Ontario and Hills here we come!

I never ever thought I would see a day where I looked forward to hills over a flat ride, but man can I not wait to get into Ontario. The endless sky bit is really cool, but the endless wind is totally draining!

Since Swift Current we've maybe had half a day of nice wind, other than that it's been down-right scary! The first 2 days out had the worst cross-winds I have ever seen. We had gusts of wind that reached over 60km an hour. Luckily the first night we were graced with the wonderful hospitality of Rita and Don Cushing! Turns out I had extended family in Saskatchewan through my Aunt Joan- man oh man do I wish I had known about them earlier in life because they are the nicest people. Rita and Don took Neil and I in for the night and fed us a delicious dinner after giving us a tour of Moose Jaw (which is actually a really cool city by the way with beautiful parks and a mineral hot spring!). Then Rita's sister and parents came over and we had some tea and cake. Her parents are both turning 90 this year and they were just hilarious! I really hope that I can remain that lively and hilarious at the age of 90. Her dad even treated us to a private concert on his fiddle. It might have only been an evening, but it sure felt like a rest day!

The next day we biked to Regina (by the way, it's a slight 2% grade uphill after Moose Jaw pretty much until Brandon, Manitoba on a bike... which wouldn't be that bad if you had a tail-wind or no wind... but man was it brutal), possibly the worst part about the trip to Regina was that we could actually see the city of Regina itself for an hour and a half. When you are struggling against the wind and just exhausted- that is possibly one of the most demoralizing things in the world. We actually took about 4 hours off in Regina just hoping and praying that the wind would die down. So we had a wonderful lunch that Rita had packed us and sat in front of the Saskatchewan parliament in the shade and out of the wind and just relaxed and enjoyed the sights. Then we biked around Regina a bit tackling a few small errands and had dinner and headed out of town again. Bamn! Right away they had a sign for Winnipeg- 572km

Talk about heart breaking when you are on a bike! Even in a car that would be bad! That's a good 6 hour drive! All of the other signs had smaller local cities on the signs- but there it was, just on the other side of Regina- Winnipeg, the city that would haunt us for 4 more days.

Luckily we were right and the wind did die down as the day progressed, unfortunately the sun sets early in Saskatchewan since they don't participate in daylight savings time and we ended up trying to rush it to our destination. We ended up about 12km short of Indian Head and ended up down a gravel road in a campsite in Qu'Appelle (this town only had like 200 people but they somehow managed to support a tattoo parlour- crazy). We were pretty excited about the next day of riding at this point as well. We had been traveling North East for the past few days and the wind had been coming from the North West- so as I've said we were experiencing some pretty wicked cross-winds. After Indian head though our route (basically the Trans-Canada) turned southward and we were expecting to catch a pretty decent tail-wind. Man were we wrong. It seemed like the gods were against us when we awoke in Qu'Appelle and headed out to the highway because the winds had switched almost exactly 180 degrees and were now coming from the east for an almost perfect headwind. We did our best all day just battling the wind... but after 120km of headwind we tapped out. Seriously, it is insane the differences in time we spend on the road depending on the wind. We battled ALL day against that wind and we only averaged about 20km per hour. Whereas otherdays we'll feel like we've hardly ridden and ride 170km. Needless to say we also didn't make it as far as we had that day either and decided to stop in Whitewood. We ate at a nice diner and camped in a city campground that was pecularily placed right next to the city pool and golf course. The only other campers there were a really nice couple from northern Ontario that had been on the road since Easter.

That night I had the coldest shower of my life, I'm actually suprised I survived ;)

(by the way, I realize that this is probably the most sporadic blog, and probably chock-full of spelling errors (sorry Mom) but it's about 12 am here and I'm just trying to pump this out before I crash and we take off tomorrow).

Anyways, we were lucky enough to make up all of our distance the following day. We had planned a shorter day as a pseudo-rest day but it quickly became more of a make-up day. So after a slow start in the morning and also replacing a flat tire that must have been the result of a slow-leak overnight for Neil we were on the road and low and behold we had a slight tail wind! So we used that to cross the border into Manitoba! My 10th province! Officially Neil and I have been to every province there is in Canada and we've even been to all 10 of them together! Manitoba is a very pretty province with lots of trees! But if I grew up in Manitoba I would never have become a road cyclist- their roads here are attrocious! Most of the time there is absolutely no shoulder, just the white line and then a drop off to a gravel shoulder. It's actually really scary on a bicycle here and I'm looking forward to either a.) getting back to shoulders or at least b.) getting away from Truck traffic. The trucks have been amazing, they either slow right down or move over a lane if it is at all possible. But we have been buzzed a few times and that is actually really scary, and we haven't just been buzzed by trucks. I find that cars (especially minivans) are the worst! I guess those soccer games are important... but does it really hurt to slow down for 2 seconds as you pass by someone on a bike? Additionally, anytime we bike on a 2 lane road the traffic coming from the opposite direction can be just as brutal. Trucks coming from the other direction pull a wall of wind with them that sometimes feels just like bricks as you hit it.

We've done our absolute best to stay off of the Trans-Canada in Manitoba, which has turned out to be really fun. Unfortunately on our dash back to convocation we don't have a lot of time for many detours so it's been nice to ride through some of the smaller towns off of the Trans Canada and see some more of the local scenary. We rode through Douglas the other day just on the other side of Brandon and rode for about 3km through this really cool marsh that came right up to the road that is apparently the best breeding ground for a special kind of song bird in the world! Unfortuneatly when we travel off the Trans Canada the roads are not always in the best condition or there is way more wind as the road is significantly less sheltered. In fact, when we found out that there were definitely stretchs into Winnipeg without a shoulder we decided to take the old highway (#26) that is north of the Trans Canada from Portage into Winnipeg to avoid the traffic that always occurs near a big city. This would have been an EXCELLENT decision had there been no wind. In fact, it was still a pretty darn good decision. We were able to ride next to eachother all day to block the wind, but there was so much farmland there that the wind was really strong as it had plenty of ramp-up time to gain speed before hitting us. Sometimes it felt like the wind was just trying to hold us in place where we were. But once again it was significantly more scenic than the Trans Canada and we were able to bike through some nice smaller towns like Poplar Point where a really nice couple just pulled up beside us in their car as we were having a snack and asked us if we needed any water or anything! (we had unfortunately just gotten water from the post office). The back route also didn't add too much distance to our route as we were heading to the north end of Winnipeg and it added a WHOLE lot more adventure. In fact at one point, after our only rest of about 3km with a tail wind on this road we were passing by a house when we heard a dog start barking. Which you know- we thought no big deal. But then we saw that it was a BIG dog (like Beethoven size) and that it was CHASING us. Well, we both took off at that point (which isn't as easy as it sounds with weight or a trailer). Neither of us had ever had a dog chase us for so long and it was actually closing in on us too! Luckily it must have figured we were no longer a threat to its property, but man that gave the heart a good start. This dog could have taken us down with one paw and no effort.

Well after that we called Neil's Aunt Mary because we were behind schedule and let her know we were going to be a bit later than we had planned. They were nice and offered us a ride into the city which we refused and we started our way to the perimeter highway that encircles Winnipeg. I think we would have accepted the offer if we knew what was about to come (sorry Mom, I'm sure this entire blog is not making you feel very happy about your daughter being off on a bike trip!) Inkster road is not a road for cyclists. There was once again no shoulder but this time it was only 2 lanes and there was LOTS of traffic. Sometimes I was more afraid for other drivers because some of the people passing us were absolutely bonkers!

Once we got into the city Neil actually pulled into a gas station just for a breather- it had not been a fun ride into town at all. But we finally arrived safe and sound at Neil's Aunt Mary's house at about a quarter to 9pm having traveled about 813km from Swift Current to Winnipeg in just 6 days making up our snow day that we had to take in Canmore! We've had a fantastic time here at Neil's aunts. She made this amazing cake with a coconut brown sugar topping that is to die for! She was also sweet enough to drive us around town today while Neil got his bike fixed (he's lost control of the trailer a few times on gravel roads, the trailer is very heavy and once it has a mind to tip there is almost no stopping it. He has always been okay as its been at slow speeds but his derailer hanger was bent up and that was really effecting his shifting abilities which is not ideal for the hills coming up). We also purchased a new Thermarest mat for Neil. His was quite a bit larger than mine and we decided that the extra space in the BOB trailer would be nice for Northern Ontario so that we can carry a bit more food just in case we get rained in without a grocery store nearby. We also had lunch at the Forks which is a really neat spot in Winnipeg where two rivers meet and they have an amazing food court with food from all over the world (I had Ukranian food, Neil had a Sri Lankan lunch) and also got to do some sight-seeing from the car as well! Then Neil's cousins came over and we had a lovely supper!

Tommorrow we bike again! The day after that we'll be in Ontario for the long haul. Don't expect any updates about new provinces soon. It will be several weeks until we leave Ontario, but it will be neat to bike in the Candian Shield and take the ferry from Manatoulin Island! Luckily we start the day tomorrow with a ride out of the city. After yesterday's scary adventure we decided to take their offer of a ride to the Canadian Mint which is near the perimeter of the city and skip as much of the scary traffic as we can!

Hope all is well at home! Will try to write again as soon as I can!