Dryden to Taylor’s Cove, 161km: And the gales blew

I awoke in the middle of the night to gusting winds. The winds were ferocious; I felt a tornado was billowing through camp. My tent was pressing down on me in response to the strength of the winds. I was terrified. I thought my tent poles would break and I was going to blow away. I opened my tent to look if anyone else was outside, but all tents appeared quiet. I felt so alone. I zipped my tent door closed and told myself to calm down and go back to sleep.

In the morning I viewed the damage. The outhouses were ruined and trees had fallen. The tent poles of Adam’s tent broke and Dan and Joyce’s tent was soaked and ruined. A few others had a bit of water go into their tents but other than that we survived. No one was hurt but nobody had a good sleep. I also learned everyone had been a bit scared so I hadn’t been alone in my terror. There was no running water which worried me. Today we would be following Route 502 for 160km and there was not a single service centre along the route. I had not filled my water bottles last night and so I did not have any fluids. However, we were incredibly lucky because a retired OPP officer came by and took our water jugs and filled them up for us at his home. I was so grateful for his generosity because riding 160km with no water would have been a problem.

I set out with Louise and Erik and so began out ride to cycle all of Route 502. On our map, Bud said the terrain was generally easy all day with very little traffic. On both counts he was quite wrong. The terrain was very hilly; it was up and down all day. I think one hill was 11%; short but still grueling. There were also tonnes of vehicles with motor boats passing us; it was as if a fishing tournament was going on.

During the ride we witnessed the damage of the storm. At one point we had to avoid a couple small trees which had fallen on the road.

For our breaks we simply stopped on the side of the road and sat on rock outcrops. We met Bob along the way who was laying on his back with his legs propped up on a guard rail just relaxing, it was funny :) Adam stopped for us during our ride to fill our water bottles which he did for all the riders.

At one point during the ride I was looking at the sky and the clouds were getting quite dark and the wind was picking up. I was afraid we were going to get stuck in another storm, but luckily it passed.

We finally made it to Route 11 where our campsite, Taylor’s Cove, was located. Taylor’s Cove was a significant improvement from last night’s campsite. Although there was only one bathroom and shower, it was clean. The campsite was also located on a beautiful lake and it was a peaceful evening with only a breeze reminding us of the strong winds which disrupted our sleep just last night.