Today was the first of two days in which we would be cycling
a century ride. The day began late because I was on galley crew and thus I had
to prepare breakfast. Everyone left pretty early though because they wanted to
get the day going.
I left Portage with Louise and Erik. Today would be the
flattest day on the whole trip and we would be cycling through the city of Winnipeg. The ride
to Winnipeg was challenging. The kilometers seemed to be going by so slowly yet
time was passing quickly. Louise was having a difficult time staying motivated,
but we eventually made it to the city outskirts. We stopped at the Principle
Meridian marker which was the original reference point for surveying the west,
beginning in 1871.
On the outskirts we met up with Alain and Fred. Together we
navigated our way through Winnipeg. It was fun to be able to navigate because
cycling through the Prairies had largely involved following a few straight
roads. Navigating through Winnipeg broke up an otherwise monotonous day and
provided the challenge of not getting lost.
Getting through Winnipeg spanned 40km. It was 11 o’clock
when we reached the outskirts and we decided to wait for lunch. At
approximately kilometer 105 I felt a bit woozy. I checked my watch and
discovered why, it was already 2 o’clock and we still hadn’t had lunch. Plus we
still had 65km to go! We took a much needed lunch break to rejuvenate our
energy. After that we were back on the bikes, trying to get out of the city. Navigating
through Winnipeg was fun; however, due to the length of the day all we had time
for was cycling and no site seeing, which was unfortunate.
We finally made it out of the city and had 30km to go. After
leaving Winnipeg we had to cycle on Garven Road (Route 213) to get to
Beausejour. There was a section of Garven Road that was scary. There was a
quarry on the road and so there were a lot of trucks going back and forth from
the quarry. The trucks would get pretty close because it was a busy section of
road and they did not make much room for us because of oncoming traffic (and who
wants to slow down for cyclists). We went on the shoulder but it was sand/gravel
and we had to cycle up a tiny hill so I was swerving. I got extremely
frustrated and angry because I did not feel safe in the slightest. Once we got
over the hill and past the quarry, truck traffic greatly decreased which was an
immense relief.
Once we reached Route 12 to get to Beausejour traffic was
much quieter. We made it to Beausejour at 7:30pm. It had been an extremely long
day but we finally made it to camp :) Tomorrow would be another long day, but we were
going into a rest day and we would be leaving the Prairies and entering the Canadian Shield as well as Ontario, my home province! :)
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