Hanging out in the Nation's Capital

What's a trip across Canada without a visit to the capital?

Not a trip across Canada we say.

Plus! We get to visit with more of Neil's family! Last night we slept at Neil's Mom's Cousin's House. Barb and her husband, John, have the most comfortable beds. They have "adopted" Julie (Neil's sister) while she's been in Ottawa for university and they are being ever so kind as to let us stay here for the two nights we will be in Ottawa. In fact we are even having dinner with Julie, Barb and John tonight! Hopefully we will be able to meet up with Julie for some tourist/shopping time downtown. I plan on dragging Neil to every girl shopping establishment possible to make up for all of the time I've spent in Canoe/Bike/Outdoor shops this summer :)

But today is our last FULL day in Ontario! That's pretty exciting since we first entered Ontario on May 23rd. Granted we did take a week off for convocation, but that's still a heck of a long time in one province. We accidently crossed into Quebec yesterday when we made a wrong turn. It was the Fleur-de-lis on the highway signs that alerted us to our error.

We've had a great second half to our trip so far, if you discount the weather. There has been a TON of rain. So much rain that we both bought waterproof socks for future rainstorms yesterday. However, weather aside it's been really nice. Our plan to average about 100km a day in the second half (but we've been averaging more around 120km a day) is ensuring that we get a lot more time in cities and we are nowhere near as tired or sore. This is our first rest day since we started back up, and I think both Neil and I physically could have kept biking a few more days. We have had some longer days and some shorter days though. We pushed it to 160km to reach the Rhodes, which was more than worth it. The Dairy there makes amazing icecream and it was wicked to meet Colin's family. Both Neil and I have lived with Colin at different times at "the Barn" (the Waterloo Nordic Ski House) and it's always fun to meet a long-time friend's family! (Not to mention they were extremely awesome and hospitable!)

The next day we had a shorter day to Foresters Falls where Kieran, another one of Neil's housemates and Ski team compadres, is working at a whitewater rafting company (Owl Rafting) for the summer. We debated taking a day to go rafting but the weather was still a bit too cold and we were quite damp from the torrential downpour that hit us right after we finished up dinner the day before. But we did see Kieran! (after waiting around for the bum for 3 hours.. and looking mighty sketch as we hung around the resort looking like we totally lacked a purpose in life). It was worth the wait though, we chilled with Kieran and his coworkers that night around the fire in the lodge and swapped stories with fellow adventurers. Then Kieran was kind enough to lend us his platform for the night (see posted photos) and we were able to stay dry and out of the rain while we slept. The next day we biked about 120km into Ottawa and after some shopping on the west side of town we pulled into Barb and Johns JUST before dark.

We've now completed ALMOST 5,000km of the trip and the 5 largest provinces (cycling wise). Tomorrow we continue East and into Quebec (where Neil will do most of the talking... for a change).

Hope all is well at home!