Daily Summary

The Ride

Today it was supposed to be sunny but ended up cloudy all day with a lot of fog the first few hours. However, it was warm enough that it was still comfortable.

We had just enough headwinds (yet again the reverse of normal direction) to turn the flat ride from what I figured would be 5.5 – 6 hours of easy pedaling to closer to 7 hours of a bit harder pedaling. It was just enough wind to slow us down a mile or two per hour.

Most of the roads were great. The first 30 minutes out of Chatham in the morning were a little heavy on traffic with minimal shoulders. After lunch, there was a 6 mile stretch that was sketchy with a lot of trucks and limited shoulder. Had that section gone on much longer before we turned off, I would have hopped in the van. But we got through it.

We had a few areas of gravel due to construction. We also had one detour due to an accident that closed down one of the roads. A couple of guys bailed and hopped in the van after lunch around mile 70. They just weren’t into it today and we have another 90+ day tomorrow. That left 3 of us to finish it out.

You’ll notice that it was 100.2 miles. Once again, we were coming into town with a finish around 98.5. So, I rode through a few neighborhoods to get to 100 miles.

The Sights

It was a lot of fields today, but also some very interesting homes here and there. I did grab just a few pictures. First is a picture of the fog. It wasn’t so thick that it was dangerous. I also grabbed a picture of a random Ontario branded sign.

The have very interested billboard ads here. Instead of signs, they are all just old school plastic letter boards. If you zoom in on the one picture, you can see one. These were everywhere, including in people’s yards, but none of the standard billboards we have back home. To be honest, the ones here are far smaller and less intrusive, which is likely why they do it this way.

We had lunch in a town called St Thomas. It was nice, but not as nice as the island! For whatever reason, there was a huge elephant statue I got a picture with. I also saw a restaurant whose name I liked.

The Hotel

We are actually in a Howard Johnson. Anyone of a “certain age” will remember that Howard Johnson was perhaps the first hotel mega chain and was everywhere at one point. I haven’t seen one in years.

This one has clearly been here for years and is one of the less nice places we stayed. But, it was nostalgic. One upside is that I am writing this sitting on the pad between the parking spaces and my room’s sliding glass doors to the outside.