Tour Day 27 Our First Big Rain July 21 2010

So I was trying to think of a way to phrase this yesterday without sounding dumb but I could not think of a way to make it sound any better. I had a crash. It was possibly the slowest crash of my life, and one that I could only laugh at after. We were coming up to this gas station in marathon and I see this yellow curb. I think to myself o Evan just put your foot on it that way you do not have to get off the seat. Well my body did not respond because I passed the curb and still has my foot down with nothing underneath it. I then panic and unclip both feet, but for some reason still am seated on the saddle. Well I then released an “Oooooooo (boom)”. Charles and Olivier look at me and just start to laugh as I sit there thinking wow those hotdogs were not worth all of this.

Today well it started off on the wrong foot because it rained last night, which made the ground super tacky, which then made the dirt, stick to everything. I am super anal about keeping my tent, and ground sheet clean. By the time I was finished taking it all down both were muddy and gross so I used some water to attempt to clean it. Little did I know that the park tap water was not good to drink so I wasted all of my good drinking water cleaning something that goes on the ground. So there I am thinking o crap I have to ride 40k with no water, a dirty ground sheet, and a dirty tent. Great morning. About the only thing that went right was my bug hunting abilities. I was like Rambo cleaning the flies out of my vestibule.

The other pest we had to deal with today were squirrels. Yes they are cute and such, but the cuteness does not appeal to me when it is trying to naw through my top nut bag. Then I would scare off said squirrel and it would go over to Olivier’s bag and start chewing it. Now thinking back on it we should have placed them both in the same area, but in the heat of the moment we were not thinking. Once we sent it back into the woods you could hear it talking to its buddies. Man I have way too much time on my hands if the mornings highlight is a group of squirrels.

Well back to the riding. When we got to White River we stopped in to a Robins Donouts. I have never experienced this before and we seem to keep passing them. If I were a betting man I would bet that we have passed more of them then Tim Horton’s. Well robins did not let down because they had the most delicious double chocolate donout I have ever tasted. And even better I finally got some water.

After doming 1.5 litres of water in the space of 5 minutes you can guess what I had to do next. At the side of the road in a ditch there I am feeling at one with nature when I feel something hit me in the back. It was Charles. He had thrown his banana peal at me and hit me square in the back. Luckily I was done and did not make a mess of myself and we were able to press on.

This is when our luck ran out. From km 68.5 on we were stuck battling heavy rain and lighting. We tried our trick with the shoe covers, but that did not work. We tried out trick of eating and waiting out the storm, but that did not work. We were forced to deal with this storm head on. Because I was the only one with waterproof shoe covers, waterproof pants, and waterproof coat I was happy (ish). The game I played for the last km’s was watch the one dry spot disappear on Olivier’s shorts. Every time he would sit down you would hear it smoosh down. I was thinking was that has to chafe, and man I am glad my feet are dry.

Because of how miserable we were and the fact the only campsite for 50k was a backtrack down the hill out of Wawa we decided to book a motel. Every square inch of this place is covered with something that is either being dried or aired out so that it does not give us some sort of disease. The shower was hot, and the bed is nice and comfy to blog on. I am going to bed honest though I find my sleeping mat as comfortable as my mattress at home, which makes me sleep like a bear.

Just as an update the weird dreams are continuing. Last night I had a dream that I was Mario from the super Mario bros. I was running and jumping collecting power ups and such, but this one had a twist. For some reason I had a power bar that showed how much further I could run and to refill it I had to jump on these daisies, which flung me in the air so I could not get greedy, and take to much energy or I would fall to my death. It means nothing but it just shows how weird things can get on the road.
Trip Distance: 134km
Ride Time: 6:18hr
Avg. Speed: 21.33km/h
Total Distance: 3843km
Total Ride Time: 178hr
Destination: Wawa Ontario