Silverstar Bike Park, Venon

It was the Norco VPS Fest over the Canada Day weekend in SilverStar- basically a customer appreciation day where Norco owners get to ride the bike park for free and win some rather good prizes.

A load of our friends ride Norco's and had rented a house so invited us along. The weather in the few days leading up to it was, frankly shite, but, unperturbed, we set off on the 5-6 hour drive up to Vernon, BC. It's actually a very scenic drive (even in pouring rain) especially over the two passes - the first at 1500m and the second at 1728m - thats 5616ft - pretty big when you consider Ben Nevis is over a thousand feet less - and here there's a motorway! Its an amazing road - getting on for a hundred miles straight through the mountains in the middle of nowhere.

Anyway, back to the weekend, here's our motley crew (bar a couple that didnt make the photocall)
...and yes, that is me in red as usual....









pretty views, much more like the Alps than Whistler













view from our house (which was sleeping about 20)













Good food (eh Jon?)













Who could this be then? Not wearing red so it couldnt be me.....could it? Well actually yes, this weekend marked the Christening of my new lid which is not in the slightest red so I thought it appropriate to wear somethin more subtle for a change.... and christen it I did - with a full on crash onto my face - with no injury thanks to Specialized

The park was amazing. Mostly dirt - few few rocks (unlike Whistler) and such fun singletrack - all of us had the time of our lives all day - if you have the means, I highly recommend it



a view down "Downtown" of Rich (actually out of shot at the front), Brian, Derek, Jon and Dale in formation. This seemed to be the theme of the weekend - 6 guys going flat out everywhere about 5ft apart - we had soooo much fun I really cant describe it :-D








Dale (this bit is actually super steep and super slow other wise he'd air right over my head!











The weather (obviously) cheered right up for us and was actually a tad hot but somehow we made it through ;-) This is Lake something-or-other-beginning-with-a-K at Westbank - home now to Johnny and Barb We spent a couple hours having a last bit of fun here to break up the return journey


Superb pic by Euan with his new fish-eye lens - although it doesnt look it I'm just about to leap dramatically into the air.....









...and our final "ride" - Brian, Derek and I rolling down a big rockface right into the car park - a little staged as we had to clamber up it just to ride down - but nice use of the fisheye!




Silverstar = Fun = We'll be back!