Coyotes & Songbirds

Winter bike commuting can be a very fine thing. If you were to head down to Mill Creek and conceal yourself in a snowdrift, and patiently wait, peaking out with a periscope, you just might spot me happily cycling past while whistling a jaunty tune or singing a song. On the other hand, you might not want to do that as the warble of this winter cyclist is often off-key. Despite the pleasures of commuting, it’s nice to actually get out for a purely recreational ride sometimes. On Saturday morning I finally managed to do this for this for the first time in a month.

The weather forecast had showed that Saturday was likely going to be the last of day of our two week long unseasonable thaw. We’ve had temperatures as high as +8°C when the normal temperature range for this time of year is between -18°C and -8°C. Knowing this gave me the necessary motivation to set my alarm for early Saturday morning. More importantly, it gave me the motivation to not press the snooze button a dozen times, ultimately ignoring the alarm, sleeping in and then annoying everyone around me by bemoaning the missed cycling opportunity. Shortly before dawn, I was out on the ravine bike and happily zooming down Kinnaird Ravine.

The thaw-freeze cycle has added a slick, icy crust to the boot-tromped, hard-packed snow on the trail. It’s probably treacherous to walk on, but it didn’t bother me much as I did my very best to let the studded tires do all the work. I did travel a bit slower than I normally would. I headed along the north side of the river towards the Capilano pedestrian bridge.

As I approached the bridge, I could hear some coyotes yipping somewhere ahead. Peering down the river, I thought I could see some shapes moving about on the ice. I rushed onward to get a better view. From the bridge I could see two coyotes scampering around on the river, chasing each other playfully. This was the high point of the ride, and I stopped to watch for a good 15 minutes, breaking out the thermos of tea as well. I tried to take a picture of the animals, but they were a fair distance away, and my rugged little point-and-shoot camera has wretched zoom ability.

Yes, those little black dots on the ice are coyotes. With effort, you can almost make out that they have legs. National geographic photography awards, here I come!

Also visible from the bridge, and equally majestic, was the Goldbar wastewater treatment facility that looked to be flaring off an excess of methane. Ah, the poetry of urban life!

On the South side of the bridge, I headed back upstream and into some trails with a bit more climbing. There were a few comic moments along this segment. At a couple of spots I spun out and stalled out on a steep, icy climb and had to put my feet down…but it was too icy to walk or even stand easily. In the past I have been reduced to crawling to the side of the trail dragging my bike along. Today I was close enough to the crests to stand and lock the breaks, then use the bike as an anchor, shuffle ahead a few inches, then gingerly slide the bike ahead and repeat the process. Sheer cycling elegance, that’s my style.

Down in the riverside trails there was plenty of evidence of our recent unusually windy day. I will forgo my usual sneering at what Edmontonians think qualifies as a windstorm, and admit that it actually was pretty gusty that day.

Hmmm…should I bunny hop this obstacle, shoulder my bike cyclocross-style and hurdle it, or just heroically slink around it.

As I was rolling along the path below the golf course, I startled a flock of little songbirds that flew up into the branches of a decrepit old tree and then started crying out a storm of protest at my intrusion. Suddenly suffering from an attack of a sort of digitally induced neo-pavlovian conditioning, I emulated a certain Langholm blogger and got out my camera and attempted to take a photo of the little birds. It turns out that this was actually really difficult to accomplish; the little creatures were in constant motion and my camera is at its worst in low light conditions. Once they decided I wasn’t some sort of bird-eating Sasquatch, they returned to feasting on the frost-wizened berries on the little stand of rowan trees. I found their choice of food to be a dubious one. The local rowan, or American mountain ash is, I think, the same species of tree that we call dogberry back on the east coast. Folks back there make a country wine using these berries. I’ve never yet had a drink of the stuff that I would describe as pleasant, though it certainly “does the job”.

After this, little of note happened during the ride (other than, ya know, exuberant enjoyment of the beautiful river valley trails and warm weather). I eventually headed back up out of the valley to city street level and headed off to Bikeworks to squeeze in some time at the shop before my family was up and about. The streets were a swampy slurry of water and slush covering lunar ridges of ice. Perfect conditions for creating roadway chaos when the temperature drops.

Twenty-four hours after taking this picture the temperature had plummeted from +6°C to -16°C.