Breakfast was pancakes that was served at the townhouse that four of the riders were staying at. I took some time to clean and lubricate my bike as I didn’t have a chance yesterday because it was in the bike shop. By 8 we had left Lakehead University and headed towards Nipigon.
The route took us close to the Terry Fox memorial. Some riders took the opportunity to see it but as normal I skipped it to get to camp asap to relax and rest my legs. My primary goal of this trip is to cross the country on my bike. Some people on the tour are very gifted physically and can do 100 + kms easily. I am very happy to finish each day, get to camp to eat, shower, and go to bed.
Sam, Arlen, Kerry, John and I formed a paceline shortly after leaving the campus and headed East through the city. We caught up to Chris and Kate around the 10 km mark and drafted them until they pulled over at 30 km. Today there was a pretty strong headwind for most of the day. Arlen and Kerry pulled away and I caught up with them when they pulled over for a break at a Shell gas station & restaurant at 45 km mark. John and Sam met up with us there.
After our break Kerry and Arlen broke off from the group but I managed to keep up this time. Arlen and I were challenging each other for quite a while. I am heavier than Arlen so I go pretty fast downhill and he goes up hills amazingly fast. In most cases he can stand up the entire hill with little effort. We ended up wearing each other out and at the top of one hill, at 78 km, he said “are you guys ready for a break?”. I was about to be dropped off the pace line so I was glad that he wanted to have a break then.
We did the 109 km in under 4.25 hours and beat the truck to the camp. Instead of waiting for the truck to arrive we headed into town to go to Tim Hortons and wait for the truck there. John arrived shortly after and loudly pronounced that “Day Thirty Three is in the book!”.
Julie and Ken arrived at 7 as Ken needed to get a rear wheel on his bike. We was experiencing the same problems that I had with my wheel. By 11:30 his wheel was fixed and him and Julie even took the time to see the Terry Fox memorial. We set up their tents and saved them dinner because we knew they were running late.
On our rest day people where mentioning that there was quite a few challenging hill east of Thunder Bay but today we didn’t see them. A veteran of the tour said that tomorrow will be challenging and he is going to bed early. It is only a 115 km day tomorrow so I will probably eat a hot breakfast and start around 7:30.
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| Red rock out cropping along the route |
