Rediscovering the Honda CR-V

MANILA, Philippines - I walked into my local bike shop looking for a 150 peso bottle cage for my mountain bike. Fifteen minutes later, I found myself test riding the 280,000 peso “Ellsworth Moment” of local mountain biking legend and part owner of Sabak bike shop, Ricky Montelibano. And that’s how it all began.

I didn’t sleep that night.

As much as I loved my current steed, a 6-year old borrowed Giant XTC team from my brother, Patrick, my thoughts kept drifting back to that Ellsworth, and the happy place in my head where you swerve to hit the potholes rather than swerving to avoid it. The ride was incredibly plush, the gears crisp, and the brakes stupendously powerful yet easy to modulate. It’s the kind of bike that will lure you into terrain you once described only with four-letter words.

A few weeks later, I get a call from Boy Simsuangco from Sabak. A second hand Ellsworth Epiphany frame with a Fox Talas fork comes up.

This portion of the story has been deleted on the grounds that the details may incriminate the author and be used against him in family court.

All I remember was Boy telling me, “Don’t worry, pare, this is a lifetime bike.” He is absolutely right, of course, but the problem is that these mountain bikers all seem to have 9 lives.

So now that I have the bike of my dreams, I go looking for a place worthy enough to christen it. Baguio seems like a perfect place to disguise a biking trip as a family holiday so I put a pin on the map. Its the kind of place blessed with the natural terrain to offer up superb riding just at the doorstep of your hotel without having to waste time driving to a site and eating in to your precious ride. I could start at 6am and be back by breakfast. Nobody gets hurt.

Its been a few years since my last trip to Baguio, but I do remember that if you travel at the right time of the day, and take the correct route that bypasses all those congested, tricycle infested towns, the journey can equal the destination. I’ve been hearing a great deal about this DPC Yellow pages route and I thought I’d give that a try. Just look it up on Google if you haven’t already tried it; its a touch longer, but far, far more pleasant. Next on the list was a car that could take me and my family there safely and in comfort.

I needed something roomy, but not overly so; it also needed to be powerful enough to tackle the steep climbs of Marcos highway, but frugal enough not to drink more than I planned to that weekend. The Honda CR-V just seemed perfect. The 2.4 liter engine is well tuned for city driving, but it still has the extra kick to punch my way past the ubiquitous struggling smoky bus or truck. And with the latest V-TEC technology, I know I’ll only be using the correct amount of fuel each time I dab the throttle. No unnecessary waste, so to speak, which is like the golden rule of bikers.

Armed with a good destination, a great car and a fabulous route, now I just needed a good bike rack. Scratch that, make that a damn good bike rack. I’m not entrusting ahem amount of bicycle on a rinky dink rack.

I make a call to the trusty folks over at Thule, the world’s leaders in bike racks and carrying solutions. I don’t need to explain my illness to them, they speak the same language as me. They recommend their new 591 Proride roof mounted bike carrier. It uses a center arm that clamps on to your main frame plus a front and rear wheel holder that has all been crash tested to up to 180km/h. Perfect.

I take off just before lunch. Driving the North is always a joy. Aside from the fact that I’m not charged as a class two vehicle on the expressway once I load my bike, (unlike the PNCC-run South who have trouble telling the difference between a bus and a bicycle rack) it is always a fairly predictable run and relatively hassle free. I exit the SCTEX at Tarlac and follow the yellow pages signs.

The CR-V is a pleasant surprise. I have driven it before, of course, but not since its launch a number of years ago. It is no longer the newest kid on the block, but I’m reminded of why it spurned a revolution in the compact SUV craze that swept through the world. Some critics feel that it has lost that initial excitement, but there’s no denying that it is still a very practical, reliable, and efficient vehicle.

Fully loaded with three kids, their mandatory luggage and a mountain bike on the roof, the CR-V breezed through even the steepest portions of Marcos highway without a whimper – which is a lot more than I can say about the kids. Power is always available early on in the throttle input so there’s really no reason to floor it. It is quiet, comfortable and spacious and returned a very tidy 7.7 kilometers to the liter. Needless to say that improved on the way down.

I arrive at the Manor Hotel late in the afternoon. Everything charming about Baguio seems to be personified by the Manor. It has retained all of its charm over the years and has only improved with age. I sink a couple of ice cold beers to end the day, followed by a native meal in a local restaurant within Camp John Hay, and cap it off with some hot chocolate and marshmallows for the kids just before tucking them into bed.

I lay down and dream about a nice three hour morning ride with clean, pine-scented air filling my lungs. I wake up at 5:30am, scoff down a nature bar, suit up and head downstairs to pull my bike off the lockable roof carrier. I’m so excited that you can see it through my shirt.

But how quickly a dream can turn into a nightmare.

Barely 5 minutes into my ride, a guard stops me to tell me that biking is strictly forbidden within Camp John Hay. There was special emphasis on his pronunciation of “strictly” just as a motorcycle zoomed past leaving a nauseating trail of thick white smoke. FX jeeps zoomed past, a smoky delivery truck chugged its way up the hill spewing out black oily soot, yet lieutenant logic over here still demanded that I “dismount” immediately.

I asked for an explanation, but, “basta bawal” was the best that could be offered. I explained politely that I am checked in to the Manor and that denying me entry to my accommodations based solely on my vehicle is discriminatory, but you can imagine how that turned out. I wrote to the PR department of Camp John Hay, but getting a reply was like trying to nail leche flan to the wall.

I wasn’t in the mood to spend the 12 days of Christmas arguing with the guard so I walk my bike up just as he asked. (Funny, but technically the bike is still being used, only now it is taking up twice as much space with me walking next to it) But it makes lieutenant logic happy and that is all that matters, so I walk just far enough to be out of sight and ride the rest of the way to the hotel.

On the last day I accidentally stumble across a Camp John Hay horse guide who offers to take me through Yellow trail, Japanese trail and a bunch of other hair-raising bike trails that snake its way around the US embassy. There are single tracks where your handle bar is scraping the wall and the other side is a 40 foot drop, plus stubborn roots as large as spare truck tires and rocks that crumble under the weight of the bike just as you’re in the middle of a tricky climb. It is breathtaking both in beauty and in danger, and I’m not ashamed to say that I have never been more scared to death on my bike. But I also have never felt more alive.

The amusing part was, these trails start and end in Camp John Hay. And as soon as I came out and entered the safety of the camp and its perfectly sealed roads just by the Filling Station, still shaking with adrenaline and fear and nursing the odd scrape and cut, Lieutenant Logic blows his whistle and yells out, “Dismount! It is dangerous to ride here! You might fall over!”