I was living with my pal Ryan, who also rented a spot out in the garage I had, where he took an '81 XL250 engine in shoe boxes, rebuilt it, and got the bike running after some years of it sitting. He paid $600 with registration for the bike, and it even came with a parts bike. It took him a few weeks of working on the carb, straightening the swing arm, and ordering some pieces for the exhaust system. He also went as far as recovering the seat, and the bike ended up being a pretty good little ripper. I was stoked he got it going, being my roommate, I'd obviously have someone to hit the dirt with now. I came home on a Friday to him crashed in his room one afternoon, and literally threw something at him and said "get up, we're going to the Sunshine Coast".
Ryan grew up on the Sunshine Coast, so he was always down for a trip there. We had about two hours to pack, get anything we needed together, stop for fuel, and get to Horseshoe bay where we could catch the ferry. I had been there with him once before, to a cabin on the inlet, accessible by boat only. The only other time I had been was Disasterdaze '13, which was an amazing time, but I think we were both really stoked to get out for a dirt bike trip. I personally had not been out for a camp yet with on a dirt bike, so I couldn't wait to see what kind of spots we could find to set up.
We just barely caught the ferry in time, and we're off to the coast. It was a blast, just packing the bikes, and setting out to the coast was unreal, felt like we we're headed for an epic adventure. We got to Gibsons, rode around a bit, Ryan showed me some cool spots in town where he used to skate, and then we headed to Sechelt where we checked out the house he grew up in, and the skate park beside his old high school. We grabbed a couple last minute items we needed, including some beers, and viewed our maps for a potential camping spot. We found Porpoise Bay Provincial Park on the map, and headed there to scope it out for a somewhere to camp. It was April, so it was still quite cold out. We figured the park would be empty and hoped there would be no park rangers checking out the camping areas, so we went to check it out. When we got to the park there were a fair amount of people there, so we decided to try and figure something else out. We hit up the main highway that Porpoise Bay Park is on, and started heading north when almost immediately we passed a trail that had large stones at the entrance blocking 4x4's etc, from entering the trail. So we rode around the rocks and entered the trail to see what we could find.
It was the perfect camping spot, blocked by a hill on the road side, right beside a river, no access for vehicles, and plenty of space to do some wheelies and burn outs before bed. It was getting late, well after dark, so we set up as quickly as possible. I set my hammock-net up, Ryan set his tent up, we quenched our thirst and fired up our bikes. We did some wheelies and had fun ripping around in the open area beside our camp. I noticed a small path that continued up a hill into the woods, so I headed up, Ryan following behind. We got half way up before the trail turned into pure sand. I didn't have enough momentum to continue, so I stopped. I looked back and noticed Ryan had dumped his bike, and was struggling to turn it around. I was in an awkward spot, but I managed to get the bike turned around. We rode back down the hill and instead of saying "Fuck it, it's too dark", I used my high beams to light the trail, and Ryan came at it from a further approach with more speed. He made it up the hill. I turned around, and came back at the hill with more momentum this time, getting it up it no problem. Once we got to the top of the hill, we we're greeted by what looked like a network of dirt bike trails. We followed the main trail, passing little trail cut offs everywhere on the side of us. It seemed like we rode this trail for a good few kilometers, before we both realized we had made enough turns that we could potentially lose our camp. It was after midnight, and I had the only headlight between the two of us that was working well enough to see where we were going, so we decided to turn around and head back to the camp.
We had a beer and figured we would go to sleep immediately, so we could get up at first light, and explore the trails we discovered. Both of us were super stoked. Earlier I had set my hammock up, but I wasn't very confident in the set up, I just kind of threw it up quick to get it done. So I asked Ryan to get in my hammock and test it for me, better him than me if it falls). He jumped in and it was good to go. Ryan is probably 165lbs wet, and I am pushing 250. I got into my hammock and as Ryan said, he literally watched the tree it was strapped to, uproot, and I hit the ground like a bag of concrete. I was half drunk and grumpy, so I made Ryan let me get into his 1 man tent. I'm 6'2 and his tent is actually a child's one person. Within ten minutes of laying in his tent, he said "If you keep rolling around like that, I'm not going to get any sleep". So I stayed in the position I was in at the moment, for the rest of the night. I woke up in the morning, and I basically couldn't move my arm. I had fucked up my shoulder somehow by sleeping on it all night. Long story short, my shoulder wasn't the same for months. I get a good laugh at it though. Instant karma for making him test out my half-assed hammock set-up.
I was fine to ride, so we cleaned up our camp and hid everything under a green tarp and some brush in the woods, and we took off. We got up the hill again, this time in the day light, and it was unbelievable. After a couple hours of trying to find a camping spot the night before, we managed to camp beside some kind of closed off area that was practically a playground for dirt bikes. The network of trails was amazing. We probably rode for a few hours before we couldn't find anymore trails, though there is a hydro line running through that area, and if we had the balls to bomb our bikes through a massive stretch of thorn bushes, we likely could have found some more trails, but there was plenty of riding where we were at. Around noon, we decided to pack our gear onto our bikes again, and head to the logging roads.
We entered the logging roads just on the edge of Sechelt, passed over and through the mountains, and ended up coming out at Half Moon Bay. When you look at the course we took over the mountain pass on maps, it's pretty cool. We took our time, and checked out every cut off road we could while we were up there. There are some seriously breathtaking views up there, though it's sad to see the amount of logging that goes on. It's like the woods have just been slaughtered. The remains of tree stumps and what were probably animal habitats at one point leave it looking like a battlefield. I snapped as many pics as I could on this one, but I ended up loosing them along with my phone shortly after the trip. Fuck I wish I had all those pics still, but I'll have to just go take them all again, and next time hit up the abandoned bible-camp that I've heard about now. This was my first legit dirt trip, I'll never forget it.
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| The one picture I could find from the trip... |
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