Island Flèche 1996 - The 1st
by Stephen Hinde

I was musing to Jim Runkel after reading his 2012 Flèche report Paradise Lost... and Found, that this might be the first Island / Mainland Flèche route. I Cc-ed Stephen Hinde - he had the answer. EF

Sorry, great story but not a first. In 1996, Ken Bonner, Chris Holmes and myself rode Yellowpoint-Merville (just north Courtenay) to Nanaimo. Caught the Departure Bay to Tsawwassen ferry with 15 minutes to spare (slept on ferry) and then rode Hwy 10/ Fraser Hwy to Abbotsford (slept again--4hrs) and then on to Harrison via Chilliwack. We ran out of time at Bridal Falls, but that was 375km and within the finishing distance, so it was a successful ride. I'm not sure you could do this route today as Duke Pt (yes the terminal has moved) to Tsawwassen ferry is listed as a 2 hour trip (and my control card shows 2h 45 off bike), so you're bumping into the "no stop longer than 2 hr" rule. The item that really impressed me with the 1996 route was the accuracy of our predicted time--we predicted arriving at the Nanaimo ferry (251 km) at 17:31 and our control time is 17:30; predicted arrive Abbotsford (333km) at 23:30 control time 23:30. We over slept in Abbotsford, so we missed the last 15 km of the route!

It's great to see someone use the shorter Swartz Bay route, though.

May 12, 2012