August 27th - (Day 62, Brackley Beach (PEI) to Lower Barney's River (NS))
Welcome ye to the Maritimes
Riding through Quebec was pretty amazing - along the rivers of Ottawa, Richilieu and the St Lawrence, which meant few hills and fortunately, plenty of blessed tailwinds. Trip times were shortened as a result, which for Team Sketchy meant taking longer stops along the way to enable the standard late arrival into camp each evening.
The inhumane humidity left us riding-wise after Montreal, although our rest day in Quebec City was in some of the stuffiest dorm rooms in town, which provided limitied sleeping comforts. But Quebec City was such a fabulous visit that it was such a minor problem that I couldn`t really worry myself over it. You also tend not to notice humidity when passed out.
Following Quebec City we crossed the St Lawrence River by ferry to Levis, then headed up along the River east towards the Gaspe Peninsula, riding through more quaint towns hooked on Catholicism, patisseries and decent coffee. Each home featured weatherboard exteriors, front porches, and always a similar paint theme - white on the walls, with trim colours on the porch and windows that usually matched the roof - be it a loud red, blue or green. The further east we rode we encountered fewer English speaking persons, but by this stage hand signals were pretty much down pat, and most conversations anyway involved me speaking English, with them replying in French, and both of us having complete comprehension of what the other person was saying.
This section included our longest day of the trip - 193km from Trois Pistoles to Causapscal, which turned into a bit of a no-brainer as the wind picked up right behind us and for the first time in a few days we were re-introduced to hill climbing. Like Ontario, there seems to be two seasons in the area: winter and construction. A lot of riding across fresh bitumen, which left me in various states of panic at the thought of breaking into double figures on my flat tyre count. In the late afternoon of this day I had hooked up to ride with Andrew, another member of the three-man Team Oz, and we were taking it very easy into camp, even stopping to walk across a field to witness an interesting silage-wrapping style, which ends up wrapping the round bales of silage in one continuous white-hungarian- sausage-like structure that sits across the field. As we rolled into the final turnoff, some 12km from camp, we both noticed a massive, god-awful hill rising above the valley of the Matipadia River. Just as I uttered, `thank god we`re not climbing that mother`, Andrew says, `wouldn`t that be awesome to ride down!`
I knew what was coming, and there was no way I was going to get out of it. Unfortunately, the hill climbing legs had been left behind in Northern Ontario, and I hadn't really re-introduced them well today, as I was struggling up every hill. It didn't help much that Andrew, on the only mountain bike of the whole 27 rider pack - was a clear contender for the poker-dot jersey. But, I ignored his wheel disappearing up the hill as I doggedly made the ascent - a 2.5km steep shocker of a climb. I must admit it was stunning up the top, with the now very late afternoon sun painting the corn and silage fields with an extra golden hue. All around was solid rolling terrain - the type you'd find if you drove from Warragul to Korrumburra kind of thing.
We stopped briefly for a pep talk and munchie break. Andrew's plan was for me to challenge the tour's fastest official downhill record and to enable that, he planned to have me doing at the very least 40km/h by the time we reached the sign showing a truck pointing down on a 45o angle, indicating a bloody steep descent approaching. From this point it was a 2.5km downhill at around 10%. I did a quick blood test and discovered a 3.6 blood sugar reading. Bloody hell, if the adrenaline wasn't pumping already, it was now with the thought of being too low to attempt this.
But too much stalling was getting in the way of dinner, so Andrew took off, with me on his tail - the execution exactly to plan. I pedalled hard down the first corner, keeping in the middle of the road to avoid the sketchy pavement towards the edge - typical of Quebecan roads. After the cadence became ridiculously high, I tucked in just as the road took a sudden dip - and held on. The rush took my breath away, and the added bonus of hypoglycaemia left me almost too shaky to hold onto the stumps. The bottom approached way too quickly, and knowing that I needed to break hard in time for the stop sign, I applied the break and pulled up, glancing down at my computer to see me slow to a mere 73km/h. I ended up maxing at 81.3km/h, well short of the tour record (86km/h ish). Meanwhile, Andrew behind me on his trusty mountain bike clocked a new PB of 73.
A nice way to end the longest day on the tour.
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Today sees us leave Prince Edward Island (PEI) which we only arrived in yesterday. Its a small, quaint, georgeous, historic and touristy place. And bloody hilly for a lille island. The journey over was via the Confederation Bridge - a 13km stretch of two-laned concrete, privately owned and operated. No bikes are allowed on this section, despite it having one of the best shoulders to ride on since Kristi and I illegally rode Highway 20 into Montreal. This did not stop two of our riders from making an attempt at the crossing. They made it half way before a patrol vehicle pulled them over and took them back to New Brunswick, where they had to wait with everyone else for the shuttle service. A solid pleading of ignorance enabled them to escape the trespassing fine.
Last night a bunch of us rode down to the local Drive In Theatre where they took pity on us and gave us a discount for arriving on bikes. Arrived back at camp by 2am, and seeing as I was on cook duty this morning, I opened up my tarp beside out portable kitchen and slept under the stars until the rain began at 3am. Moved into the shelter for 3 hours before my breakfast shift began at 6am.
Weather has been great, although we'll probably have a nasty cross wind this afternoon as we return to the mainland and enter Nova Scotia.
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That's all for now, bored you all enough perhaps
Not long though, bloody bloody...
thanks for all the arse-based well wishing. It has improved terrifically, actually.
cheers
Monas
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