“The occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way”

We have enjoyed the Trans Canada trail to the south so we decided to go north today and see what we find. We know it goes all the way to Nanaimo and while we were not planning to go the entire way we decided to explore.

After a few detours in town, we finally got on the trail and followed an easy logging access road, again thankful for our wide tires to make it easy. Yes, more tall trees and lots of green but it’s not getting old, and we enjoyed the. mix of trees and the sunshine along the tops of the trees.

We met a couple people and they said ‘oh the hatchery and falls are not far away’, so we had to find that. We found a map and it showed a ‘single track’ trail up to the falls. We tried our bikes but when the trail quickly became an “Adirondack trail” (erosion, mud, rocks, roots) we left the bikes and continued on foot.

What proved to be a bit non-serendipitous was the discovery, upon return to our bikes, that my rear tire was flat. Here we were several kilometre down the Trans-Canada trail, with no ability to get a car there and no spare tube or repair kit in our possession (that will be rectified this week).

So the plan was for Bill to ride home to pick up the car. I would walk out the 2.5 km pushing my bike. The tire had not just lost some air, it had NO air. So I had some concerns about even rolling it along the dirt road, but I had no choice.

I had been walking not 5 minutes when true serendipity happened. Two very fit young men stopped and offered to help me with their patch kit and expertise. They quickly took the wheel off and found a small piece of metal stuck in the tube. They patched it, struggled somewhat to get the chain back in place and I could ride out to the road to meet Bill. These guys were the sweetest. They were from Victoria and were riding the Trans Canada trail between Nanaimo and Cowichan Lake. They had 50km left to Nanaimo and took the time to help me (and get very greasy fingers in the process). I only hope that my donation to their ‘post-ride beer fund” was well used!