the road to young's point

the ride out to young's point is a beautiful addition to the ride to lakefield.

with a little detour west through the town you end up on the outskirts of lakefield.

take the first right turn and you're off on a wide country road that takes you past all sorts of lovely sights including these buildings that caught my eye.

on this particular ride a large red fox crossed the road about thirty feet in front of me.

i wanted to say hello but he moved as smooth as water into the trees to the right

and was completely gone within a moment.

i love the fields, trees and big skies the most!

ride for africycle day ten (part two)

uxbridge to peterborough

100 km (part two)

after riding through the countryside south of lindsay we hooked up with

the rail trail that runs between omemee and peterborough.

i've used this trail many times before, most especially to bike out to omemee

to pick up some of the most very best buttertarts in this universe at ruby's roost.

the coffee there is excellent and the owners are fun and lovely.

so we got on the trail and the feeling of being almost home was palpable for some of us.

some of the riders still had a long way to go -

airplane flights and car drives were still between them and home.

the trail is made of well-packed very fine gravel and makes for excellent riding

if you watch out for the odd soft spot or wash-out.

eventually we found ourselves crossing a completely rebuilt rail trestle that has the most incredible views.

first some posing.

and then some admiring of the view.

and what a view it is!

and then in what seemed like a matter of minutes we were making our way through the streets of downtown peterborough and on our way (well i was definitely on my way) to an americano at the silver bean.

it was so strange to sit in the bean with some of the africycle riders.

the context of connection was so different.

people wandered in and congratulated us which was nice.

but it seemed sort of anti-climactic to be sitting down - the ride at an end.

it was a journey that felt like it should have no end.

in some ways it doesn't.

the work we did raised money for a project that will have lasting and meaningful effects.

friendships were forged on the ride that will also have lasting and meaningful effects.

a few of us left the bean and wandered through an area that was celebrating the annual ribfest event.

to our great fortune we ran into a guy from the steam whistle brewery down in toronto who wanted to know what we were about and when we told him he gave us free beers in fact he said we could have as many as we wanted but with some of us still needing to ride on our bikes to get home we were careful. too bad actually it was really good, cold beer.

my ride through downtown peterborough and out to the west end where i live was hilarious and bizarre. i had two near traffic accidents - both my fault - and both because i was feeling that post major achievement euphoria that just rushes through you.

happily i made it home and my family were happy to see me.

after everything and everyone had settled down i dumped out my clothes.

the smell was so bad!

so really really bad!

rotten swamp. decay. mold.

those would describe the stench.

the picture doesn't tell the story but here's my stuff dumped and waiting to go in the washer.

some of it still smells funky after several washes.

scratch your screen for a scratch and sniff sensation - or not!

here's the google map for the stretch from uxbridge to peterborough.

it doesn't include the extra 10 km i rode in order to get home!

i hope you enjoyed this ride with me.

i've committed to next year's ride already.

somebody said to me "i guess it's like having babies, you forget the pain pretty quickly!"

i guess that must be true.

come back to my cycles blog for more rides - they'll be shorter that's for sure.

for further information about the ride for africycle you should go to the africycle main page

and the ride for africycle page.

ride for africycle day ten (part one)

uxbridge to peterborough

100 km (part one)

waking in a park in the middle of a small town.

no one around.

i stumbled over to the washrooms.

perhaps one too many beers last night i dunno.

it was a good time and i know my body enough to know that once i'm on the bike it'll all wake up and my mind will clear and the day will unfold as it should.

but that first half hour of stumbling back to my tent and lying down and realizing that i had slept with my feet higher than my head because the tent was on a slope.

that i had slept awkwardly because the "pillow" i had made had lumpy stuff in it that was sort of damp.

oh boy - you're how old !!!

one ibuprofen, some coffee, granola, and juice. then i put back a pile of water

and i started the head-clearing process.

it seems that i missed a bit of a meeting somewhere along the line and when the morning ride headed out i was a little behind everyone else so i was headed out of town until my buddy john paul chased me down and told me that we were meeting at africycle world headquarters

on the outskirts of uxbridge - a place that i had passed a couple of kms back.

if you'd like to drop by and have a look at the africycle place for yourself then here's the google map!

here's a blurry pic of john paul in part of their showroom.

it was a strange ride.

i was preoccupied with getting home, seeing my family, seeing the world cup final, having cold beer.

well you name it.

i was preoccupied with it!

the ride between uxbridge and peterborough is really pretty.

it took some fancy navigating, some riding alongside cars travelling at a good clip,

and an eye for the rural beauty we were passing through.

sometimes you just keep an eye on your shadow.