Thursday, January 2, 2014

Carrying Place to Ivy Lea, 158km: Hello family, did you miss me?



Today was the day, I was cycling home! I was the only cyclist on the tour in which their home would be 5km from camp. My parents, cousin and aunt were going to visit me, I was so excited! I decided against actually cycling home because I felt being at home and sleeping in my own bed would break up the tour so that cycling home would be part 1 and cycling to St. John’s would be part 2. I did not want to break the tour up in parts and so I stayed at camp that evening.

Unfortunately I was on galley duty so Louise and I wanted to leave early to get to camp early so that I could see my family and have dinner ready for the group on time. Louise and I have been notorious for stating that we would leave early; however, we would leave half an hour later than planned. But today it was different. The night before we got our sandwiches and snacks together and that morning we woke up early, had breakfast and left camp at 6:50am, 5minutes later than planned. We were the first to leave camp which impressed ourselves and other members of the group.

We managed to cycle 70km before we were passed by the speedy riders of the group which was pretty awesome and we were not met by other riders until we reached Kingston which was 115km into the ride.

The ride was great as the weather was nice and there wasn’t that much traffic on the roads. Louise and I reached Kingston at 1:30pm where we stopped for homemade ice cream at White Mountain in downtown Kingston. The previous evening I was telling all the riders they needed to stop at this ice cream shop because it is so yummy. When we reached the ice cream store Alain, Eric, Danny, Neil, Elaine, Rob and Yukon Greig met up with us soon after and we all enjoyed the tasteful wonders of White Mountain ice cream. After that point I knew exactly how to get to camp as I was in my own territory :)



When we reached Gananoque I gave Louise a tiny tour along the water, showing her the Gananoque Inn, the playhouse and my secondary school. Right when we left Gananoque I noticed a van had stopped at the information centre and lo and behold my parents and brother were there cheering Louise and I on with mini Canadian flags, it was fantastic. I had the hugest smile on my face, it was such a nice gesture from them :)

My parents and brother met Louise and I at camp and they hung out with us for the remainder of the evening and my cousin, her partner, and my aunt came during dinner. Although I was on galley duty my crew was awesome, allowing me to slack off so that I may spend time with my family. As well, other members of the group helped our crew get dinner going and my Mom even helped out :) Since we had so much assistance we actually had dinner ready too early which was hilarious because we typically served it too late.

My Mom and cousin brought with them a whole bunch of goodies for dessert and the cycling group was ecstatic. Everyone had one plate full of dinner and another plate full of desserts. My Mom and cousin ended up being the best dessert providers of all the family members from the group who visited us; it was fantastic, my Mom was so happy when I told her that.

It was an amazing evening and it was such a great boost to see my family and have them give me tonnes of support to continue on and complete the tour.

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