01/07/2009 by Brigid.

As you might expect, we were on the doorstep of SWMotorrad as they opened this morning. I confess my bike was in a shocking state. We had been caught in a hailstorm in the middle of some road construction on the way up to Williams Lake and, in comparison with John’s relatively clean Triumph, the 1200 looked as though I had been doing some serious trail riding. Perhaps BMW deliberately design them to attract dirt that way, to give unadventurous commuters a little street cred. Anyway, the bike was going to need a good rinse before any work could start and I could either do it myself at the car wash a couple of blocks down, or pay the dealer to give it a valet job. John and I went for breakfast …

Winding on an hour or so, the bike was up on the bench, minus its rear wheel, and a technician was examining the thick brown gloop that was coating the drive shaft inside the swingarm. He shone a torch into the void so that we could see where water was getting in. The issue, as it turned out, was not nearly so serious as to require replacement of the final drive. Although the shaft was visibly corroded, its function had not been compromised. In cleaning out the muck from the swingarm, the Portland dealer had treated the symptoms but not the cause, which was odd as, with the bike up on the bench, it didn’t take a trained technician to diagnose the problem. The rubber boot that covers the joint between the gearbox and the shaft was perished, and so was allowing water and dirt into the swingarm every time it rained. It was this emulsified mixture of oil and water that I had seen leaking out over the wheel rim in Williams Lake – nothing to do with a damaged final drive at all. Even so, I now face the prospect of being endlessly ribbed by John. After all, isn’t this the bike that is supposedly built to go anywhere, stopped in its tracks by a leaky pair of wellies? The technician shrugged. “We see this occasionally”, he said, “We call them Oktoberfest bikes.”

The parts were relatively inexpensive and would be in tomorrow, so we could start making contingency plans to salvage the rest of our trip.

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01/07/2009 by Brigid.

Why do these things always happen at a weekend? It is frustrating enough when things go wrong, but worse when one cannot get them sorted immediately. The one consolation is that, unlike the US, Canadian motorcycle dealers do open on a Monday.

We arrived fairly late in the evening yesterday and, having checked into our motel and eaten, we were exhausted. Today, we thought we ought to investigate the downtown area. And, yes, Kelowna does have a vibrant downtown area, down by the waterfront. Though you could be forgiven for losing the will to live getting there, past the miles upon miles of grotesque malls that have sprung up either side of Hwy 97 to the north of the city.

We had quickly come to the conclusion that, one way or another, our Alaska trip was probably busted. But it didn’t do to dwell on our predicament. Rather than confine ourselves to our gloomy motel room, staring glumly at our veritable library of maps and guide books, as soon as we were showered, shaved and shampoo’ed, we took a ride into town to look for breakfast. After which, we took a stroll along the shoreline, and learned about Ogopogo, the Loch Ness-type creature that is said to inhabit Okanagan Lake. We briefly contemplated inviting ourselves into the KelownaYacht Club as visiting yachtsmen but, instead, visited the Orchard Industry Museum and wound up at the next door Wine Museum, discussing Canadian wines with an ex-pat Brit. John went off to buy a book to read, while I sat under a tree in the park and uploaded a couple of days’ blog entries from a wi-fi hotspot. All very civilised.

The bikini-clad girls running the boat rentals from the marina pontoon were doing brisk trade, and some of the more energetic kids entertained us practicing spectacular parkour moves, somersaulting over waste bins and steps. They were oddly camera-shy, but John did manage to sneak this one shot. For most, though, it seemed like the ultimate lazy Sunday afternoon by the lake.

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