Trip Logs
Saskatchewan
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Wed Jun 6 | Whitewood, SK | 131 | 2012 |
| So, after a good night's sleep at the Brown's, we got a pretty decent start this morning at about 7:30. Soon afterwards it started to rain and when the big gray clouds rolled in I got pretty miserable. The fog and drizzle persisted and we thought it would be smartest to get off the road and let at least the for clear a bit considering the visibility wasn't great. Adam got a flat front tire and then we pulled off at a truck stop restaurant in Indian head and waited out the weather. After about half an hour we slowly got moving again and got to the end of the divided highway. The two lanes were pretty good, better than I thought they would be because most drivers pulled over to the left to give us lots of room. We pulled off the road a little later for a GORP break (that's when we frantically eat as many nuts and raisins and other good stuff as possible), but we managed to pull onto a mud puddle and Adam's bike got covered in mud. It was actually pretty funny to watch until we started rolling again and mud started flying everywhere. We biked to Grenfell and the sun FINALLY decided to make an appearance, which was a welcome change after biking in the rain for almost three and a half hours. We had lunch outside the supermarket and then Scott did some work on his chain to try and cure the noise that he had heard. We got going again and made it to Broadview for a break. Suddenly, with no warning, there were mosquitoes! I HATE mosquitoes and they LOVE me! Bad news! I was a little sore and we stretched for a bit before continuing. That's when Scott gave Adam and I the scare of our lives. We (Adam and I) continued biking thinking that Scott was right behind. He wasn't and by the time I noticed, we were at least 2kms ahead. I yelled up to Adam to stop. We stopped and waited but no Scott, so we turned around and started biking back towards Broadview. Eventually we got close enough that we could see a bike at the side of the road and a yellow lump next to it. Adam took off and we were both a little worried. Than the yellow lump stood up, we eased up on the pedaling, and made it back to discover that Scott's back rack had come loose. We fixed the rack and continues to Whitewood. We wound up the day in good weather, light winds and just in time for dinner. Camp went up pretty fast, I made me daily phone call home and made dinner, and we went to bed. N.S. | |||
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Tue Jun 5 | Qu'Appelle, SK | 53 | 1882 |
| We were not feeling too
optimistic about this morning when we went to bed last night. The
forecast was for rain and strong winds so when I told Scott to wake
me only if we were going to ride, I didn't expect to be woken. As
luck has it, I woke myself up shortly after 6, but too late to see
Ann off to the airport. The weather didn't seem as bad as we had expected so we sat around for awhile humming and hawing about whether today was a go or no-go. Eventually, as our indecisiveness peaked at about 8am, Gary offered to drive me to the highway. It was windy, but not TOO windy, still no decision and still sitting around the kitchen table feeling lazy. Eventually we decided that if we were ever going to get out of Regina it had to be today, so we packed up and left Gail and Gary's at around 11. Sure enough, we got to the highway and the winds that I had previously felt from the car were pretty ugly. We crawled along the Trans-Can for about 10 kms before running into another cyclist. The "Legal Kid", Clayton, is 14 years old and biking to Ottawa and then Washington to deliver petitions to Chretien and Bush concerning children's rights within divorce proceedings. His website is www.legalkids.com and he's biking with his dad (who drives in front in an RV). After leapfrogging with the legal kids entourage all morning we were about to stop for lunch when a white van pulled onto the shoulder ahead and three guys spilled out. Turns out that Troy, Cary and Philippe are also biking across Canada and had stopped in Regina for a repair on Troy's bike (he broke 13 spokes when his front rack went through his wheel - yikes!). Troy's family lived down the road just past McLean and he invited us for dinner at his place. About 30 kms down the road we notices Tory's white van parked at the end of his drive and pulled into his place. We had lasagna for dinner with the three guys, Troy's three brothers and his parents and then crashed for the night at their place. We didn't end up making it very far today but its always nice running into other cyclists and even better to spend the evening together! Goodnight. N.S. :) |
|||
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Mon Jun 4 | Regina, SK |
Rest Day |
1829 |
| What was everybody saying about doing the trip west to east so that we get tailwinds? Somebody forgot to tell Saskatchewan! :) As you probably guessed, we were winded in again today. We all got up at 6:00 am like usual, and since it was hard to tell what the wind was like from a residential area, Gary drove Scott and I out to the highway to check things out. Once we got there things weren't looking too good, so we headed back to the house and hung out for another day with my Mom, Gail, and Gary. The forecast isn't too good for tomorrow, but I guess we'll have to wait and see. Maybe we should buy another "Tailwinds" cake! Bye for now, Adam | |||
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Sun Jun 3 | Regina, SK |
Rest Day |
1829 |
| Somehow I was appointed to wake up early
this morning and check the wind with strict instructions only to
wake the guys if we could ride. I woke up, checked the
weather network and the flag outside my window, and then crawled
back into bed. Yup, no riding for us today. I
managed to sleep a few more hours and then Ann and I went for
breakfast down in the hotel restaurant. Adam and Scott
decided that they would take advantage of our wind day and sleep
until well after 10, abusing the Sunday brunch for an hour or so
before finishing their packing jobs. We arranged a late
checkout in our room which gave us all some more nap time and then
we dragged our stuff down to the lobby and waited for Adam and Ann's
cousins to give us a call. In the meantime I checked
email and the three of them read the paper and caught up. Gail,
Ann's cousin who lives in Regina, came to the hotel to pick-up Ann
and give us directions on how to ride to their house. We
biked, mostly loaded, to Gail and Gary's and then chatted on the
back deck for an hour or so before dinner. We had a BBQ
and then - believe it or not - our first campfire of the trip on
their back deck where they have a Franklin wood stove. It was great
but the sad news is that the forecast for tomorrow isn't great. I'm
starting to wonder if a summer vacation in Regina is in the works. N.S. |
|||
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Sat Jun 2 | Regina, SK |
Rest Day |
1829 |
| Today was certainly a treat! Waking
up this morning in a comfy bed for the second night in a row was
great! Ann and I phoned over to Adam and Scott's room to find that
they were, surprise, already awake. The four of us walked
over to the Second Cup for breakfast and then spent some time
wandering around the mall. Scott bought a computer disk,
I made a trip to the drug store and then we all met up to walk back
to the hotel where the three of us split up for the day while Ann
did our laundry (aren't moms great!). Scott ended up
spending most of his day doing a minor repair to his bike, checking
e-mail at the internet cafe, and then heading to the library. Adam
and I went to a bike shop on the east end of town to buy
a chain whip (the tool needed to fix a broken spoke - in case that
ever happens again), then to the grocery store to buy food for lunch
and for the road, lunch in the park, library for e-mail, and finally back to the hotel to relax. We were treated again to a nice dinner by Ms. Patteson (Ann) - not as fancy as last night - and then we packed for tomorrow. The forecast seems sketchy...weather network is predicting 45km winds from the east of all places which wouldn't be ride-able...we'll have to wait and see. I could have sworn Adam told me that prevailing winds in the prairies were from the west when we were planning this trip - seems we're witnessing very unusual weather. Go figure! N.S. |
|||
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Fri Jun 1 | Bussed to Regina, SK |
Rest Day |
1829 |
| We were up at 5:30 to make sure we were ready well ahead of the bus at 6:15. While Tompkin is lovely, we didn't want to have to wait for the bus that afternoon. We moved our gear and nicely 'boxed' bikes out to the front of the gas station and waited. We hung out with a guy on this way home from Whistler whose car had coasted into the gas station and he was waiting for the pumps to open. We knew he was a skier or snowboarder because of the deep goggle tan he had and the cast on his wrist. The bus arrived, and luckily it had a little cargo trailer behind it. We had worried that we would have a hard time getting our bikes onto the bus, but the trailer was mostly empty and the driver wasn't concerned at all. We dozed and played a bit of chess on the way to Swift Current. The bus make lots of stops along the route to deliver packages and newspapers. In Swift Current we had a 40 stop; we bought our tickets and ordered some breakfast at the little diner in the bus depot. The lady from the ticket counter came and found us and said she could offer us a better price using different student cards than she had used, so after our breakfast arrived and we hastily gulped it down, we redid the sale and rushed back to the bus. We continued to doze, read, sleep and/or ignore the bad movie that was playing on the TVs. We made it to Regina around lunch time and set to work rebuilding our bikes after the mild disassembly we had done to package them. Adam and Nadia didn't have much trouble, but my handlebars don't go on and off as easily as theirs. We chatted with the guys working on the loading dock that we had commandeered. We walked over to the hotel and were pleased to find that Adam's Mom had already made all the arrangements and we didn't have to do much to get a room. The room was across the hall from hers and was gorgeous and spacious. We went to the nearby bike shop and got Adam's spoke fixed. The guys at Western Cycle were really nice and helpful. We looked for a tool that we found our version of to have been inadequate. They didn't have the chain-whip, but phoned all the other bike shops in the city and found one for us. With repaired bike in hand, and a heavy duty tire tube for me, we headed back to the hotel. They kindly put our bikes in their storage room, and we headed out to lunch and the only internet café in Regina. We went back to meet Adam's Mom, get showered and cleaned up. Mrs. Patteson took us out to a wonderful and fancy dinner at this restaurant in this great old building. It was absolutely gourmet, thanks Mrs. Patteson. Back at the hotel the four of us tried to watch a movie, but couldn't quite get the system to show the movie we wanted, so we ended up talking and laughing and deciding it was too late to watch a movie anyways. We then settled into a very pleasant evening in comfy beds and clean sheets. Lots of kilometers today, but somehow the odometer didn't seem to change... -SK | |||
| Date | Destination | Distance (km) | Total (km) |
| Thu May 31 | Tompkin, SK | 104 | 1829 |
| Hi everybody, Adam here. Today was definitely our craziest day so far. It started out relatively normally, except we got confused by a phantom time-zone change. Our maps showed that at the Alberta-Saskatchewan border the time changes. So before going to bed, we set our watches ahead an hour and expected it to be around dawn when the alarm would go off the next morning (at 6:00). Only when the alarm went off it was still pitch dark outside. Not wanting to get up before sunrise, I reset my alarm for 7:00 and went back to sleep. What felt like hours later I woke up to sunshine and Nadia up and packing up her stuff. My watch said 6:18. I got up too, and it wasn't until we were all having breakfast that we realized that Scott had set his alarm for 2:30 in the morning so that he could watch the stars. I guess that's what woke the rest of us up when it was still dark out. So we got going and after riding across the border, and another 40 km, stopped at a Saskatchewan tourist centre. That's when we found out that our map was wrong, and that Saskatchewan time is the same as in Alberta! Doh! I promise that we'll get at least one time-change right before the end of this trip. While we were at the tourist office, we met a nice man that publishes a local newspaper with his wife. So we did a quick interview, and he took some pictures, before we got rolling towards Swift Current. That's when IT happened. "It" was a little prairie dog that was sitting in the middle of the road. At the last moment it looked up, saw me, and ran back towards the grass on the right-hand side of the highway. Don't worry, it made it. What these things lack in smarts, they make up for with speed. This was evident when I realized that it was now running parallel to me, about two feet away, and keeping up! That's when it suddenly bolted to the left, right underneath my front wheel. We're not totally sure that it was killed, but it was pretty likely. Me and my bike have a mass of 120 kg (we checked at the weigh station, remember?) and I was traveling at about 30 km/h forward. The prairie dog as a mass of, maybe, 0.150 kg, and was traveling at an equal speed perpendicular to my bike when it was hit. Therefore, the Law of Conservation of Momentum states that things weren't looking too good for the prairie dog. Sadly, we made our apologies to the universe and continued on our way. Apparently the Universe didn't accept our apology, as the road turned making our nice tail-wind a stiff cross-wind. In fact, it blew both Nadia and myself off the road and into the grass on more than one occasion. As we were peddling though the wind, I though that my rear wheel was felling kind of sluggish. I look down expecting to find a flat and instead discovered that my rear rim was badly warped. Upon further inspection, I found that one of my spokes had busted, leading to the warped wheel (there's a LOT of weight on that back tire). Apparently the Universe was kind of mad at us. No problem, since replacing a spoke and Turing the wheel wouldn't be that hard to do. That's when we found that our wrench didn't quite fit around the Lockring remover for my cassette. That was OK, because the handle of Scott's headset wrench fit nicely inside the middle of the Lockring remover, so we could still hold it in place. That's when we discovered that the mini chain-whip that we were carrying wouldn't be able to provide enough torque to remove the cassette. If you can't remove the cassette, you can't replace the spoke. But we were in luck, since we found a way to bend one of Nadia's longer replacement spokes so that it could be threaded onto my rear wheel without removing the cassette. Score! That's when we found out that the spare spoke's diameter was just a tiny be bigger than my old spoke's, and that it wouldn't thread into the old spoke's nipple. Apparently the Universe was downright pissed at us. Luckily, we were only about 3 km from Tompkin, SK, so we walked our bikes to the town to figure out what to do. We talked to a bike shop in Swift Current, which told us that they didn't have any spokes (?) but if we got there between 6:00 and 9:00 that night, they MIGHT have a nipple that would fit our replacement spoke, but couldn't be sure. That sounded kind of sketchy, especially considering we were 80 km out of Swift Current. There is a bus twice daily at 6:20 am and 2:45 pm, so we just missed the last bus. The guy at the shop told us that if he couldn't fix it then we would have to go to either Moose Jaw (230 km away) or Regina (300 km). With that information we decided to spend the night at the motel behind our gas station, and grab the 6:20 bus to Regina. It didn't make much sense to get of in Moose Jaw, only to risk the shop not being able to do the repair. It turned out though that the motel was closed, and up for sale. Luckily for us the owner lived right across the highway, and agreed to open it for us. The next step was to get our bikes ready for the bus the next day. Greyhound Canada insists that all bikes on busses be in a bike box. The only flaw to this policy is that they don't sell boxes at all their pick-up points. The woman on the phone asked if we could get a box from a local bike shop. We pointed out that if there was a local shop, we wouldn't need the bus. She then suggested that we put our bikes inside our hockey bags. Right. Nadia talked some more with the woman, who told us that while she understood our situation, her supervisor said that there was no way we would be allowed to take our bikes on the bus unless they were packaged. About that time, Scott came running out of the gas station with a idea. Inside they sold large vinyl tarps and Duct Tape. The plan was to wrap each bike up like a present in the tarp, and wrap it in approximately a third of a roll of Duct Tape (did we mention that Red Green is our hero?). It wasn't as good as a box, but we figured that it would be as good as using the hockey bags like Greyhound suggested. After grabbing dinner in the only restaurant in Tompkin, we took the front wheels off each bike and wrapped them up in a lot of plastic and tape, before going to bed ready for the bus the next morning. Like I said, today was exciting, and pretty hilarious at times, too. Hopefully tomorrow isn't quite as exciting or hilarious! :) See you all later, Adam | |||
