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Mountains, Desert and Beaches!

KAVU Dynamic Duo, John Rathwell and Tracy Guenard head west to find adventure.....every step of the way

By KAVU

February 13^th, 2018

hit the road

The last few months have seen several scene changes. After leaving the fall colors of the Appalachians, we decided to head for warmer weather, but one can not just drive from the east to west coast without a few mandatory stops. ColoRADo and Utah!

We pulled into Steamboat Springs CO to meet up with a few good friends, some we knew we’d have guaranteed good times with.

As we drove down from the pass, we could see Steamboat with its gold Aspens and a dusting of snow on top of the mountains....

but we still hoped to get some riding in with our friend Rob.

trail riding indeed happened the following day...

We surrounded ourselves with trees in the peek time for golden leaves. We rode all the way up to the snow and mud line before turning around and bombing down. Tight switch backs led into big cross cut berms, which sent me flying off them and into the Aspen’s a few times. It’s not riding unless your crashing right?

in the end...

A snowstorm ended up chasing us out of Steamboat. We wanted to stay longer, but we also wanted sun and warmth. We had sunny San Diego on our minds.

The deserts of Southern Colorado and Utah for some more riding. We made stops in Fruita CO and Virgin UT. Both are insane! Fruita is the dream land for van dwelling mountain bikers. You simply park up on BLM land, and ride countless laps of dessert flow trails with jumps, berms and everything else fun.

Virgin is much the same, BLM galore, but the biking is a step up, so don’t forget your knee pads and bandaids because you are going to need them. Especially if you show up during Red Bull Rampage. Virgin essentially goes like this… hike your bike up the mesa until you are scared beyond belief, and then...try to ride it down.

Good luck.

Luckily, both Tracy and I made it out without too much damage, but not without hucking some of the hardest trails we have ever ridden.

good medicine

The cold desert nights of Virgin made us want to get our van to SoCal ASAP, except our picky little "Westy" had other plans. She decided to blow a water jacket gasket and set us back a few weeks... and a big chunk of change, to give er a shinny new heart.

The good news is she now comes with almost double the horsepower and can now do 65mph without sweating!

finally, the beach!!

The first 3 weeks of surf were amazing. Three to five foot with no wind all day. It was a “just-go-fun-size” type of month. We surfed and surfed and surfed and surfed until we couldn’t feel our bodies anymore.

And repeated.

There is something special about surfing SoCal when you are from Canada. Maybe it’s not having to wear booties or mitts. Maybe it’s all the iconic surf spots like Black’s, Swamis and San Onofre, or maybe its just the sheer awesomeness of the sun and sand.

It's also just really fun to surf and hang at the beach with friends! Plus, when my friends surf, I get to exercise my passion of swimming around big waves with really expensive camera gear. When I'm in the right place, banger photos of great times end up being the result!

Anyways, the winds are blowing off shore again, and the surf is coming in. I still got one thing on my mind and I am just going to go do that.

I’m about to go have a #KAVUDay.

See you on the water!

#FoundSero // John and Tracy

John Rathwell Photography

Tracy Guenard

Footnotes

John and Tracy are KAVU in every way, leading by example that fun has no season! Follow their adventures in their trusty van as they continue to search for sero and of course, another KAVU day!

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FootNotes

John and Tracy are KAVU in every way, leading by example that fun has no season! Follow their adventures in their trusty van as they continue to search for sero and of course, another KAVU day!

Havasupai 2025

Mountains, Desert and Beaches!

KAVU Dynamic Duo, John Rathwell and Tracy Guenard head west to find adventure.....every step of the way

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