vancouver in the (alleged) spring

Well, the arm is (mostly) healed, the back feels like it has been reclaimed from the irresponsible longshoreman who's been borrowing it for the last couple of years, and Vitamin D levels are climbing out of the grave. It's spring time on the North Shore, and it's time for adventures! (There have even been periods of less heavy rain, though I haven't seen any ducks queuing up to leave).

To the left is a typical North Vancouver view, including Ro, water, a boat, more water, some clouds, and a seaplane (and more water). (There really is a seaplane there, but it's a bit small, and white, and in front of some white clouds, but not behind a curtain of rain, which is unusual)

With the arrival of spring, I had a go at 'two (strenuous) activities in one day' thing that everyone says is such a feature of the lifestyle here (if you're part commando, or possibly cyborg). The spring snow has been much better than last year, so Ro and I got up for a bit of a ski both mornings. I was a bit worried that the snow would revert to the usual slush, or a sloped skating rink (the other local specialty) but some heavy cloud cover kept the snow ski-able. The emotional effects of said snow preserving cloud on the non-skiing population won't be mentioned here.

Once the skiing had got my legs nicely annihilated, I decided to finish them off by a nice little lap of Fromme. For those of you unfamiliar with what a 'lap of Fromme' means, the easiest option involves 600m of climbing, with a particularly soul destroying initial burst of 120m up a straight asphalt road. Due to the rigours of the descent, it is necessary to lug up a bike that could serve double duty as a boat anchor, meaning that you end up working pretty hard to move faster than the local pedestrians. It's a place where cycling egos come to die.

Once that particular pleasure has been dispensed with, you've only got another 300m or so to gain on a gravel road of more reasonable grade, which is pretty doable when it's not covered with snow. However, if there's enough snow to let you stand your bike up, you'll find yourself walking a bit.

Though I was a bit worried, most of the descent was pretty good; however, the first couple of hundred metres were a bit of a worry. I remember first arriving in the North Shore and being intimidated by the roots and rocks in the dry, then going through the same adaption process in the wet. If I had enough sense to think about what a crusting of ice might do, I'd still have my shiny new helmet; however I was too busy showing up a couple of boys behaving a bit more sensibly on their big bikes.