Other than the trains going by I had a good sleep and woke up on my own at 5:30. I managed to get out by 6:30 but had no food until I reached Upsala which was 40 kilometers away. Of note there is a tiny little gem of a place called English River which was only 20 km up the road that had lodging – oh well!
I had low energy but made it to the Upsala which is just a general store and two restaurants. There was a familiar looking bicycle outside and low and behold Mark was sitting inside! I couldn’t believe he was ahead of me based on his previous pace but he picked up some skinnier tires and was very persistent with riding most days. Unfortunately work called and he was taking a bus home but he really did awesome considering he never really biked before.
There isn’t much to say about the country side except that it was starting to get hillier and hotter. I stopped for an hour at the Eastern time zone marker where I met a pug and a family heading to Winnipeg for a wedding. A Belgium couple who sold everything and where biking across from Montreal to Banff and then South down the Rockies also road up and chatted with me for a while.
Eventually I moved on and inched my way into the hills closer to Thunder Bay but it was hot and I was tired. I took the 102 highway which turns out is shorter than the Trans Canada for those that bike and finally pulled into town after 6pm. I literally took my shoes and socks off and fully submerged myself in this river for 10 minutes!
I met up with Andrew Moorey from Global Hydration who was one of the earliest donors. I met his wife Nicole and son Anson and daughter Ayla who shared inner with us on the back yard deck. Friends of theirs Lorna and Jide from Ottawa also came by for a brief visit and we talked about resources and treaty negotiations with first nations.
After that Andrew graciously showed my around town explaining the history and sites. They have a free jazz night every Wednesday in the park by the lake during the summer. Finally we went to see the Terry Fox memorial. It is hard to describe how I feel about it since it does bring up emotion for me and I would guess most Canadians. What a hero and great Canadian icon!
