Hobbies and Interests

Biking

I am an avid cyclists and enjoy all types of cycling including mountain biking, gravel biking, and bike packing. My cycling journey began in 2014 when I bought my first mountain bike. Since then, biking has been a central driving force in my life, influencing where I live, travel, work, and the people I surround myself with.

For me, mountain biking allows a structure and an outlet for me to experience the great outdoors. It is an unmatched, exhilarating experience and it has brought me to some of the most magnificent places in the world.

Strangely, though mountain biking has brought me to another hemisphere, it has also tied me even closer to the place I grew up. Mountain biking in Kamloops is world renowned, something that I never knew until I interacted with other bike enthusiasts in other countries. It took me a long time to truly appreciate this land I grew up on and mountain biking is completely responsible. What was once beige I now see as gold.

In 2017 I strapped a sleeping bag to my bike and went on my very first bike packing trip. This experience opened my eyes to a whole new way of experiencing biking and the outdoors. On this trip, we mountain biked for 6-8 hours each day for 3 days. There were cabins smattered along the trail which we stopped at each night. We packed in all of our food and supplies and packed out all of our garbage. This transformational experience further ignited my passion for cycling and made me more interested in longer cycling experiences.

In 2018 I bought a gravel bike. This glorious bike allows me to bike for longer stretches more efficiently, allowing for a more meditative cycling experience. This bike also allows me to travel and camp while bike packing more efficiently than a mountain bike can. I see this bike as so much more than a sport or a piece of gear, this bike gives me a sense of freedom that I have never experienced before.

As my relationship with cycling evolves over time, my love for the sport continues to deepen.

Snowboarding

Snowboarding is another sport that has brought me to spectacular places. Though I have issues with the lack of accessibility to the sport due to its high cost, I cannot deny that there are few things that get me as excited as a 30cm pow day.

Despite being Canadian, I didn’t learn to snowboard until I was 18. After I quit dancing and before I learned to snowboard, I began to experience seasonal depression. Once I decided to dig more into the sport, that depression completely went away.

I am extremely fortunate to have been able to travel and do the sports that I do. To date, I have snowboarded in 3 different countries and I plan to continue to use sport as a way of traveling and experiencing culture.

Travel

As an teacher in training, I have begun to reflect on why traveling is important through a education lens. Travelling is an immersive, place-based learning experience which engages the learner in such a way that causes a deeper more meaningful learning experience than can be gained through theory.

I feel exceptionally privileged to have done the travelling that I have. Each trip I’ve done has been transformative in one way or another, causing me to grow and mature each time. During my 6 week trip around Central America, my eyes were opened to what true poverty looks like. In one particularly intimidating night in Honduras, myself and my travel partner stayed in a hostel in San Pedro Sula. This city, best known for its violence, has the designation of murder capital of the world. We were rushed into the hostel by the taxi driver because police were approaching down the road. Once inside, we were not allowed to leave until morning. The hostel was surrounded by high cement walls with barbed wire embellishing its tops. Though I felt safe inside the hostel, I immediately began to reflect on my privileged Canadian upbringing. To this day, I feel grateful to be born in a country and with a family where I do not have to live in fear of violence.

For two years I lived, worked, and mountain biked in Queenstown, New Zealand. I got a working holiday visa and for the first time, experienced a longer, more community oriented form of travel. I worked at a small pub called Atlas Beer Café which was the unofficial, local mountain biker pub. There I became involved in the local biking scene which motivated me to push myself on my bike and develop my skills further. Through this working experience, I made life long friends that brought me along on adventures I never would have dreamed of experiencing. This travel experience allowed my love for nature and my passion for biking come into full bloom.

In October, 2017 I obtained a working holiday visa for Japan. I packed a jacket and my snowboard and headed towards Japan’s northernmost island, Hokkaido. There I lived in a staff accommodation affectionately known as the Cheese Block. Our accommodation was located right beside the lift at the world-renowned Niseko ski resort. There I managed a small café called Green Farm Café from November 2017 to April 2018. After I left the café, I spend one month travelling the rest of the country sometimes alone, sometimes with friends. This travel experience was initially a challenging one for me as it was my first and only solo trip on a working visa. Before this trip happened, I never thought I would be the type to travel alone. As a woman, I considered travelling alone to be unsafe and I did not think I had the confidence to tackle it. Looking back, I realize that all of my previous travel experiences were stepping stones, preparing me and directing me towards this monumental challenge.

I can’t overstate how much this trip challenged me and caused me to grow as a person. On this trip I experienced some of the highest highs and the lowest lows in my life, all contributing to my sense of confidence, making me the person I am today.