Monday, June 16, 2008

Kettle Valley Trail - Coquihalla to Hope


On Sat. June 14, Tina and I met a Vancouver friend in Hope just after 10am and after a drive up from Bellingham. We left a vehicle in the town center and drove all 3 mountain bikes to Coquihalla summit pass. We were pleased to find a parking area and restroom facilities on both sides of the highway, right at the tollbooth. There is a rough gravel shortcut between both sides of the highway, so you can avoid paying the $10 toll each direction. From the lot, we biked through the toll area to find a small road dropping off to the right, east. When the road bottomed out, we took a right to find a large locked gate and sign saying that we were in the right place.

Immediately, we found ourselves going down a canyon on a cobbly road due to the towering rocky walls constantly releasing their rock loads. However, the rough spots are short enough and the scenery spectacular enough to keep on going. The actual KVR grade stays above you for about an hour as the pipeline road drops a little faster. Unfortunatley, the kvr above is no longer navigable as the trestles have already been either blown up or taken down by landslides. The Trans Pipeline oil company maintains the parallel gravel road and has replaced many of their bridges in recent years. It improves the further south you travel. Eventually, the road crosses the Coquihalla River and does a short climb up to join the KVR grade again. There we found a hole where a stream pops out of the mountain and plunges under the road. Continuing on, we passed through a short tunnel where we ate lunch and enjoyed the scenery down valley. The sun was out but cool and pleasant for exercise. With all the snowmelt happening above us, there were dozens of waterfalls to view throughout the route. It was a good time to be there.

After the tunnel, we passed an old snowshed and noticed the road was improving. We encountered some people on atv's who were not really supposed to be behind the gate. The road once again left the kvr grade and passed through a roller coaster section of small hills before reaching the highway about 3pm. At that point, we needed to cover about 6km of pavement but the grade was all down, allowing us to cover the ground in about 15 minutes or less. Then we found the Carolin Mine turnoff and followed a grade parallel to the highway for a few miles. Parts of this road are on the KVR original grade and pass by a couple of private gates. Once you reach the pavement again, there is about 20 minutes of mostly downhill riding to the Othello Tunnels turnoff. We would have covered it a little faster but a strong headwind made us fight the downhill gradient.

At the Othello turnoff, we followed the rural road until we found a sign telling us to go left 1km to the tunnels recreational area. From there the gravel path starts and passes through the stunning Coquihalla canyon where 4 tunnels must be passed through. The trail then continues on for awhile until you reach a paved residential road. This road quickly reaches the Kawkawa lake road going west into Hope. We arrived there around 6:30pm. The next item on the agenda was of course, dinner. So we scouted some places and settled on a Japanese restaurant we had passed by on the way into the town center. We locked the bikes there and drove back to the car waiting at Coquihalla summit, about one-half hour away. We choose to kill time at the restaurant and did not leave until around 9:45 to make sure the border wait would be minimal. there were only 3 cars when we crossed around 11pm.

The section we covered in a day was about 40 miles. It is possible to shorten the day by only cycling the pipeline road and leaving vehicles at both ends of that. We took our time enjoying the scenery on this section but you could spend more time there by skipping the highway sections. Then finish the day by driving down to Othello tunnels for a walk or even bike back to Hope with a car spotted there. It is also possible to cover the whole 40 miles in less time, but we were not in a hurry. We look forward to attempting the sections near Princeton next.
Paul Cookson

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