Threw the drop bars on my Karate Monkey and headed up the coast to Campbell River and island hopped to Quadra and Cortes Islands over the weekend. Around 180km return in total, and a nice mix of main road, back road, fire roads, and overgrown double track to make things interesting. I finished up at the Smelt Bay Provincial Park campsite overflow site (not advertised, but they do have sites available!) about 100m away from the ocean! It was smooth mindless riding for a lot of it, with a handful of spicy loose sections thrown in for good measure. Cortes Island was amazing, quiet rolling roads, plenty of tree shade, and very polite drivers that give you plenty of space when passing. I messed up the route planning on the way back and had to make a 10km detour to get back on track. It also meant riding up 4km of loose sand and grit in the sun, still feeling that one.
Bike setup is mostly the same as last time, but I swapped the bars out for Spank Flare 25 in 480mm and the stock rigid fork. I use the Zeno Q-Connector and a SRAM AXS group set to swap between drops and flats easily. In theory I can configure this bike 12 ways by changing out the bars (drop, moloko, or flat) fork (stock rigid or Ohlins RXF36) and wheels (stock 27.5×2.8” or 700x55c) depending on what/where I’m riding.
by the_other_skier