Unpacking, reshipping box, preparing and launching.

When I arrived in Canmore, I immediately begin unpacking the bike, assembling it, and taking it for a test ride.  If any damage had occurred, I wanted to maximize my two nights scheduled booking in Canmore to get it resolved.  There were a few issues, but nothing I wasn’t able to resolve with some tweaking.  I made the front desk staff aware that a FedEx driver would be arriving the next day to pick up my box but they wouldn’t let me leave it at the front desk.

Day two in Canmore had me waiting all morning for the FedEx guy to show up.  When he finally showed up around noon, it was a contractor (not in a FedEx truck) but the guy was cool and hooked up the paperwork just fine.  That afternoon, I went downtown to do some shopping.  I was a little afraid of security bothering me about bear spray on the plane, so I decided to buy it in Canada.  I nice outdoor shop in Canmore had it, along with a neoprene sheath that I used to attach the heavy can to the back rack.  Finding food for the trail was no problem but finding denatured alcohol for my stove was.  I went to three hardware stores and none of them had it.  That shouldn’t have been a problem but it was.  I picked up some rubbing alcohol, which works, but not as well. 

The first on-trip food pickup below.  Note the bear spray top left and bear bell bottom right.  I tossed this bell somewhere in Canada or Montana.  The noise was annoying. 

I packed the bike up the night of Day 2 and turned in early.  The next morning, I got up, ate breakfast down the street and pulled out of town about 7AM.  The next phase began.

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