Interesting

Day 67. Lindsay to Bellaville. 87 mi. 4,175 miles TTD. 3070 feet elevation. The weather was good, and the wind was mostly cooperative.

That box in my lap is a sausage-and-scrambled-egg box from… You guessed it, Tim Hortons. There was one just a kilometer from my motel, so that’s how I started my day, trying to be a good Canadian. The scrambled egg boxes are quite good and relatively cheap. Maybe I should worry, but interestingly, they’re ready in about 30 seconds.

After breakfast, I continued through town until I came to a rail trail, which headed southeast. When I first came upon it, interestingly, there was a detour sign, which made me panic, but fortunately, it was just for 100 yards. Detours and closures are the bane of bike touring. I had my fair share of detours today. This was just a prelude.

The bike trail was lovely. It took me many miles. That is not a tunnel in the picture above, but just vegetation. That type of growth makes the trip on a trail feel like you are in the middle of nowhere. In fact, when I finally came upon pavement, I realized I must be near a town, and sure enough, there was a town hidden behind the trees.

I stopped at one of the convenience stores for some refueling and, interestingly, found this wonderful treat. Perhaps only my children and friends who have been to my home will recognize this treat. It was one that Gloria used to make frequently on Sunday nights and seemed to be a traditional treat from Southern Alberta.

The trail was wonderful, crossing several large rivers and passing lovely little towns along the banks. But all good things come to an end. Eventually, I came upon a trail closed because a trestle was out. Interestingly, there were no rerouting suggestions or detours.

This creates a huge dilemma. Do I go forward and hope that there’s enough of the trestle to cross? If the trestle is completely gone, would I be able to walk across whatever the trestle was meant to cross? Will I pedal for several miles and then have to backtrack? In this case, I decided to reroute and found roads that bypassed the trestle, adding only a couple of miles. I was then back on the rail trail.

A few photos won’t do the town of Peterborough justice. It’s a relatively large community; in fact, large enough to have a homeless population. The city has made good use of the Otonabee River, which runs through it. The park along the river is beautiful. The restrooms next to the splash pad have wonderful flush toilets, which I’ve pointed out previously are critical for those of us with Giardia riding through towns on bicycles. They even had a kids’ triathlon going on while I pedaled through the park.

It’s difficult to appreciate what’s going on here, but if you look closely, there is a mechanical device under that piece of road across the water from the end of this bridge. That mechanical device is used to swing that piece of road/bridge so that it would abut the bridge. As I was pedaling down the trail, I came to a fence that I couldn’t open and a bridge behind it. I couldn’t quite tell, looking down the bridge, what was going on, and there was nothing to suggest I shouldn’t trespass. Two young men stood on the bridge, looking at the mechanism above. Interestingly, as I prepared to walk down the bridge past the gate, they jumped off, which made me wonder how I would cross it. In fact, after walking around the gate and down to the end of the bridge, I was grateful there was a gate because I would have ridden right off the end of the bridge. Once again, I had to reroute, but fortunately it wasn’t long and just took me down to another bridge, a kilometer or two away.

The new bridge, in the town of Hastings, also swings 90° to allow boats through. I had to wait a few minutes while this chunk of the bridge rotated, but it was interesting to watch. And the couple I was standing next to in the picture was also interesting. As I talked to him, his standard response was pish posh.

I started seeing fields of sunflowers. These are such interesting plants, as every single flower appears to be facing the exact same direction. Interestingly, I think they move as they follow the sun across the sky each day. I didn’t pick any seeds, but I thought about it.

Just so you understand why I prefer the rail trail over the hilly countryside of Ontario, I took this picture halfway down a hill I had climbed up on the other side. It’s not as big as a mountain in British Columbia, but a few of these add up quite quickly to serious elevation.

Finally, to end my interesting day, they gave me a room for someone with a disability. Maybe I was wobbling more than I realized when I checked in. Some of you may hate me for keeping the disabled room, but I didn’t choose it. In any case, it turned out to be a useful benefit, as I was able to roll my bike right into the shower. So now I’m not only sleeping with my bike but also showering with it. I might ask for a disabled room at motels from now on.

It turns out there is a church nearby, and I’ll be able to go to church tomorrow. Then a day of rest and rerouting, as I’m now completely off the GNBR route and have to figure out my own.