Last week, I was able to escape the heat here in Texas, and go on a family vacation to Whistler, Canada. (Whistler was used for some of the Olympic games back in 2010, and they are hoping to host again).
One of the new things, I experienced on the vacation was doing a Summer Bobsled Run.
The bobsled track, which was used for the olympics, is concrete in the summer, so they use a special Bobsled with wheels.
Before we went down the track, which is the fastest bobsled track in the world, we were able to walk a section of it, and learn more about bobsledding.
When watching bobsledding on TV, I did realize how tall some of the turns were....also, if someone crashes, they say it's usually from a mistake they made a couple of turns prior.
When my brother and I went down the track, we got up to 90kph.
In the winter, they, of course, have ice on the track, which takes over 4 hours everyday to maintain. That's why they do the summer bobsled runs for tourists. At checkin, they also had one of the Olympic torches used back in 2010, which I was able to pick up.
Another new thing for me was riding an electric bike (or e-bike)
The e-bike we rented, weren't scooters that would propel you while you did nothing. The e-bikes, just HELPED you go WHEN you pedaled. They also had 3 different levels of help they would provide.....eco (very little) Medium, and high. When I went up hill, I used the high, and it made quite the difference. (as I would pass people who were riding regular bikes).
We rented the e-bikes to ride around town, and around a lake.
They were quite fun, though when we checked out how much they cost to buy, they were over $1000. With gas prices these days, it is tempting.
Another "adventure" type thing we did, was do a kayak trip for a couple hours. We started out on a lake, and then made our way down a river.
The river was thinner than any other river I had kayaked before, and we had to portage (get out and carry the kayaks) at one point, because the river was so high. (we'd have just 1 foot clearance going under a bridge).
Also, because the river was so thin, we would occasionally run into brush, which we were told to lean into. Well...one time, I leaned into the brush, and didn't tip over....BUT lost my sunglasses. Oops!
But it was a fun kayak trip. We even saw a bald eagle. (sadly too far away to get a picture)
We did pose for a group photo when we were done.
To kayak, the river was fairly calm.....we did however also go white water rafting.
That was me filming the video.
The white water rafting was different than other trips as the whitewater was more consistent. Other trips elsewhere we got a break, this one we had to paddle and pay more attention, as to not fall in(which nobody did).
All in all a fun vacation.
I'll blog more tomorrow about other things we did.
K.C.-ya!