Well the threat of a thunderstorm last night passed without any sign of lightning, for which I was very thankful. There was quite a bit of wind however, which kept me up most of the night. All the same though, when 7:30am arrived and I got out of bed, I felt surprisingly refreshed and ready for another day of riding.
Following a small breakfast at A&W, Dave and I said farewell to Dryden and headed for Ignace. The sun was shining again, and all was good. The first portion of the trip went without incident, and then we saw a sign saying there was construction for the next 23km. That was when the cycling became interesting!
The first obstacle was stripped asphalt which had grooves that were almost the perfect width to get our tire caught in and throw us to the ground... riding over that stuff was certainly a challenge! Next, we had one lane traffic where each direction gets their turn while the other has to wait. Now, this seems like it would be a rather easy thing to co-ordinate with the other sign holder radioing to the other that there were two cyclists coming through, and then they would know not to let the other traffic through until we passed. However, on several occasions we were faced with oncoming traffic and nowhere to go except off onto the gravel alongside the road... not a pleasant thing at all!
Once we finally navigated the stretch of construction we were able to continue peacefully for the remainder of the trip to Ignace. The only problem I was left to face was my ever increasing hunger! The A&W breakfast was not enough to keep me going, and after about 80km my body began to shutdown... it was all I could do just to get to Ignace.
When we reached Ignace the first task at hand was to eat, so we found a little restaurant and ordered a large meat lovers pizza. To top it all off, I had a hot brownie mudslide, which was absolutely delicious! After lunch, we headed to the library so that we could check email and surf the web for a bit. Finally, we picked up some food for supper and the road, and then headed to the campground.
The first sign that we were in for a long night was when the only three available campsites were mere feet from the lake with no trees acting as a barrier. This didn't bode well as the wind was blowing pretty hard, thus we had to actually tie the tent down. Next, as we looked around, no more than 50 feet away we spotted a live bear trap! Great!!! Supposedly there were a couple of bears spotted a few days ago on the other side of the grounds. Hopefully they do not return tonight.
As we lit up the ol' propane burner to boil some hotdogs, a light shower provided an ominous outlook to our gourmet meal. Sure enough, after barely cooking the first four hotdogs, the trusty propane tank flickered and then extinguished itself as the last bit of gas was expelled. It had done us so well up to this point, but unfortunately we are now in a position where we may not be able to get propane until we reach Thunder Bay.
Just to top things off, as I was returning from washing up in the bathroom, a light shower was developing. Then as I was getting into the tent,the sky opened up and it just poured! I jumped into the tent and battened down the hatches as fast as I could. So I sat there as the wind desperately tried to blow me away and the rain beat down. Luckily, the rain only lasted for about 10 minutes and then the sun returned.
So now I am lying in the tent hoping the rain is done for the night and the bears stay away for one more night. Tomorrow we will head for Upsala and after that, Thunder Bay. By the looks of it, we should be in Sudbury in less than two weeks, which I am really looking forward to!