Mt Washington Bike Park

Leaving Campbell River heading south on 19, of the main highway is Mt Washington Alpine Resort, home to skiers and snowboarders in winter, and armour clad mountain bikers in summer.
Having done my home work, I was an eager beaver to check out this mountain biking mecca of Vancouver Island. Downhill riders out number XC rider a million to none!!! Sweet.

On another hot Canadian day we made our way up the mountain to see what all the fuss was about. The previous day one of the bike mechanics at the local bike store, Pedal Your World - http://pedalyourworld.ca, said we should hire some big travel bikes and hit the slopes.. Not one to shy away from such an obvious challenge seeing that we were XC paced folk, off we went.
We arrived at the park and went straight to the bike store, Tread Shed, passing only gladiator style bikers, not a Lycra short in sight.. Knowing there was an XC race over this long weekend, BC day, we were keen to shot that first and take it from there. The guy in Tread Shed was no help at all, bordering on being rude and seemed to know nothing of the XC course which oddly enough started right outside the store, as we found out later.. Um.. I guess had we been hiring his gear he would have bend over backwards..
The course was hilly, very steep but had some great runs. It was well marked out with orange arrows and crossed various sections of the numerous downhill tracks.
About 3/4 of the way around we hit a very steep and twisty downhill section, just cut out the day before, but dry, loose and real dusty.. Brakes aren't much use on this stuff and neither are winter tyres; we still haven't swapped rubber since leaving the NZ winter, now that's a big mistake and cost both us..

Esther came off worse losing both traction on the bike and foot, drawing blood and leaving skin on as many rocks as she could find. I got off lightly and managed a wimpy couple of scratches, damn! We finished the course run and finished back at the car park.
Bruised but not out we did decide to leave the downhill madness until we get to Whistler, plus i didn't want to hire from the 'dick' at Tread Shed, not to say they are like that, as some other guys were really help full and wanted feedback on the XC course.

I would highly recommend a visit here especially if you like throwing yourself down mountains on a 30+ pound bike.. Looks like fun for sure, and having the chair lifts take the hard work out of pedalling all the way up.
As for me, new tyres are in order.. A second big hit bike would be nice as well, but I have to get one of those job thingies first.. Ek.