest local trails before finishing down in Trail for some A&W (Canadians enjoy their fast food). There were a few notable moments but a steep loamy chute, at which point my enthusiasm truly peaked, was probably the highlight.

Lefty & Bedframe

We then bid farewell to the Rossland area and moved accommodation to a place in Ymir, just up the road from Nelson. The Sunday was cold, grey and wet. We were nervous that the snow line would drop substantially and ruin our chances at some of the bigger objectives we had planned. Thankfully, the snow line didn’t look too bad on the Monday so we grabbed a coffee from my favourite coffee shop (Oso Negro) and visited the popular trail centre at Morning Mountain with the intention of riding Lefty. I struggle these days on jump/flow tracks that I have not ridden before and Lefty was no different. Caught in between speeds needed to hit some of the larger gaps but lacking the confidence to send it blind, we decided against another lap and instead pressed on further up the up-track on our second lap. We weren’t sure how high we’d be able to get due to the fresh snow and almost overdid it as we had set our sights on Bedframe.

I have ridden Bedframe before… but over 20 years ago! We were keen on the idea of a Nelson classic though so set off through a sketchy, snowy start. We probably had to employ survival riding skills for about 150 vertical meters before the snow faded and we got stuck in properly. Some amazing loam and a fair bit of riding around soaked granite and wooden features popped us out the bottom and rounded out our first day in the Nelson area.

At this point the weather improved dramatically and stayed so through the end of our trip. Many thanks to whichever deity saw to this!

Slabalanche & Newtsac

I had never ridden the ultra-classic Slabalanche and, seeing as it was on a south-facing aspect and had additional trails nearby, this was easily agreed upon. I really enjoyed this trail. Packed with very committing slabs, beautiful dirt and a slightly out-of-the-way vibe, I am now a huge fan. We tagged on the intimidating looking Newtsac and really got our fill of steep rock faces. Apart from some smaller stuff here and there, this was the day I opened my ‘drop account’, having decided pre-trip that should some exciting North Shore drops be found, that I would like to hit a few that required commitment. Most of my formative days riding bikes as a kid/teenager were spent hucking myself and bike off of progressively taller drops so it seemed only fitting to dip my toes back into that world.

At this point it might be worth discussing my riding buddy Josh and one of the many enjoyable conversations we shared during the trip. I was lamenting the lack of wooden features on UK trails and he was able to explain to me that forestry land in the UK, or, more specifically, the legal constraints of building trails on UK forestry land, prohibits the building of wooden features due to liability concerns. While this seems short-sighted, it is an obvious and easily defined rule that should keep UK trails on land categorised as such, open.

Josh was able to share all sorts of insights like this during our time in Canada, while driving around or on the numerous climb trails that we both enjoyed. He has spent a great deal of his time digging amazing trails around where I now live, in North Wales, as well as where he now lives, near Glenmore Lodge in Scotland. He is a true gem of the mountain bike community and a pedalling fiend. Josh likely enjoyed the climbing even more than I did, taking photos of the beautiful wooden bridges that allowed for flowing, uninterrupted upward gradients.

The Monster

We were running out of time and had been talking about checking out The Monster in Kaslo since the inception of the trip. Our concern was that the snow line was going to render the outing a big waste of time but decided that, based on the warmth of the Slabalanche day, a good forecast, and a mostly southern aspect, that The Monster was worth a punt.

The work involved in digging the climb track for this one is simply medal-worthy stuff. Over 12km of beautifully consistent, groomed trail winds its way up the side of the mountain taking in a grand total of almost 1300m vertical in a single climb. The builders have included benches at viewpoints along the way offering stunning views back up Kootenay lake in the direction of Nelson. We were stopped a little shy of the summit due to snow (no surprises here) but still managed to get to ride the majority of our intended objective.  

The Monster was exceptional in every way. The drive from Nelson takes you along a beautiful, winding road, tracing the shore of Kootenay Lake initially along the West Arm and then north to Kaslo. By the time we had driven the final stretch along Kaslo River to the parking, it felt more remote than most of the riding we had done on the trip up to then.

A quick side note:

We combined a holiday vibe with some very real daylight and temperature constraints and were commonly rolling out to ride around noon or later to catch the warmer hours. This strategy collided with the short days on more than one occasion.

We were late getting going and Josh was the first to voice his concern about getting the ride done within the remaining light. He was right but we both also knew that snow would probably shut us down shy of the summit. We started at a gentle pace and crawled our way up through some semi-mature forest on undulating climb trail. This is a very well-built trail. It is a shared trail, for ascending and descending, and I don’t know how busy it would be in peak season, but we didn’t see anyone until a party of three higher up who had shuttled to a drop point. This dual-use mandate means that the climb track is peppered with rollers, bermed corners, and a generally ‘3D’ feel, making the climbing seem impossibly easy and engaging. I don’t think I’ve enjoyed a climb as much as this one anywhere before. Chapeau trail builders, well done.

We did run into snow. It appeared around 600m from the summit and the map clearly showed that a big chunk of the remaining climb trail traced a series of tight switchbacks tucked around to the west of a ridge, no longer on an exposed, southern aspect. We decided to try our luck as there is a point at which The Monster crosses the climb trail, about 150-200m vertical from the summit, and we thought if we could just make this junction, we’d get most of the best riding anyhow. We made the junction but only just! The snow was fairly deep where the wind had loaded it and was virtually omnipresent on the trail we were riding in depths past ankle deep.

The light was fading somewhat so we got stuck in right away. We slithered down snowy, wet sections, which quickly gave way to some really classy riding in nice dirt. We had wondered what had earned The Monster a double-black rating, having seen no stunts in photos, and it turns out it is simply really steep. Long, technical and in places exposed steep riding. Not for the first time on the trip I was happy to be on a mullet setup.

The extreme, sustained steeps burned our hard-earned meters at a remarkable rate as we virtually skied some sections, back wheels locked as we surfed down snaking chutes filled with deep soil, sand and loam. There were so many steep sections with differing flavours as the trail passed through altitudinal ecological zones, some deciduous forest with bright leaves and sandier soil, some mature conifers and cedars blocking the light but growing in deep, dark, loamy soil. Toward the bottom we found some stunts and took time to ride the long log ride and hit some of the drops. I over-sent a drop with a particularly flat landing and had my one bottom-out incident of the trip. No harm done.

Secret Stash & Clandestine Trail

Our final day was not a full day. We wanted to get on the road soon after lunch to get the 7+ hr drive back to Calgary done. That didn’t stop us having a good time though, although it turned out we had saved some of the spiciest for last.

We started on a trail called Secret Stash, located near the bottom of the Whitewater access road. A friend had recommended it and was a short climb, so seemed low commitment. It opens with a drop made from a log sawn in half along its length, offering a 30cm wide diving board. It was probably too many cups of coffee but it felt pretty rowdy. We quickly encountered a decent-size jump and then may have made an early left turn, stumbling into the steepest section we had ridden all trip. I truly thought I wasn’t going to be able to control my speed and was bracing for a bad one but the dirt was Grade A and the tyres bit. Hallelujah.

The second trail we rode was a clandestine tip-off from a friend who had been out riding in the Kootenays over the summer. It was more straight forward but steep and loamy as we were beginning to become accustomed to. One more fun steep and that was it. Trip done.

I want to extend a huge thank you to Josh for believing in the trip and agreeing to venture repeatedly into bear country with me. He graciously and generously carried the bear spray every day. Absolute hero with great chat and taste in music.
A big thank you to Hope also. Bike felt made-for-purpose on this trip and I couldn’t have been white-knuckle clinging on to a better machine. I really appreciate the support Hope have given me over the years.


Word & Pictures: Harry Widdowson