Critique Of Alberta's Iron Horse Trail

Welcome to BikeBike Adventure TV!  "We do these trips so you don't have to!"

Well, we tried, and failed at bikepacking the full length of Alberta's Iron Horse Trail. 

We thought we did enough homework. We knew the trail was not optimized for bikes. We knew it would be slow going in spots. But we persisted with our plans.

What we didn't know it would be impassable in many places. We didn't know the trail was completely ripped up from Bonnyville to Cold Lake. Like ripped up completely by water main construction for 40+ kilometres.

Now you know.  

In short, we'd recommend avoiding this trail for bikepacking.  

Strava Link Day 1

Strava Link Day 2

Strava Link Day 3 

New Bikepacking Route: Canals For Daze

Fans of the WID Canal (Western Irrigation District) pathway to Chestermere will likely understand why we were intrigued by the idea of riding more of Alberta's canals: It's peaceful, completely car free, often people free, with wide open views of this beautiful part of Alberta.

One of the interesting parts of the canal system is that it follows a "lay of the land" route instead of the monotonous range/township grid offering an ever-changing view ahead which makes riding out on the Prairie a little less boring.

After some digging in the 'ol intranetwebs this past winter, I found a map of all of the irrigation canals in Southern Alberta and very quickly began linking together some of these canals with those boring rural roads to try and create a route that was available earlier in the season than mountain routes, would be safe and easy for new bikepackers, and explore a part of Alberta often forgotten about.

Bikepacking Old Porcupine's Choice Loop Alberta Canada

Flashback to the middle of winter 2017-18 when, on a winter's day off I asked Nadia if she'd join me for a day in the car exploring some country roads I saw in the Backroads map book. On this day we ended up finding one of the most lovely country roads I have ever had the pleasure of driving and so it began: Trying to loop together a new gravel/bikepacking route on roads (I was sure) that most local cyclists - even the adventurous ones hadn't ridden.

Further map studying showed me there was, what looked like, a road that ran north-south, west of the Forestry Trunk Road in the Livingstone PLUZ and after some more car-based exploring I was convinced it was there.

The last piece of the puzzle was some more car-based exploring of the Skyline Road in the Porcupine Hills PLUZ  and BOOM! - a loop was possible.

So here is the ride report. Connor from AccessCourier.ca agreed to ride it with me and we set off on a Friday night after work so we could start early the next day.

Rodebud Rambler 2018

Connor, Mr. Pillows, and Chris overlooking the Rosebud River Valley

In the never ending quest to ride in new places the 3 of us set off on a mostly-gravel bike overnight to the Canadian Badlands, destination Drumheller, Alberta. Our route was based around avoiding pavement as much as we could and would take us through Rockyford, Rosebud, Wayne, and eventually to the giant dinosaur in"Drum".

Day 1 Strava
Day 2 Strava