Let's see, that afternoon, I got whooped by "the Cheif" as he calls himself (as do, alledgedly, the Nanton RCMP) in a game of pool. He is 81. And he was drunk. We (the bartender, another guy I was hanging out with, and I) all said little prayers every time he got up to dole out candy to the patrons that he wouldn't fall over and need mouth to mouth. He kept mumbling something about prairie oysters and barn dances, but he was a kind old man, even if his eyes were a little cloudy with age.
Ya, so made a few friend on my day off in Fernie. We laughed until we were holding our stomachs at one point. Beauty.
Next thing I knew, I was out of BC and into Alberta. When I hit Alberta, I starated *blowing* down the highway, quite literally. I had a tailwind, and was averaging over 2x what I was averaging in BC. If you ever have a tailwind, just keep riding. Waa waaa my legs hurt... no shit? Keep riding. Waa waaa, my butt hurts. Aww muffin... keep riding. You'll thank yourself for it later. Look closely, those are windmills.
The wind in the prairies doesn't know what way it's blowing half the time. Tailwind, great. Crosswind, ugh. Headwind, might as well just tow an elephant on a unicycle.
Alberta came and went very quickly, but not without incident. I blew a flat in Fort MacLeod. It turned out to be a great place, as some friends were coming down to meet me from Calgary, where they happened to be working for the night. So I hung out there for the afternoon, and by evening they'd picked me up and we were back in a hotel in Calgary. We had a great time, good to see familiar faces. The following are photoes of Mattie casting magic spells of healing and massive muscle building into my body, in Lethbridge. These is not photoshopped, Brandon is an amazing photographer.
They took me to Taber the next day, as Lethbridge didn't have a single camping site available (long weekend, and baseball tournies). That saved me a day of riding, thanks boys.
The next few days, I did 125 km a day, and I am now out of Alberta and into Saskatchewan. Yesterday I met a cyclist going my way for the first time in the 900 km I'd gone up till that point. A single female cycling to Montreal. So we've paired up for a few days anyway. It's nice to have some company, and also somebody to make sure I'm not breaking landspeed records. I'd hate to get carried away .... :)
The prairie sky is never ending, and awe-inspiring. You should see it before you die. Wheat kings, and pretty things indeed.
Okay, enough for now. Much Sasksatchewan love.
Yesssss, notice, revenge of the beard. I tried to stop it, but it's just having its way with me.
No comments:
Post a Comment