Thursday August 20, 2015

We woke up to rain again. Dave our host had to leave at 7:30 am and said we could wait out the rain until it clears up. We checked the forecast and it was supposed to be raining all day. Sheila said we could stay another day, but I got the feeling that they would prefer us to carry on our trip. Ralf wanted to hang out for another day. I spoke to him quietly and told him they were just being polite, by inviting us to stay.

We headed out in the rain much to Ralf’s chagrin, but when the rain stopped he was glad we had opted to ride that day.

The ride to South Baymouth was going to be 96 kms and I knew we would have a headwind or at least winds that were not tail winds.

We met four touring cyclists before we came into Little Current. They said they are cycling across Canada four days at a time! They were enjoying the great tail-wind.

The wind was brutal today, coming from every direction except from behind. We had gusts of up to 35 ks per hour it was a tough ride.

We saw this beautiful stone with a plaque on it that read: \”Franklin Delano Roosevelt 32^nd President of the United States of America during his vacation in Canada immediately prior to the historic Quebec conference fished these waters August 1^st to August 8^th 1943\”. I guess I should know what the historic Quebec conference was all about but I don’t.  Either that, or nothing happened here before August 1, 1943 and not much since that day.

We were coming through Birch Island, which is an Indian Reserve, when I noticed that the British flag was hung the wrong way. There were two guys outside of the band office. I told Ralf that the flag was up side down, he said go tell the guys.

I did, I said “Sorry to bother you but the British flag is upside down.” They walked me over to the flag poles and asked me which way it was supposed to go. I showed them the fat white strip and told them that should be in the bottom corner, closest to the flagpole. They promptly took the flag down and hung it the right way.

Ralf was laughing and shaking his head, he took photos of them doing it. One of the guys said to me “What\’s he doing – taking a photo of an Indian working” I couldn’t stop laughing, I said “No he is taking a photo of his wife who keeps telling people the flag is upside down and you are the only guys who has ever corrected the flag when I told them it is hanging upside down”. Nice guys.

When we got to the swing bridge at Little Current there was a motor bike in front of us with two Austrians who were riding across Canada. She was amazed at how much we were carrying.

We got into Little Current and had a second breakfast/lunch.

Then we headed back into the wind, Ralf took the lead all the way as Highway 6 had a bit of a shoulder and the traffic was not too busy.

We stopped at a lookout point and met Lisa and Sage. A woman who is cycling across Canada to raise money for the Ride to Conquer Cancer with her dog in the trailer, her total weight that she is carrying is over 300lbs including trailer dog and panniers. That is crazy.

We were only half-way and it was already 2:00, once again back into the wind.

We arrived in South Baymouth at 5:20 pm, the ferry to Tobermory left at 5:50pm. We hadn’t planned on taking the ferry today but if we got on it we would be able to have a full rest day in Tobermory tomorrow, save the cost of a motel in South Baymouth and spending two nights in Tobermory. We lined up with the motorcyclists and the two Austrians were in front of us. She couldn’t believe that we had caught up to them, saying \”Where\’s your motor\”?

We went straight to the cafeteria to have our supper. Chicken pot pie, mashed potatoes and corn with a bread roll for $8.75, good price and it tasted good as well.

However, it was a very rough crossing and within minutes people were rushing for the barf bags. At one point one of the women in the cafeteria shouted to another crew member “I need more barf bags”.

Ralf and I were fine.

We got off the ferry and headed to the first motel – no vacancies, second motel – no vacancies! Crap it was 7:45 pm and we had nowhere to sleep. Fortunately the Tourist Info office was open she told me there was a bunkie (small cabin) available at Mermaids Dream across the road. By the time we got there it was gone, back to Tourist Office for a campsite, she called the campsite to make sure it was still available. The campsite was 5 ks down the road, we headed out with lights on, as it was getting dark.  We have never pitched the tent in the dark before.

About 200 metres down the road a lady stopped her car in front of us and told us she knew someone who had a cottage to rent that night. We followed her another 200 metres and asked the owner how much to rent for the night? He responded $250 per night, but would give it to us for $140. We took it, the cottage has two bedrooms and can sleep 5 adults and has 2 roll-away beds as well. As we were getting our bags into the cottage it started to rain.

Tomorrow we are staying in a motel in the downtown core, only $80.