It was a foggy Saturday morning as Miles and I climbed the gravel road out of Port McNeill, a town we have both come to love on the north end of Vancouver Island. We decided to take advantage of the sunny forecast to scout one more route before the coastal rain set in for the winter. We pedaled slowly up the short climb out of town, making small adjustments to our bikes, tightening straps, adjusting loose bits, and debating if we would regret not bringing shorts. We weren’t sure. It was sunny and 13°C, but the wind whipped around us.

After a few rounds of checking for traffic, we crossed the highway to continue our climb up Keogh Main, a gravel road that would carry us east on our overnight loop. I saw a truck and a brown, medium-sized dog in the pullout. The dog looked at us briefly but showed no real interest. A man appeared from behind the pickup. He wore a black jacket and pants, rubber boots, and a flat expression. As we pedaled by, Miles and I waved and said hello. He said nothing in return. I don’t blame him; we were likely a funny sight on our bright bikes riding up a secluded gravel road.

I didn’t think much of this limited interaction. We continued up the hill, and Miles pulled off to take photos. I caught myself turning to peek over my shoulder. I like to think I was checking to see if Miles was coming up behind me, but in reality, I was also checking for the unimpressed man in the truck. Valid or not, those instincts are hard to ignore as a woman. A quiet alarm goes off, even if it’s barely audible. You do a shoulder check, and maybe another. All clear, just Miles and his camera. I had to remind myself I wasn’t alone on this ride; the man and his dog weren’t coming to find me, and I didn’t need to start looking for an escape route or hiding place should the truck appear. I just needed to chill out.

I’m Not a Bad Bitch

In the spring of 2023, I was feeling confident coming off my longest bike trip yet. Miles and I had traveled to Australia and spent six weeks biking Dan Hunt’s Sydney to Summit route and the Munda Biddi in Western Australia. Until that point, I had never done any bike trips longer than a few days. I wanted more. As summer approached, I remember casually sharing with friends that I wanted to ride the route Miles had created a few summers before, the Tree to Sea Loop, and if I kept saying it out loud, maybe I’d actually follow through.

As a teacher, I’m fortunate to have the summers off. I wanted to make the most of July and ride another big route, but getting a friend to agree on such short notice isn’t easy. I also considered how tough it might be to travel long distances with people I didn’t know well, and I wasn’t extroverted enough to risk it. I decided to ride it solo.

I didn’t even tell my mom the truth. I said a friend was joining me, just so she wouldn’t worry. It wasn’t entirely untrue. I hoped someone might. But mostly, it was just me, my bell, my Taylor Swift downloads, and my overactive imagination.

Who Was I?

I’m a notorious chicken. I hate scary movies. I will sleep with many lights on if home alone (and try to avoid being home alone in the first place). I still sleep with a small stuffed animal that my brother gifted me almost 24 years ago. I wish I were the type of person who could confidently go into the backcountry alone and just enjoy, but that’s not me. I overanalyze, I question, I spiral in anxious loops, I picture everything that could go wrong. I am not cool and collected.

I’m inspired by the women who go on big trips alone, and seeing their stories through outlets like BIKEPACKING.com has been incredible. For many of the women riders I look up to, a two-week solo trip on Vancouver Island would not be a big deal. I wish I were that calm.

I also think this feeling of not measuring up is why it’s taken me over two years to share anything about this experience. In comparison, this is not a big deal. There isn’t a huge story. I rode an established route, one that my partner knows inside and out, and came home. It’s not badass in the grand scheme.

Still, riding those same North Island roads with Miles recently, I realized how different it felt. When I was alone, I was blasting Taylor Swift on my iPhone 8, dinging my bell every 30 seconds, and shoulder-checking constantly. For cougars or humans, who knows? Now, with Miles, I barely looked back. I just rode.

I’m proud of that trip. But I mostly felt like anything other than a bad bitch.

Look What You Made Me Do

It was day five of my solo trip on the Tree to Sea when I rolled out of Port Alice. I wanted to stay forever, but I pedaled out on the pavement, skipping the gravel to Marble River after a bear encounter the day before.

I had been flying down an overgrown logging road, noting piles of bear scat. Bell ding, hey bear, shoulder check. At the bottom of a hill, I spotted a mama bear and cubs. I stopped dead, heart racing, trying to push my loaded bike backward uphill. Mama got up on her hind legs to check me out, and though it wasn’t a close call by any means, I panicked. I wasn’t about to ride past her, but turning around wasn’t much of an option either. Thank god for my Garmin inReach. In my mind, this was an emergency. Miles! 9-1-1!

This was my last run-in with a bear the entire trip. On the east side of the loop, the roads were busier, the bear signs rarer. One of my best camp experiences was at Naka Creek, where I spent the evening looking out at the ocean and sharing quiet company with another solo woman traveler. After watching the sky darken, I cozied into my tent with my book and prepared for a well-deserved sleep. I remember realizing I smelled faintly of the smoked salmon I ate for dinner. There was a simple fix, but my hand sanitizer was tied up with the rest of my things in a tree, and I was too scared to get out of my tent in the dark and wander down to the ocean to wash my hands. Instead, I lay there all night, wide-eyed, listening for a big bad bear to come and get me.

Back on the pavement out of Port Alice, I psyched myself up for a remote section of gravel road. Ding. Sing. Shoulder check. After a few uneventful miles, I spotted an older man walking in the middle of the logging road. My stomach flipped. I mentally located my bear spray and pocket knife.

“Hello!” I said as I cruised up to him, determined to kill this man with kindness.

The man was not, as I had fearfully assumed, out to murder me, but was simply on a morning walk from his rural property up the road.

“Do you have a knife? Not to scare you, but you’re a slow-moving target for cougars out here.”

I half-laughed. “Well, I have a pocket knife and some bear spray?”

He shook his head and showed me what I had thought to be a walking stick. Turns out it was a custom walking stick, outfitted with a large blade on the end. “This is what you need,” he said.

I smiled tightly. “I’m not sure how I’d carry that with me. Have a good day!”

If I Was a Man, Then I’d Be the Man

I encountered so many kind people during my two weeks: A family from the Netherlands, camp hosts, and a group that shared their whiskey at Atluck Lake. The memory that sticks out most was meeting Chloe and Evan, a couple I ran into on my first night at Upper Campbell Lake, who were also riding the loop. I was instantly drawn to their warmth and humor, and I found myself with or near them periodically throughout the two weeks. I ended up camping with them many nights, and even, unknowingly, crashing their engagement-celebration dinner at Telegraph Cove, on the east side of the route.

I truly didn’t mean to run into them so much, but we had similar trip plans and got along really well. In all honesty, I had thought that maybe I was that annoying rider for the good part of a year, fearing that maybe all of these amazing memories I had weren’t mutual. Then they signed up for Slow Coast, an event I run each September, and it was a fun way to affirm that the friendship wasn’t just in my head.

Still, being a woman alone brought its own chorus of comments. It wasn’t just the cougar man outside of Port Alice; it was small gestures that I couldn’t ignore. It was a man, albeit a kind one, who offered to put a dropped chain back on for me in a parking lot (I was fine). It was the multiple warnings about being cougar- and bear-aware (trust me, that’s all I could think about), and the remarks of disbelief. “You’re so brave” (I’m not). “You’re out here alone?” (Am I not supposed to be?). I had done many trips with Miles before, and though we always met so many kind and curious people, I never heard comments like these. The contrast was clear. I can’t describe it as eloquently as Laura Killingbeck does in her article “Man or Bear,” but it was real for me, too.

Though I was admittedly on edge most of the trip, I was in control of it. I could decide when to call out, when to be aware, and where to hang my food. I could choose to stick to the route or take a paved detour because there were fewer chances of seeing bears, but also quicker access to gas station snacks and a lake swim. I chose my daily distance, I decided when and where to stop, and I determined how scared or brave I wanted to be. I am a chicken, but don’t you dare tell me that. I decide.

I Don’t Know How It Gets Better Than This

There are a few things that brought me great comfort during this trip and made it doable, one of them being my beloved Kobo e-reader. Solo, I realized I could move quite quickly during the day, and I had a lot of time on my hands at camp. So, I read. I read 10 books in 14 days.

I have clear memories of biking out to San Josef Bay to camp on one of the loveliest beaches on Vancouver Island. I sat for hours, perched against a log in the sun, engrossed in A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas. Until this point, I hadn’t been interested in fantasy (or, let’s be honest, romantasy), but I relished in the escape—the distraction, the romance, and the chaos. Some days, I biked faster to make it to camp earlier so I could read. Someone asked for my reading list after this trip, and at first, I was hesitant to share. It feels like a guilty pleasure. But it was truly one of the highlights of the trip.

If you love a good romcom, maybe some R-rated scenes, and a bit of drama, check out my reading list from my trip below.

Tree to Sea Reading List

• Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld (Started light. Good, but don’t remember too much)
• Meet Me At the Lake by Carley Fortune (This is where things started to ramp up!)
• One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid (A goodie)
• A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas. (This was a turning point for me. I became quite obsessed)
• A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas (At this point, I was almost two-thirds through the route)
• A Court of Wings and Ruin by Sarah J. Maas (Obsession continued)
• A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas (Obsession continued)
• A Court of Silver Flames by Sarah J Maas (The spiciest one)
• Mating for Life by Marissa Stapley (I’m sure this was a good book, but after A Court of Thorns and Roses ended, I figured my bike trip should be over, too)
• It Happened One Summer by Tessa Bailey (No memories of this. Almost home)

I also spent countless hours listening to Taylor Swift’s older albums, singing loudly enough to scare away anything with claws or judgment. My MVPs were Fearless, Speak Now, and Red (all Taylor’s Versions). Pop music, nostalgia for my teen years, and some heartfelt lyrics are the perfect recipe for avoiding overthinking.

Begin Again

Two years later, I’ve only done one solo overnighter. I’ve logged more miles and trips since, grown more confident on the bike and in discomfort, but I’m not sure the anxiety of being alone will ever disappear.

On a short ride recently, I was climbing a local trail with my headphones in (pop music, naturally) when I realized I hadn’t seen another cyclist in about 20 minutes. My thoughts jumped straight to cougars and bears. I pulled over and took out my headphones. Best to be aware.

Maybe being badass isn’t about being unafraid. It could just be about pedaling anyway, dinging my bell, singing along at the top of my lungs to Taylor Swift, and hoping the fog lifts.

The Tree to Sea Loop is an incredible 1,000-kilometre gravel loop around the lesser-known areas on the north end of Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The route links massive valleys, oceanside villages, towering coastal mountains, and deep fjords via an impressive patchwork of forest service roads. Aside from some of the best gravel riding on the coast, there are opportunities for spelunking, whale watching, waterside camping, and much more. Find the full route guide here.

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