What, more praire?

Day 8 - Regina to Kenora, June 18th, 2009
Day number two of high mileage runs. I left Regina a little late but made good time and passed into the Manitoba province and finally into Ontario province. Everything went smoothly with the day until I was coming into Winnipeg from the praire and the wind picked up out of nowhere. With countering the wind I made essentially the longest right turn of my life, something like 50 kilometers. One thing I noticed coming into Manitoba is that while Saskatchewan has a lot of bugs (aphids, gnats, etc.), Manitoba beats is by the shear size of the bugs or at least their splat marks. My faceshield was covered in bugs not more than 10 miles after cleaning it and I'm not sure the stains will ever come out of my jacket...

Crossing into Ontario came quickly enough and I was forewarned about the fact that it was "bug country" by a couple of guys returning to B.C. from trip they were doing on scooters. Heeding this information I bought a large can of bug repelant and set off on my way to find "home" for the night.

I've encountered lots of road construction on my trip and Ontario was no different. Not much past the border the road work started but it soon got dangerous. First was grooved pavement (that's no biggie), then uneven/bumpy pavement (that's alright too) but finally there was "loose gravel". This wasn't like some gravel that was spit up from the edge of the road, it was more like they COVERED the road in gravel a little larger than marbles. It took a fair bit of concentration to maintain speed and road position with the backend slipping around as it was. Once I got used to it I was actually having a bit of fun. The fun stopped when the trucks started coming the other direction, throwing waves of gravel at me. The first few passed without much ado but a train of three big rigs came flying by that sent me ducking behind my tall, Mike's windshield. With the last truck came the home run gravel that hit the shield just right and broke off a good chunk of it... There goes $75.

The night ended with me struggling to find an open campground and finally settling on bit of ground by the rowing club. Good night!

The sad evidence...

Day 8 Photos