Angling for some Backcountry Adventure
I leave central Vancouver Island mid-August on my 2013 KTM 990 Adventure Baja, heading south and over to British Columbia’s mainland. This kicks off a 13-day roundtrip adventure through the southwest coastal mountains, north up the Fraser Canyon, west through the Cariboo Chilcotin region to Bella Coola, and returning to northern Vancouver Island via ferries and weaving my way south back home. The trip will consist of roughly 1,100 km of gravel roads from maintained double-wide to deactivated single track, 800 km of various paved roads and 400 km of ferries on three different vessels and routes, and I’ll be tested by changing road conditions, gear failure, forest fires and temperatures between 3 C and 33 C.
The Fraser River Canyon offers remote, rugged beauty with its impressive carved slopes up to 1,000 metres deep and nearly 300 km long. The lower half of the canyon is easily accessible via Highway 97, but it’s the remote northern half I am exploring. I’m planning on four days and 500 km of gravel back roads from Pavilion to Tatla Lake. I can already taste the dust and fresh trout I’m going to eat!
Focus on the Road
On High Bar Road, I descend 750 metres in elevation over 4.5 km with five hairpin turns. The rock is loose and sharp, and the single-lane,
