This was the last day of our summer 2023 bike tour! After breakfast, the kids and Daisy went back to the beach to play while I packed up camp and the bikes. The Adventure Cycling Route in this area (Pacific Coast #1) takes you on several no-car roads by the oil refinery. This was a quiet, pleasant stretch of the ride. We did have a little trouble at one of the gates getting our loaded touring bikes past, though. This was easily solved by taking the bags off, pushing through the small gully, and reloading them again.

There were then some minor hills, but the more important characteristic was that it started to get hot and sunny. And due to that I started to wilt. (One of the things Daisy loves most about me, you can be sure, hahaha.) We stopped at a convenience store and dumped ice cold water on my shirt to cool off. That helped a lot! When we finally rolled into town we stopped at Wood’s coffee at Boulevard Park. This is a great spot to relax, and get some snacks and coffee. We finished the day by riding to a friends’ house, where we camped in their back yard. We got some much needed showers/baths (H excepted, who continued to be a dirty little monster, I guess!) and enjoyed poke bowls for dinner.

15 days and 293 miles later, we were back where we started. We had a great time on our Salish Sea Bicycle Loop!!

Next summer we are thinking about a loop along the Sunshine coast and Vancouver Island north of Nanaimo… TBD!