Sunday August 23, 2015

Up and away at 8:00 this morning heading towards Collingwood and my friends place. Aynsley and I used to work together at Meridian Planning.

Owen Sound has some lovely old buildings.

We passed the intersection of 10^th Street East and 4^th Avenue East which is nicknamed “Salvation Corners” for the four limestone churches that are in each corner of the intersection. One block west lies “Damnation Corners”, once the location of four notorious taverns.

We had a good ride on Hwy 6 the shoulder was variable but the traffic wasn’t too bad. There were some nice rolling hills before we got to Meaford. Meaford is the start of the Georgian Trail, it has a crushed limestone base and is a nice route to follow. However, we had opted to stay on the road as we knew it would be quicker and we have cycled the trail a few times.

We cycled into the harbor area and I passed a couple of cyclists. Jorrie (I hope I have spelt that correctly) commented that I looked as if I was going a long way, I told her Nova Scotia and carried on cycling. Usually I would stop and chat, but Ralf had headed out of the parking lot a different way and I had to catch up to him.

We arrived in Meaford and were looking for somewhere to have lunch. It was still a little early and Ralf remembered a place to eat in Thornbury so we carried on for another 13 ks. The Meaford area is a large rural area that grows a lot of apples – hence the big apple.

Thornbury had a farmers market, it looked like it might have a food stand, but they had veges and plants but no food for cyclists. Jorrie and her partner John spotted us and asked if they could take a photo of us. She said after she had spoken to me in Meaford they were trying to catch up with us on the trail so that they could talk to us. She invited us to stay with them in Mississauga, but we are not going that way. The kindness of strangers again, it would have been really nice to sit down and share a glass of wine with her and had a good chat. Jorrie bought us ice-pops instead.

While we were chatting to Jorrie the lady at the ice-pop stand asked a few questions. Her husband arrived with their son and he has a Marinoni as well – nice bike. She told us that the highway near Collingwood is down to one-lane and gravelly due to road widening and we should really take the Georgian Trail from Thornbury. We often take the advice of locals and the trail was hard packed it was a nice ride all the way into Collingwood.

The place Ralf had remembered was no longer there, we headed out of Town on the trail and spotted another roadside café, which had bikes outside. We had a really nice lunch and then carried on along the trail.

The trail has a really good hard-packed limestone base and is easy to ride on with loaded touring bikes. I wouldn’t want to ride on it after a rain, but when it is dry it is nice. There were a lot of other cyclists and runners out on the trail and we greeted everyone with a happy smile.

We arrived at Aynsley’s condo at about 4:15. We inspected the bedroom, bathroom and general facilities before agreeing to stay with her. It passed with flying colours.

Aynsley has a huge shoe selection and we always joked with each other about our shoe preferences. Mine are flat and comfortable, Aynsley’s are heeled and fashionable. We have the same shoe size and I had to try on her newest selection. I could not walk in them. My sister (Wendy) and niece (Kelly) have the same love of shoes.

We had a lovely stay with Aynsley and caught up on all the news of the people we know. We tried not to leave Ralf out of the conversation too often, but it did happen, sorry my love.