Day 17 - Eagle Valley Camground to Maple Creek Motor Inn

Hello Again,

This morning we woke up pretty early and were glad it wasn't raining. The skies all around us looked really dark so we packed up quite quick and were soon on our way. The headwind from yesterday was still as bad as ever after a couple minutes of biking it started pouring. Today was alot colder than yesterday and both of our hands and feet were freezing cold. We saw a gas station with a restaurant so we decided to warm up there and form a plan of action for the day. Well, the restaurant was still under renovations but the owner invited us in from the rain, gave us each a cup of coffee, and gave us a phone book and phone to call some motels and see what was open.

There really wasn't anything we could find along the highway until Swift Current which is a full days ride away. We took the advice of the man who owned the restaurant and decided to head south to the town of Maple Creek - it was about 8km south of where we were. We talked with the guy in the restaurant some more and were soon on our way. We don't usually like to go so far out of our way and in fact this is probably the furthest we've been from the trans Canada highway the whole trip but, there really wasn't much between where we were and Swift Current and we didn't want to be in the middle of nowhere and freezing cold. So, it was a pretty quick ride into Maple Creek now that we weren't going directly into the wind. We biked all around the town and eventually found a nice little motel right near downtown.

We checked in and since it was early enough and the lady running the place was nice enough we got a free continental breakfast. We then went and got groceries and a few beers. The motel also had free DVDs to watch so we just relaxed all day watching movies and TV.

Hopefully tomorrows weather is a little better.

-Chris & Patricia

Day 16 - Medicine Hat to Eagle Valley Campground

Hello Again,

Today we took our time getting up since the campground office didn't open until 8:30 and we hadn't paid yet. Not a problem we just walked to the restaurant near the campground.We had bacon and eggs and it was delicious. They also had a poker table so we played a few rounds of poker with the locals...it got kinda messy as seen below.

After a few rounds of  poker.

 After we ate we headed back to the site and packed all of our stuff up. We headed to the office to pay and the guy in charge told us not to worry about it! Huh? It seemed like they didn't get alot of tenters and mostly had big trailers and RVs but still we were quite happy to have camped for free. So we left the campground on a high note after having a yummy breakfast and free camping.We camped on the west side of Medicine Hat so we got to see most of the town this morning(or as much as you can see from the trans-Canada)

Worlds prettiest girl in front of the worlds biggest teepee.

 We stopped at a Sobeys and got some food for the day at the east end of town and were on our way. The skies looked  pretty bad all around us and it soon started raining just outside of town. With the rain also came a headwind. The rain would start just long enough so that both of us were completely soaked then it would stop for a while - this pattern repeated most of the day. However, the wind never stopped once it started and it really made us work for every kilometer today, as evidenced by our average speed(on the stats page). We went 160km the other day and in the same time today we went under 100km.

Some rolling hills.

Anyway, we eventually made it Saskatchewan!!! Two provinces down! You can see the wind blowing the flags in the picture below.

So long Alberta!

 At some point this afternoon a large bird, which neither of us know the species of, started screeching at us from its nest in a tree near the side of the road. Then, it started flying around us in circles and swooping at us...it never got very close but it must have been quite the site to see: the bird squawking and screeching at us, Patricia screaming because she thinks its going to attack us, and me laughing my head off the whole time. The bird gave up chase after about 100m and  never attacked us and was presumably just trying to scare us away from some babies or eggs.

Prairies my ass.

 We finally made it to Eagle Valley Campground and after today we couldn't have been happier to see it! It was a pretty neat little campground, nothing fancy but everything was clean and it has just about the only trees we've seen all day. We set up our tent and ate our supper really quick since it was pretty cold out. We've discovered that when it is raining or cold out we have no where comfortable to eat since we don't want to bring food in our tent - maybe we'll have to invest in a lightweight tarp. We both had a really long shower to warm up and then we hid in our sleeping bags the rest of the night. Our internet was really slow here so we just played cards and went to bed pretty early.

Our site.

Day 15 - Bassano to Medicine Hat

Hello Again,

This morning we kind of slept in and slowly packed up and were on the road around 9. Our room was on the second floor so it was kind of a pain carrying the bike and trailer down ... it was worth it to have the bike and all of our stuff in the room though(we always sleep much better when its close by). Anyways, we only saw one or two cars go by while we were getting ready. There really isn't too much in downtown Bassano. Below you can see a shot down the main drag - the restaurant we ate at last night is on the right. It was a neat little town though and everyone we met was friendly - one lady even offered us a place to stay when she overheard us telling the waiter about our trip(we had already checked into the hotel though).

Downtown Bassano.

Downtown the other way.

The weather forecast for today predicted rain most of the day in Medicine Hat and even thunderstorms in the afternoon. So, we were on high alert expecting rain. The skies around us definitely looked like rain at several points during the day but we got lucky and remained dry for the entire day.

Patricia is on the left.

A shot of the bad skies

We stopped for a rest break and the odometer stopped at exactly 100.00. This is really exciting for two reasons. First, its the praries so we don't see too many exciting things during the day. And two, we stop for rest breaks whenever there is a sign pole or something to lean our bike against and these are few and far between on a flat straight highway.

A highlight of our day

More crazy looking skies

Good shoulders!

Theres an entire train in this picture on the horizon.

For most of the time today we had the coveted prairie tail wind which was awesome. At some points during the day we were cruising along at nearly 40km/h. The highway was also pretty flat today and we can count on one hand the number of times we had to go up a hill. Also, the mosquitoes were pretty bad a few times when we stopped but, near the end of the day they were even getting us while we riding. Because we had a tailwind the mosquitoes just had to float in the wind and they'd be going at the same speed as us so it wasn't too hard for them to get us. These clever mosquitos only lasted about half an hour which we were thankful for.

Eventually we made it to Medicine Hat!

Made it!

We read in our Alberta guide book that there was a campground right off the highway in Medicine Hat. We took the wrong cut off for it but thats OK since it brought us right by a Subway so we grabbed subs for supper. We eventually found the campground and got a site. Getting the site consisted of talking to a guy on his porch.

Our campsite.

We were really roughing it at this campground - we had to walk about two minutes to get a Mc Flurry from McDonalds. And our site faces a giant water slide in a hotel next to the campground - we could hear the excited screams from our tent. We checked the forecast for tomorrow and it looks like rain and thunder showers so fingers crossed they are wrong.

Our progress thus far.

Well thats all for now folks,

C&P

Day 14 - Calgary to Bassano

Well sorry folks, we forgot to take a picture of our campsite last night... don't worry though, it was basically a patch of grass with a picnic table and our little tent.. not too thrilling. Neither Chris nor I had showers last night, because they cost $1.00 per 5 minutes and instead we went to bed nice and early. I have some No Rinse Shampoo from Chris's mum and dad, so I used that this morning - I was surprised by how well it worked! Anyway, we got a late start this morning, I have a nasty cold so Chris let me sleep in until 7:30, and we were on the road by 9ish. Our morning went pretty quickly, we didn't stop too frequently since we had a pretty big day today, and we wanted to put in some serious mileage before it got too hot. The sun was out all morning, and it was really hot - so we figured the more kms we could pump out before lunch, the better.

After about 30km we stopped in Strathmore for lunch, and to get some groceries. Chris went into Sobeys while I waited for the bike, and when he came back we had a delicious lunch consisting of turkey and havarti cheese sandwiches, fruitopia, and some fruit. We also chatted with a Sobeys employee who was taking a smoke break, and was quite excited by our trip.

The bike propped up for lunch.

The view today was pretty much consistent throughout the day - there were tons of rolling hills that just looked on to more rolling hills. The trip was supposed to be all down hill after Calgary, but we're still waiting for that to happen. Most of the hills were pretty small and not the least bit intimidating to pros like Chris and I, but there were a few that were pretty big, and overall it made for an exhausting day.

The rolling hills of Western/ Central Alberta

We were both feeling pretty sore today in the bottom region, and so by mid-day we were taking fairly frequent breaks. We stopped in this rest area for a quick bathroom break and nap, as pictured below. Unfortunately, Chris is a party pooper and wouldn't allow me to nap for more then a second, as we had to hit the road once more.

Patricia attempting to nap at a rest stop

Sitting/ lying on the ground was a habit that was quickly broken for me today when, during a water break, I accidentally sat on a red ant colony, and before I knew it I was absolutely covered in red ants. There were literally hundreds of ants crawling all over me, but with some screaming, and frantic brushing off by myself and Chris they were soon all gone - although every once in a while for the rest of the day I'd find a lone ant walking on me somewhere. Overall, not a fun break.

After the ant invasion

Ants aside, the bugs today have been really bad. Every time we stopped for a drink or to stretch, we would soon be overwhelmed by mosquitoes and have to start peddling again. Thais made for much fewer pictures taken then normal. This was also due to the fact that there wasn't much to take pictures of. Where there have been mountains and waterfalls previously, there is now grass. This is shown below.

The view today.

We planned on making it to Brooks today, but that was almost 200km away, and we just didn't have it in us so when we got to Bassano, we decided to stop for the day. We knew there was a campsite just west of the city, but we found a hotel that cost almost the exact same as the camp ground we stayed in last night so we went for it, and checked in. We got some groceries and ate some dinner, did some laundry in the sink of the hotel room, and that's pretty much the extent of our day! Tomorrow is supposed to thunder storm so we may just try to make the 52km into Brooks and try to keep warm and dry, for the big day into Medicine Hat!

We'll keep you updated!!

C&P

Day 13 - Stoney Nakoda Resort to Just east of Calgary

Hey Everyone,

Today we got up fairly early and had all our stuff packed and ready to load on the bike by 7. We went to the continental breakfast then headed out. The ground was still a little wet from all of the rain and it was still overcast. It cleared up pretty quickly and was sunny before we knew it.

We are now pretty much out of the mountains and this was one of the last pictures we got of them. It was a bitter sweet goodbye - we're going to miss the scenery but certainly not the hills.Also, the clouds today were really neat - they were getting trapped by the hills and were really low.

One of our last mountain sightings.

With the mountains at our back we kept biking. We climbed Scott Lake Hill a later on and it is the highest point in elevation on the Trans Canada highway. This confused us a little bit since we assumed Rogers Pass or Kicking Horse Pass would be the highest point.

A little later on we were going down a hill and the steering became really wobbly and the whole bike was handling really strange. We stopped right away and sure enough the front tire was going flat. Our first flat! Luckily it was the front tire so it was real easy to pop it off. We though the metal burr below was the problem but it was just stuck in the tire and didn't puncture the tube. We found a small hole near the valve - if it was any closer we probably wouldn't have been to patch it.

Suspected flat culprit.

Bike propped up on our water jug.

We got it all patched up and made it to Calgary. We knew were getting close since we could see all of the sprawling suburbs. We decided to take the highway straight through Calgary since it was the fastest route. We somewhat regreted this decision since the traffic through the city was quite heavy which doesn't make for fun biking. It was the worst traffic we have biked in so far. We stopped at 7-11 for a bathroom break and a slurpee. Before we knew it we were thorough the city.

Just after we were through Calgary we noticed a really wierd wobble in the bike. We pulled over and inspected the bike - eventually we found the problem. The rear tire had a few 3 or 4 inch bulges in it right near the rim. They looked pretty bad so we decided to walk the bike to the nearest bike store which was about 9km away. After about thirty minutes of walking and getting eaten alive by mosquitos we decided to take our chances and ride the bike to the store. The tire held up and we bought two new tires and 2 sets of brake pads. We then walked across the street to Sobeys and picked up dinner.

Now that we had a spare tire we were much more confident riding the bike with the messed up tire. We made it to the campsite we were staying at for the night and ate a delicious dinner: salad, cabbage rolls, and sweet and sour pork...and a few bud light limes. After dinner we replaced the rear tire. We discovered that because of the rear fender we never noticed how much the rear tire had worn down. A guy who worked at the campground chatted us up quite a bit and even looked up some maps and the weather for us.

New tire, old tire, and front tire.

We did our tire repairs and changed the front set of brake pads. Thats about all that happened today.

-Chris and Patricia