... by johnny Smoke of Bushpilot Tours.

It's not that I don't like the Shore or anything like that. It's still one of the best places to ride ever. It's just that I've grown up road tripping. Besides, the rain and mud can get a little overwhelming after a few months.

The first road trip I ever took was a couple of weeks after I was born when my folks took me to Penticton for Thanksgiving. It"s still my favourite weekend destination for riding. Only four hours by either Highway 3 or the Coquihalla, it could be in Northern California the climate is so different. The Okanagan Valley lies in the rain shadow of the Coast Range and harbours many plants and animals that are more typical of the Sonoran Desert than the Pacific Northwest. Cactus and sagebrush, rattlesnakes and scorpions, and best of all almost no rain. If it rains at all in a morning, the locals generally view the whole day as shot.

Then there is the riding. Whether you are a cross-country fanatic or a big ring DH shuttle queen, there are trails here to blow you away. Let me tell you about a couple.

One of the best cross-country rides in Western Canada is the old cattle-driving route between Penticton and Kelowna. I prefer to ride it south to north as this gives you the maximum amount of single track descending. I rode this last summer with Barb, some old friends from Nelson, and some older friends from the Cove.

We started off from the Hog"s Breath coffee bar in Penticton on a warm late spring day. After a short climb on pavement out of town we hit the old highway to Naramata for a few miles. Not too long on the pavement and the road is intersected by the Kettle Valley Railway. Say good-bye to the blacktop. The KVR line is an abandoned railway line that provides a spectacular touring route for cyclists. This portion is the longest 2.2 percent grade (the steepest allowable grade for trains) in North America. It"s great to climb on since you hardly feel like you"re climbing at all. This particular day we could feel it, though. It could have been the heat, which turned on like an oven as soon as we got away from the lake, but was more likely due to the local abundance of world-class wineries and some extensive sampling from the night before. Be that as it may, it still wasn"t long before we were a couple of thousand feet above Okanagan Lake with immense vistas of the valley stretching away in all directions.

Approximately twenty kilometers in you have to turn off the rail bed and onto the Chute Lake Road for a little serious climbing, but luckily only for a couple of clicks. The heat can really bake in here, at least by Canadian standards. I know that on this trip we all were glad to see the turnoff to Okanagan Mountain Park leading into a nice cool tunnel through the canopy of Spruce and Fir trees. This southern entrance to the Park is the terminus of the Wildhorse Canyon Trail, a 31 km. point-to-point single track. No exits, no emergency access routes, and almost no water. Full commitment. Plus, if you"ve ridden from Penticton, your legs already hurt. Good thing there isn"t much more climbing. A few short and technical climbs lead into a steady flow of sandy smooth descents, right back to lake level. The first fifteen kilometers have a series of climbs and are fairly technical and demanding. Then, about halfway, there is an area of grassland and a turn off to Commando Bay. Commando Bay is a great side trip if you have the stamina, but I usually skip it as I am kind of fragged by this point. Luckily the trail opens up from here on.

This is the beginning of the Wildhorse Canyon. The canyon is a result of glaciation, not running water, so apart from a couple of swampy areas of stagnant water it"s quite dry through here. The trail is an old road that is slowly being reclaimed by the land, but you can really fly through here. At the northern end of the Canyon the trail once again climbs but for a mercifully short distance. When you hit the double track descent you are almost to the end of the trail. Soon the forest gives way to grassland and then there"s the road.

Great--a road. You"ve got twenty kilometers to go still. Just remember, the Eldorado Hotel is just ahead. They have great margarita's and are right on the beach, so you can have a quick dip before you have a drink. I just hope you remembered to arrange a ride back from Kelowna because it"s at least an 80-kilometer ride back. I usually get my dad to pick us up. Skinny was so punched on this occasion that his head kept bouncing off the window in the back every time he passed out sitting up.

Of course, a bunch of you are saying, "what do I care" I ride a forty pound bike, eat cheeseburgers." That"s cool; you want to ride the Bog.

The Peat Bog trail isn"t so much a single trail as it is an area of interconnected lines. Located to the east of Penticton, the network is accessed via Carmi Rd., which incidentally is the same road that the local hospital is on. How convenient. The top of the network is on an access road for a peat moss mining operation, hence the name. At nearly six thousand feet above sea level, the top of the Bog is strangely taxing on us coastal types, especially as there is a short climb from the parking area. But it"s only three or four minutes and then it"s pretty much all down hill.

And fun. Picture open pine forest with fast and twisty single track. Throw in an assortment of small log rides and bridges, then season with a healthy assortment of confidence inspiring jumps. As you progress down the mountain, numerous optional lines offer progressively sicker and sicker moves. Plus the sheer number of trails here means that subsequent runs will yield new experiences every time. I"ve been riding the bog at least six times a year for six years and I"ve ridden something different on every visit. Plus the locals have really stepped up a level. If you feel up to it, there is a forty-foot gully gap and a twenty-foot step up gap out there. If you are just learning, there are innumerable natural tabletops and non-mandatory air type lifters to learn on and build confidence. At almost four thousand feet per run, two runs can wipe out a good rider. Big breakfasts and Advil nightcaps are the rule here.

All in all, a very satisfying and almost unknown weekend destination. Or, if you are on the way to the Kootenays, Penticton is exactly halfway and you are only on your first day of a multi-day mountain bike extravaganza. Keep drooling over this, I"ll tell you about the Koots next month.