Epic tailwind – 195 kilometers

A little update between yesterdays post since I posted early. I went into town for dinner and there didn’t seem to be a restaurant. I came across two young men, really 8 or 9 year olds who mentioned the Elk hotel. They really seemed to be a lot older in maturity, maybe they were thinking of roughing up the city boy. Totally kidding but they seemed excited that a subway restaurant was coming to town this year. Anyway I headed to the Elk and when I walked in there was complete silence and everyone was starring at me. I said “hello” and one of them said hello back as they all watched me go sit down. After about 15 minutes a waitress came by and as always people warm up to me quickly. I probably didn’t need more food but I had the fried chicken which was a cholesterol nightmare!

Okay sorry to bore you. At 4am I woke up to the howling wind, I had to look outside to check the direction: it was going my way. I was thinking about getting up but slept in to 6am before getting packed etc. I was off by 7:30 and the wind was massive and for the first time a tail wind! I went into a zone right away. For those that do not bike, you do not question or wait to admire a tailwind you get out there and crank out the gears. Even though I had to pee I did not stop until 38 kilometers in because you never know when the the road or wind will change direction. It was a challenging wind as well since it was from the South West so the southerly gusts would give the bike a good jolt. I had to keep a tight grip on things which meant my hands started to go to sleep after a while.

I took my first drink of water also at the 38km because it was not safe to have only one hand on the handle bars. Again cyclists understand. This is like a powder day for skiers, you just go and ask questions later. Around Chaplin lake I had a few surprises (please stop reading if you are my mother or a sister), the first being the paved shoulder disappearing and being replaced by loose gravel. I think I got a little lucky and hung on until I got back on the road. This was unpleasant though because I had to ride on the road. It was a good kilometer before there was about a foot of shoulder which was still unsavoury. Eventually the shoulder expanded again, keep in mind I still had cross winds gusts from the south so I was a little nervous out there. Then it happened again, this time it looked like gravel but I wasn’t sure and when I hit it there was no option to turn out of it, I had to ride it out to a complete stop. I think this one was luckier because I was going 40km/hr and in gravel things happen really fast and I wouldn’t have been able to clip out. After that a another slim shoulder for quite a while. This is a bad stretch of road folks and you need to be careful here.

Most stretches felt like no chain and I had a stretch of 45km/hr for about 4 kilometers without much effort at allow. I rarely got out of the big ring even on the hills where I would only slow down to the low 20’s. I loathed to stop for pictures but I have to do it because sharing the story is very important and some of you folks paid for some road. Earl your stretch kicked ass!

I arrived at Moose Jaw and was immediately beaten by the wind since I was now heading South into town. I met with reporter for the Moose Jaw Herald Lisa Goudy for some photos since we had talked on the phone yesterday. Hey I made the paper!

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I finished the journey from Vancouver BC to St. John’s NL on Thursday August 30th. However I will continue to post me (I am turning Newfie, I meant “my”) whereabouts here for those interested in my remaining travels in Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

Thursday, September 13, 2012 – Halifax
Friday, September 14, 2012 – Halifax
Saturday, September 15, 2012 – Halifax?

As of Tuesday September 18th I am safely home in Vancouver!

61 kilometers of green

I woke up at 6am but was dead tired and didn’t want to move. I slept in to about 7am before crawling out of my little hobble. I was in a total funk and couldn’t wake up but preceded to pack things up very slow a methodically. I probably took a good hour or so before I was ready to go. I went to pay the caretaker Ron Marcia and he turned around and donated the money to the cause. He told me that he had no problem donating to someone working hard biking across the country. I really appreciated that statement.

Off I went up to highway 1 and made my way to the edge of town where I did some stretching since the body was a little stiff and hadn’t woken up yet. The weather was clear but cloudy and a slight head wind like the day before. It is more hilly than yesterday but I am making okay time considering I am not putting much effort at all, simply going through the motions.

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185 kilometer details

This was the biggest ride to date and although not the hardest ride I was done by the end. I woke up around quarter to 5 am still brooding over yesterdays defeat. I was ready to go but it was still dark so I laid in my sleeping bag before packing up and getting on the road. There was an erie mist surrounding the whole country side and the sun was barely poking through the haze to give a few hundred meters of visibility. I figured it was safe enough as there was next zero traffic.

I rode for maybe 5 minutes with no wind, yes this is correct no wind, until I came upon Saskatchewan in the form of a rest stop. I took a few pictures but didn’t want to lose any opportunity with the wind being asleep and all. The road was kind of hilly with mist hanging off the tops of the hills. Any traffic that passed me soon disappeared about a kilometer ahead as if entering the Bermuda triangle. Though hilly I got over 30km an hour on some of the downhills and actually got into the big ring once.
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48 kilometers of hell

Every day we always start with the best intentions. Though a little mentally and physically tired I got up early thinking maybe I sneak into town for a little bit before making my way into Saskatchewan. Before heading off though I wanted to tighten up the rear rack since it seemed a little loose. After applying a little pressure the lower mounting bolt broke – shit! Now I was in trouble sort of. By this time Randy had come by and he said he had a drill and at the very least could get the bolt end out.

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138 kilometers see detail

Other than some loud Englishman next door berating his son for marrying a German girl because his father told him not to marry a “Helga” all the while the supposed wife and some other Germans were in their company. It was totally embarrassing I wasn’t even there. I myself can say I have met a few German ladies and most of them were marriage material. I guess you can’t pick your family eh?

I got up pretty early around 7am and Mark the rider from Montreal had left a note that he had left already and didn’t want to disturb me. I packed up and started to ride off as Tim appeared from the camper trailer. I said farewell and was on my way up the hill back onto the flats. I discovered that the camera on my phone has a really easy wide angle option which will stitch 2 to 5 pictures together so I took some more of the badass lands.

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83 kilometer ride details

Note the railway runs right behind the campsite or the whole town for that matter. There were a few trains at night and one in the morning that blew their horn but I easily fell back to sleep after the sudden blast. I woke up at 6 and proceeded to sleep until 7. I got up, organized and then rode without my gear to the credit union to get some cash since this campsite is run by the town and uses the honour system. While I was at the bank I decided to pick up supplies at the grocery store. Inside I gave out a small cough while reading my phone. From out of nowhere I heard a voice “I wish I had that”. I looked around at the clerk stocking the shelves and said “my phone?”, “no your cough so I could get off work early” said the clerk. You know those akward forced conversations where one party wants to tell their life store while other just wanted a loaf of bread? Well this was one of those and I learned he was in the army, lost a third of his brain in a truck accident and was fifty years old. I didn’t know what to make of it but the accident was very plausible.
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I really tried and tried to get up early but just couldn’t. Then I needed to sort out my electronics which I thought were okay but turns out they weren’t. First was the Gopro camera which now when I turned on just started taking hundreds of photos and I couldn’t turn it off without removing the battery. The second problem was my solar charger which I had returned and upgrade yesterday at MEC. The different brand had a multitude of connection types for various phones and electronic items but when plugged into my phone, the phone indicated I was at risk of wrecking the phone. It also would not charge my tablet no matter which combination of connections I used.

I left the apartment by 9AM and had the Gopro replaced at London Drugs. I have to admit I always get great service at London Drugs and there is no fuss or blaming the customer. I then rode to MEC and simply returned the new charger, borrowed a floor pump for my tires and bought a 12′ x 12′ tarp! By the time I got on the road for real it was around 11am and already starting to get hot which I in fact welcome.
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The rest day consistent of wrestling cow girls, riding bulls and roping the little balls hanging off Chevy pickup trucks or something like that. I set up all my malfunctioning equipment to charge up fully while I rode out to Bow Cycle out by 16th where I entered Calgary the day before. I was great because I pretty much took the bike path along the Bow river almost the whole way. Even though it was midday Wednesday there were lots of cyclists and even more runners.

When I got to Bow Cycle my new friend Tim was on lunch so I chatted up the people in reception about my trip and gave them some of my cards. Wait, let’s back up, this shop is humongous! I walked in the service entrance where 3 or 4 mechanics are going at it. To right of their area is all of the bike accessories in the middle of the floor and there are bikes and frames hanging all around including an upstairs balcony full of bike overlooking the floor. There is another group of mechanics working downstairs out of site and finally there is an off site warehouse where they build bikes. Okay back to the story.
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128 kilometer ride details

I got very early in anticipation of the long ride and was on the road by 8:30. It was a bit chilly in the mountain air but things  soon warmed up as the road wound up and down the valley to the East. Even with the odd little climb of 100 meters or so I covered a lot of ground in the first couple of hours. There were still interesting camera shots but nothing like yesterday from the top of Sulphur mountain.

There is a Banff cycling trail beside the highway but it just didn’t hold the consistent grade like the highway so I only tried it for a kilometer before going back to the highway. Coming out of the mountains really felt like I was in new territory growing up in British Columbia and only having only seen Toronto and Montreal outside the province. The road is mostly flat but the grade changes from time to time and there are little hills here and there that take a little effort.

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