Day 16: Spanish to Thessalon. Trip total: 1842km

Mississagi River

Today I had the choice of staying on 17 all the way from from Spanish to my campsite in Thessalon, or spend a few extra kilometers and weave my through the backroads instead.

17 was under construction through long sections leaving poor road conditions and little room for bikes. Rather than spend the day dodging big rigs on chewed up roads, I opted for the backroads.

Serpent River 

Blind River 

After crossing over the Mississagi River, I immediately found myself on winding, hilly,  gravel roads through dense,  fly infested forest.

Some sections of the gravel roads were in such disrepair as to be unrideable, and I actually had to get off my bike and walk for the first time ever on a tour.

I'm sure this route is a charming little hike if you have a couple of hours to kill,  but it's completely impractical for getting anywhere on a bike.

I eventually made it to my campground, Thessalon Lakeside park,  which had a lovely beach where I immediately jumped in to wash the road grit of out of every crevice on my body.

Thessalon Lakeside Park Campground

After hitting Sault Ste. Marie tomorrow,  I'll have to come back this way as I begin my journey home. The question will be: do I suffer through the backroads again or take my chances on the 17 with the construction and big rigs.  Decisions,  decisions.

Day 15: Sudbury to Spanish. Trip total: 1736km

Today I made my way west roughly along the 17 toward Spanish.

I missed an exit and ended up with a hellish experience for about 8km along a narrow gravel two lane road that was also being used used by big rigs.

Watch with sound for full effect

It was incredibly unsafe and I took my first opportunity to duck back down to the trans Canada/ waterfront trail,  which was a very enjoyable ride for the next 50km or so before getting routed back into the 17.

I got a late start to the day (8ish) which I paid for in the early afternoon as the clouds dissipated and the sun started beating down on me.

I passed 6 other touring cyclists coming from the other direction today.  This is the first time I've been on the cross Canada route on this trip,  so I expect to see a few more over the next two days on my way to the Sault.

At my camp tonight are two cyclists that just came from my stop for tomorrow,  Thesallon. It's useful getting information about where I'm heading,  and to able to help out with what they can expect for their next ride.

Spanish River

I don't have a long ride tomorrow (just over 100km) but I'm going to try and get out before 6am to beat the heat that's promising to return for tomorrow.

Day 14 1/2 - Day off

When in Sudbury,  you visit the Big Nickel

Today is scheduled day off,  which I'm taking in Sudbury. I feel good and was tempted yesterday to just keep riding today, but there have been subtle signs that these days off are important.

When I settled in at Bala a few days ago, it was after a hot, hilly day of riding but I thought my body was holding up pretty well. Once I showered, I was set to grab some food and beer and check out the little town. 

I had the TV on while I was getting ready and noticed AMC had a Jaws marathon starting. I haven't seen the first one in a while so decided to watch a bit of it before heading out. I sat down just as Roy Scheider was deciding to close the beaches, I blinked, and all of the sudden Dennis Quaid was running Seaworld.

I didn't feel tired,  but somehow I had spontaneously blacked out for most of Jaws, all of Jaws 2, and part of Jaws 3. My body shut down for over 3 hours without so much as a warning.

Well, that's not true. There were definitely warnings,  but I hadn't been noticing them while I was riding,  which is why these days off are useful.  I've been thinking my legs feel fine,  but my knees and calves have been redlining for a while and I haven't really noticed until everything started loosening up today.

All of this probably wouldn't be an issue if I had properly trained before doing this tour - which I would highly recommend doing - but that's just not how I operate.

So for now, it's a balancing act between pushing harder than I should, and taking strategic days off to balance out.

I'm a firm believer in the value of duct tape on these tours, but this time around it's been gorilla glue and random pieces of plastic that have been keeping my phone, gps  and camera mounts together as uneven road conditions have snapped off critical pieces along the way

Now I feel fresh and ready for my 120km ride to Spanish tomorrow.

Day 13-14: Parry Sound to Noëlville to Sudbury: Trip total: 1617km

With the lack of network or wifi access yesterday,  I'll combine two days into today's post.  I covered 217km between Parry Sound and Sudbury,  see below for the rough route -

Friday

What a difference a day makes.  There's no way I would have made it through this route during yesterday's 43 degree heat,  but with today's 20 degree temperature and cool breeze,  it was a perfect ride!

As expected,  large chunks of today's ride were remote and there was a 25km section along 529 where I didn't see another vehicle,  let alone a rest stop, and that was fine by me. No flies to deal with,  just lush forest and a quiet two lane road to myself.

Pickerel River

French River

I was able to dart onto highway 69 for periods at a time, but the headwind and hills did a number on my legs.  The hills weren't high,  they were just constant. Below is the elevation graph from that 56km section of the ride -

Although winding and not well marked,  the route wasn't as convoluted as I anticipated. I didn't really need the gps navigation as long as I tracked the distances between turns.  I tried not to think about what would have happened if anything broke down on 529 as it would have taken me all day to walk out of there. All in all, a great day's ride. 

Saturday 

I ended up in Noëlville yesterday,  leaving me just shy of 100km to Sudbury.  No need for the map today, just straight up 535 to Markstay-Warren, then 17 all the way into Sudbury. 

The landscape is definitely looking more like northern Ontario.  Lots of rock and forest, not so many farms.

Day 12: Bala to Parry Sound. Trip total: 1395km

My plan was to bike 147km to Grundy Lake Provincial Park today.  It was going to involve a lot of backroads, hills, and extreme heat.

I found an unexpected restaurant right at the 35km mark this morning that happened to be open, a rare occurrence along these roads at 7am.

While enjoying a hearty breakfast,  I went over my route again and still wasn't confident.  The roads were poorly marked and zig zagged in every direction so once I lost network connection (which was inevitable), the likelihood of me getting lost would be pretty high.

On top of that, I was getting extreme heat warnings for the area saying it was going to feel like 43 degrees with the humidex.

All of this,  and the likelihood of dealing with another swarm of flies, sealed it for me. My stop for the day was going to be Parry Sound.

It puts me behind schedule,  but getting caught in the middle of nowhere in 43 degree heat, getting attacked by flies,  and struggling through the tail end of a 150km ride had disaster written all over it.

Tomorrow and Saturday are forecast to have much more tolerable temperatures so I'm confident I'll be in Sudbury on Saturday.

Today was a welcome rest.  I spent the morning at the beach and did some painting in the afternoon.

I'm not great at painting bikes, but Dolores deserved the effort, she's been a trooper through some challenging conditions.

Day 11: Collingwood to Bala. Trip total: 1337km

By my loose estimate, I'm halfway through my trip. Based on the mileage so far,  I've been underestimating the actual distances, but it's been close.

Today was also the first day I felt like I was really in the unknown. I don't think you're supposed to bike up the east side of Georgian Bay,  and today's experience reinforced that assumption.

Highway 400 is how you get to Sudbury,  unfortunately you can't bike in highway 400. There also isn't a direct secondary highway so I've been relegated to obscure backroads for up to 100km at a stretch without any rest stops.

I was expecting this so I had plenty of water and food,  but I didn't factor in the flies.  There was a consistent swarm of flies pacing me for the last 50km along Muskoka road 13 and they attacked whenever I slowed down or stopped - which meant no rest when I needed it the most. It also meant I didn't have opportunities to take many pictures.

Bala Falls

I expect tomorrow to be even more remote. I'll hit Parry Sound in about 50km,  and after that I don't expect to see civilization until I hit my campground 100km later.

This is roughly the route over covered so far

While searching for cycling options I came across this article that seems to sum up my expectations,  most notably the following quote -

"There's no going between Toronto and Sudbury... that's because the new four- laned portions of highway 69 prohibit cyclists"
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/pave-the-way-for-cycling-tourism-manitoulin-group-says-1.1393150

I have about 300km to cover over the next 2 days to gey to Sudbury. After that I'll be in familiar territory as I retrace sections of the trans Canada I've already ridden.

At the very least,  the next two days will be a challenge,  and I'm looking forward to it.

Day 10: Port Elgin to Collingwood. Trip total: 1205km

Today I made the move away from the Huron shoreline and headed east across Bruce County to the Georgian Bay coast in Collingwood. 

The Saugeen River

As for today's ride, google tried very hard to send me on a roundabout route to Collingwood in spite of the fact that highway 40 went right where I wanted to go.  I'm pretty sure google was trying to save my quads because that route involved over 400 metres of elevation climbs I had to manage - 100 metres of that was from a single ascent.

That last ascent on the horizon was 100metres all on its own

After all the climbing,  there was bound to be an epic descent.  I hit 64km/hr here,  a record for this tour so far

I'm not a good climber,  but I do enjoy the challenge so today was a lot of fun.

I'm getting more acclimatized to the heat so today wasn't as physically stressful as some of my past rides even though I didn't get out as early as I should have. Having said that, a quick dip in Georgian Bay did wonders to cool me off.

Georgian Bay

I spotted this handsome fella walking confidently along the other side of the highway so I made my way over to take his picture,  but apparently he's shy.  Sorry to bother you, buddy.  Be on your way

The next few days going up the east shore of Georgian Bay will be interesting because I don't think there's a convenient way to do it by bike.  Tomorrow's ride is little longer than usual,  but I'm looking forward to it.