DAY 36 OF THE AROUND THE BLOCK MC RIDE - AUG5,08

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August 5, 2008 - Tuesday - Day 36
USA/MEXICO/CANADA
DOUBLE CROSS COUNTRY
& THE TRANSCANADA HIGHWAY
  -- OR BUST - SUMMER 2008
Miles Today - 300    - Total Miles -   8381
Winnipeg,Manitoba,Canada to Ignace,Manitoba,Canada
(-staying at The White Otter Inn   -)
(Manitoba)
- SYNOPSIS -

  After I finished breakfast in the little dining area in the motel, I engaged three Harley guys who were eating. Nice fellows and we traded stories about our rides. The handsomest of the three said he had gotten a ticket the other day. The other two were ahead and he was catching up and got nabbed. It was the first mc guy that I heard of getting a ticket, and I felt bad for him.  He was sort of down in the dumps about it, but I took ten bucks out of my wallet and paid for his breakfast, and despite protestations from him, I could tell that picked him up.
  And then it was out on the highway through town. That didn't take long, and soon I was out on the bigger three-lane highway. I noticed that the further I move east, the more signs are in English and French.
   ***
   The last time I had been in Winnipeg was when I flew in and bicycled out of the airport on my Winnipeg-to-Lincoln,Nebraska bicycle trip.(The reason for that trek was to get the states, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Nebraska!)  That trip had many many interesting aspects to it including touring a palace made entirely of corn, a visit with and couple day ride with a former student, and the very very toughest day of any day in all my bicycling career. It was only 65 miles south into Oakes, North Dakota, but it was entirely against a strong cold wind and storm. And no place to stop and even lean a bike the whole way. Now, THAT was tough pedaling!
***
    An odd-looking building on the way out of Winnipeg was the Royal Canadian Mint.
    I had been wondering whether I was halfway through Canada when I saw a sign by the road announcing: THIS IS THE LONGITUDINAL CENTER OF CANADA!  I was so sorry that I wasn't able to get a picture.
    Didn't go by many farms today - but there were acres and acres of trees in probably thousands of square miles of forests.
   140 miles out of Winnipeg I passed through Kenora. It was a gorgeous little town with a large lake beside it.  In fact, there are hundreds, probably thousands of lakes, gigantic and tiny, in the area I rode through today.  And I might have passed right next to half of them.
   Each little town seems to have a museum of some sort. What a clever little way of advertising Dryden's history museum!  They had a billboard exclaiming, "Life In The Past Lane."
   Just as I passed a sheep farm in the early afternoon, two police cruisers came up on my left and passed me with siren blaring.  I've mentioned before about hating to be surprised on the road. But that was quite a surprise there!
   I chatted with a whole bunch of folks at the gas stop in Dryden. After hearing about the extent of the trip and then admiring the bike, one guy commented with a smile, "You got the toy to do it!"  Another wasn't so excited about doing such a trip on two wheels - he noted with a laugh, "I'd rather do that in a JET!"
   There were a lot more long distance bicyclists on the roads today than other days.
   By around 4pm, I was way short of goal, and felt badly about that, but I knew I just couldn't go on with any good margin of safety.  My concentration was shot, my eyes were drooping, and my head just wasn't clear.  I was "seeing" things on the side of the road that weren't there, and my reaction time was suffering.  So at the next town, Ignace, I decided to have a meal and see how I felt. Well, I learned that there was really no place to stay between Ignace and Thunder Bay, which was my original target stop. That would be another 100+ miles down the road.  So I would have had to go all the way tonight, and with the time change in a few miles I wouldn't have gotten in until about 8:30pm.  It wouldn't have been a problem with getting a room since it wasn't the weekend, and the national holiday was over.  But who knows if I would have made it.  So I decided to stay in Ignace.  Ignace had about 20 businesses on each side of the highway, and as far as I could tell, that was it.
  The young couple who had been following me much of the way on a sport bike came in to the gas stop right after me. He was a tall guy and she was short. They were riding two up.  I said that was quite a patch of road we had just enjoyed, and they agreed.
  After a Subway sandwich, and learning that the water was undrinkable in this town because of too much iron in it, I popped across the street to the White Otter Inn. It advertised newly renovated cozy rooms, good rates, and internet service.  Well, everything was mostly right except that the internet service was down for the community, and they were working on getting it back. I nudged them along. By mid-evening, it still wasn't working.
  I met one of the owners, Albert. After turning down coffee, and nixing a beer, he asked me, "Are you a friend of Bill's?"  With a quizzical look, I told him I didn't know what he meant. And then he explained that when someone is a member of AA they don't ask if someone is an alcoholic, they ask if the person is a friend of one of the founders, Bill. Albert said he'd been dry for 9 years, and I congratulated him with a firm handshake. I asked what prompted him to quit and he said he was about to lose everything in his life…
  Albert asked me if I had seen any moose. He said that around here a lot of accidents were caused by animals. In fact, 79% of the last 65 motor vehicle accidents involved deer or moose.
  After getting most of my gear up to the room, which had motel-provided bottles of water, I went down and spent about an hour of quality time with the Vulcan.  It was looking good before, but I got it about back to showroom total shine!  A number of people walked by and commented about how good it looked - and I told them about one of my goals being to roll in on the last day, and have someone say, "It just looks too clean to have gone those many miles."  It always makes me smile when I think of that.
  I also gave my helmet and shield a good cleaning.
  Without emails to catch up on I was able to concentrate on finishing up yesterday's and today's journal entries, downloading picture files, bringing the trip map up to date, and studying the route for the days ahead.
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To view photos from past days, you can check out
http://www.photostockplus.com/home.php?tmpl=45&user_id=42473&event=196141
    Some folks have reported trouble with this link, but most find that it works. Sometimes it takes two tries… Also, you can check out the past day journal entries by going to joelperlish.com, and clicking on the appropriate trip down at the bottom on the left hand corner, by going to http://www.joelperlish.com/blog/blog.html... and/or you can just email me back and I'll put you on the daily send list.  (I especially recommend days 10,12 (the sandstorm day!), 14, and 32.)








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