Days 11 & 12 - The Hump/Give-and-Take

A great sign.

One disorienting part of the trip is not living within the week cycle. Every day is "go"!, and we rest when we are able. So as we have paid close attention to the weather, we are again aware of the day of the week. So happy Friday readers! But this blog is about Wednesday - hump day.  Wednesday was our hump day, because of the weather. It was the third day of the rain, but the worst was over, and we saw a forecast that indicated sunshine again by the weekend. So things were looking "up"!

But the day started with setbacks. As you know from the day before, the first task is to fix Kyle's rack. Good and bad news: it turns out that he also has broken spokes, and we all replace our rear shift cables and casings. But the staff at Jessome's Source for Sports in Edmundston takes fantastic care of us. Thanks so much!! We won't actually hit the road until almost noon.
The ride is nice but still wet. We take Hwy 2, a closed access highway that allows cyclists. This gives us the great advantage of a well-paved wide shoulder, somewhat flattened hills, and no stops. We are able to get up to 22-25km/hr, but with the late start, all we can accomplish is Grand Falls, for 77km on the forced half-day. Behind schedule again!

Kyle taking cover under an awning

We would wake up the next day (Thursday) early, to try to take back some time lost the day before. And by early, I'm talking about 5:00am (4:00am EST). We still move slowly in the morning, and with some alignment issues we are on the road by 6:15. But this start was the worst of the four; it was actually raining when we left, and we knew we were in for a long day.

By our rest stop at 9:00am, we had already put in as many kilometres as the day before. But after a misty but not rainy morning, again it rained, and again we found ourselves under a ledge at a gas station. Inside, we delay going outside by convincing ourselves into an unsatisfying 3-for-the-price-of-2 chocolate bar deal. But this is not the low point that it was two days earlier; rather, as we leave, we see an old friend that we have missed, peeking out from the clouds. No words to describe!

The next several hours are fantastic. On-and-off showers, but lots of sun, and some dry roads! We're just cruising along, and by the time we saw a Fredericton 114 sign, we knew we were going for it. And go for it, we did! 220kms on the day, another new high, and we made it to the capital. But not without some hiccups...

We're experts, now.

We hit three flat tires in the last 40km, all tire-related, but we ran out of collapsible spare tires. So we're 19km from the city, and while we're deciding what to do, Tyler flags down a passing motorist, who gives Kyle, his bike, and all of our panniers to a nearby bike shop. Thanks Paul!
Tyler and I make flat 50km/hr on some stretches, freed of our luggage. We probably made it to the city faster considering the blown tire! The staff at Ski Wolf in Fredericton were fast, helpful, and very kind. Thanks again! Who knew you could patch a tire with duct tape?

And now we're in Fredericton and back on track!

That's the gist of it, a recap in the truest sense. We'll try to add more narrative/pics when we get to a computer.

Sent wirelessly from my BlackBerry device on the Bell network.
Envoyé sans fil par mon terminal mobile BlackBerry sur le réseau de Bell.

Roadside: Music

[As promised, I'll try to update during the day sometimes, as well as daily recaps. It will be much more feasible when my hands aren't wet and shaking when we stop! I thought this post out yesterday, and cheated a bit by typing some of it out last night.]

What do you listen to for 400 biking hours? The short answer is: your entire iPod, several times. But there is more to it than that.

There is a yet untold story of heroism going on within the B4B. Anyone who knows Tyler is probably familiar with his music misadventures while traveling. The stolen iPod in Austria, the Greece iPod story (you've probably heard this story 15 times), and the forgotten iPod on the plane in Venezuela. You know where this is going...

The epic charging station we use at fast food restaurants.

Tyler's iPod died slowly on this trip. On the first day of the rain, his battery quit. Not too bad, but not great. But then when we did an emergency charge in a McDonald's, it didn't take. Ok?? So the next day, we hooked it up to one of our battery backups, and it worked just fine, for a few hours. Then the whole iPod just died. One voided warranty later, and Tyler has been musicless for pretty much the last four days. If you have read any of our other blogs or our Twitter, you know how tough these few days have been. Tyler is doing it without music. But it's not even listening to music that's the the issue - we go long stretches unplugged - it's the option to have music. And the absence of that choice must be brutal. I like to think that his iPod heard him singing, and took it upon itself to end everyone's misery.

I have a another problem: randomness. My iPod (probably the headphones, actually) has this crazy pause-pause-max volume-min volume routine, with a healthy dose of the "voice-over lady" (Kyle gets her, too). She reads you the song title, then the song title and artist, and then the song title, artist, and then the name of every playlist on your iPod. This happens sometimes every minute or every ten minutes. Always in the middle of a big hill. But at least I have the possibility of music.

But back to the music - songs that we've really been feeling: Semi-Charmed Life (TJ), Desire (J), Amazing (T - on the first day, he went long because he was so locked into this song), Levels (K), and Baggage Claim (J). My number-one song right now, the one I would put on for a run, is Springsteen by Eric Church, and I haven't heard it once. I've listened to the entire device several times, but I'm too stubborn to choose it, so we will see how long this lasts.

Kyle's got Rush, Queen, Alanis Morissette, The Beatles, two country songs, and some two-weeks old Jays podcasts. Country and Top 40 are my go-to genres for cardio, but my iPod is spitting out healthy doses of rock and oldies, which is cool, too. Tyler is hoping someone reads this and magically ships a new mP3 player. Hey @Apple.... kidding!

Don't worry mom, I usually do one earphone at a time. And I'm NOT typing this as we ride. :)

Sent wirelessly from my BlackBerry device on the Bell network.
Envoyé sans fil par mon terminal mobile BlackBerry sur le réseau de Bell.

Test post

Mobile test from BlackBerry. So here's a picture of our first course tonight! Followed up with cereal, Doritos, grapes, bananas, cheese and crackers and peanut butter. Gotta save some food for tomorrow!
Sent wirelessly from my BlackBerry device on the Bell network.
Envoyé sans fil par mon terminal mobile BlackBerry sur le réseau de Bell.

Days 9 and 10 - Teamwork

If you follow us on twitter, you would have seen the story of the last two days with this little comment early on Monday morning:

Not heavy, but cold miserable rain as we enter Levis.Definitely more mental than physical today.30/205kms in the books.
— Bike For Bricks (@BikeForBricks) June 25, 2012

Quebec City from Levis

And that defines our last two days. Not that the physical wasn't difficult, because it was terrible, but it really was a mental battle. We quickly became soaked and chilled to the bone (rain booties don't do much!), and faced headwinds on a hilly day compared to our entrance to Quebec City. Every time we pedaled, we would feel the water sloshing around inside the shoes. Every time we stopped, it was just that much harder to get back on the bike. It was too wet to GPS, to Tweet, or to have any amount of fun. We knew that we would hit rain on our trip, and we knew it would suck, and this was it.

A little off-roading

Things hit an early low point on Monday. About an hour in, we weren't clipping in with the booties, and in the day's heaviest rain, we stopped to cut larger holes in the bottom. This had mitigated success, until later in the day when we just stopped using them. But things got better quickly. Almost immediately, we got a great view of Quebec City from Levis, the breeze turned warm, and we found our motivation. We moved at about 19km/hr for most of the day,actually increasing gradually. 

End of Day 9 in Saint- Pascal

I could really fill this entire post with complaints, but let's get to the title, where I choose to frame it: teamwork. Yesterday, we really hit our stride in working as a team to accomplish our goals. Advanced drafting, everyone got into the lead. It is obvious how much it really helps rotating the lead. I don't know how strong the winds were, but they were directly in our faces for most of the day. It is impossible to understate how essential our team attitude was to even just getting through the day. Other little examples too, but it's really as simple as the drafting.

Ultimately, we didn't make our ambitious goal of a campground south of Riviere du Loup. We ended the day in Saint-Pascal, after 185km, still a career-high for all of us. That means that Tuesday we will have to do about 160 to catch up to our plan of Edmundston.

Entering New Brunswick

Tuesday, the wind isn't as strong, but the rain is heavier. We turn south onto the 85 towards New Brunswick, which has very few places to stop. A low point this day is in the afternoon, hiding under a small ledge, fingers too cold to even tweet. Ultimately, we use a well-timed Tim Horton's stop to keep us going, and take a more direct route than we had anticipated, so we made our destination in only 145km. Tyler and I have never been to this province before! We made sure to get a pic at the sign.


Also, late yesterday, Kyle's rack broke. We have a complicated bungee situation holding right now, but we need to take care of this soon. Another casualty of the rains is our motivation to tent. At the end of a day in which we are completely soaked, I think it is a smart health decision to get indoors. So we have been motelling for each of the past two nights. Not ideal, but essential.

We're starting the day with wet shoes, knowing the rain is coming, heading to a cycle shop...fun times!

Kyle MacGyvers his rack support

The Rest Day in Quebec!

Once in a while things work out well without actually having to plan for it. Our rest day is an example of one fo those fortuitous circumstances.

Plains of Abraham

Having arrived at the house of Claude Gratton, an old friend of my father, late the evening before we took advantage of comfortable sleeping arrangements and slept in till 8am, a real treat after having been on our bikes before that time for most of the previous week. Now, let me explain something about Claude - he's crazy. Don't get me wrong, he's an accomodating host, a riot around the dinner table, and excellent company, but he's an army veteran who won't let us speak English much - which really causes a problem since Jordan is the only one who can string a decent sentence together in French without having to resort to English and risk the Claude reprimand. However, we've managed to learn to peek over our shoulders to see if Claude is listening before conveying our thoughts in English, and in a mere two days have picked up a few more passable french words and phrases to communicate.
On to the rest of the day..
After I made the boys breakfast we set about taking care of the "rest stop necessities". That really just means laundry and filling our stomachs with food at our leisure as we planned the rest of our day. We weren't moving quickly but we did manage to accompany our host on a beire/pain/lait trip to the corner store.


We then planned our day trip back into Quebec City, took our panniers of our bikes and started biking.

It's interesting to note how scales of distance can change through experience. Today, on our rest day we biked around 40kms; month ago this would have been a good day of biking for us, now it's considered an easy day off. Oh how things have changed.

Old Quebec

Back to the day and the fortuitous circumstances that made it special.
Turns out today (Sunday) is St. John le Baptiste day. A huge celebration focusing on Quebec culture, and birthday of the province. When we planned our day off here we didn't realize the stat holiday was going on. It was just another Sunday. But upon arrival the night before we realized something huge was going on. There was talk of parties, revelers, concerts in the part, potential riots and all sorts of other fun stuff. There was also A LOT of people and tourists enjoying the beautiful city on a gorgeous day. We biked down to Quebec City from Claude's house in St. Emile, about 16kms and then started biking UP to the old city. And up. Dodging traffic and pedestrians on the old, narrow, streets of the city. It really did feel and look like a town Europe. We made our way to the Plains of Abraham and snapped some beautiful pictures (coming later) rode around the park, imagined the battles and looked over the Fleuve Saint-Laurent.

Chateau Frontenac

Went around Le Chateau Frontenac before stopping in a nice (expensive) restaurant beside the Frontenac to eat Poutine and watch the England v Italy. The price tag was high, we were wearing our awkward biking clothes, but the experience was worth it. It's delightfully cheesy (literally and figuatively), but we did it. We ate 10$ plates of poutine in Old Quebec City. Day complete.



Poutine

20kms back to Claude's house, two delicious pizzas waiting, some cold drinks, some funny stories, Happy Gilmore, and early to bed to prepare for our first potential 200km day and 4:30am wake up.
Rest day over, back to biking.

Day 7- Biking to Quebec City

The day started with us biking through Trois Rivieres. We had stayed in a motel in Trois Rivieres the night before. The temperature and humidity had dropped from the previous days, however, there was some wind blowing at us that slowed us down in the early part of the morning. After biking an hour we stopped at a look out point. There we met a lady and her daughter. The lady spoke some English.

After the break we were still biking slow until a group of cyclists pulled in behind us and then passed us. Tyler was in the lead. He looked back and smiled. I was behind Tyler and I knew from that point on we were going to try and keep us to this group. For the next hour we increased our speed by an average of 10 km/h to 30 km/h to keep up with the group. For most of the hour we biked at the back of the pack until we faced a big hill. Tyler made a move to start passing some of the cyclists in the group. Jordan and I then followed. Robert, a cyclist in the group, has since found us on facebook. Thanks Robert! We ended up finishing near the front of the pack before we stopped for lunch Donnacona at a Subway.

At the Subway, we met the lady and her daughter again. They offered us strawberries and cheese. A staff person at Subway offered us cookies after hearing of our trip. Excellent!

In Donnacona we were a few hours away from Quebec city. We had hoped to get there by 5 PM, but then trouble started in the afternoon. We were just leaving the town of Neuville when I had a bungee cord break and get caught in my back bike brake. No big deal. I took it out with help from Tyler, but as we started to take off Tyler ran over a small plastic piece from my broken bungee cord. Immediately his tire went flat. This was weird because Tyler had a flat the day before. We said to each other we'll just replace the tube. However, when Tyler put in the new tube, the tire wouldn't hold air. We then assumed that the tire was the problem so Tyler put on a new tire. The tire held air, but the problem was we had just used our only back-up tire. The back-up tire was a foldable tire that is of lower quality. We knew we needed to get a better tire on Tyler's bike.

     We had been doing the bike repair on the front lawn of a house. The owners of the house- Mariette and Roget Rodrigue- had come out of the house when we first stopped to ask if we needed help. We had said no, but now realizing that we needed a new tire on the bike, we knew we needed to get to a bike shop. Adding to the urgency was the Quebec holiday St. Jean Baptise day was on Sunday. This meant that Monday would be a holiday.  Stores would likely be closed on Sunday and Monday. Mariette and Roget were very nice, but they knew little English and we knew even less French. Jordan is the best at speaking French in our group and worked with Mariette to connect a bike shop. It ended up that the closest bike shop- Performance Begin- was about 15 km away in Saint-Augustin-de-Desmaures. It was about 4:30 PM at this point and the bike shop closed at 5. We knew that we would not be able to make it by 5. The bike shop owner- Stephan- then made an offer for us to come to the store at 7:30. 

We took Stephan's generous offer and biked to Saint-Augustin-de-Desmaures. We had supper at Metro then went to Performance Begin. Stephan took Tyler's bike and put on a new tire. He noticed when doing this that the tire pressure in the bikes was not high enough. The tires were suppose to be 85 psi and Tyler's were 40 psi. Jordan's were 50 psi and mine were 60 psi. Not enough pressure meant our tires were at risk of becoming flat easier. Stephan didn't charge us labour for changing the tire and re-opening his shop since we were biking for charity.  We are greatful for his generosity.

After Stephan pumped up our tires, he offered us a 10 minute truck ride to Boulevard Champlain that would take us to the base of Chateau Frontenac. We thought that maybe this may taint our pledge to bike across Canada, but we knew that we would be biking out of our way in Quebec City to get to the place we would be staying (more on place later) so we took the offer on the truck ride.

We started pushing our bikes toward Stephan's truck when Jordan noticed his back tire had gone flat! How inconvenient/convenient. The flat tube was inconvenient, but having it at a bike store was very convenient. tephan then re-opened his shop and put in a new tube.

After Stephan drove us Boulevard Champlain, we biked on this road until we arrived at Chateau Frontenac in the dark at 9:30 PM (Don't worry we had our bike lights on!). From Chateau Frontenac we biked to Tyler's family friend's place. His name is Claude and he lives in the north part of Quebec. Tyler had told Claude we'd arrive by 9 or 10, but we didn't arrive until 11. Good thing for us that Claude is an easy going friendly man and welcomed us in his house despite our late arrival.  

Day 8 is an off day that we'll spend in Quebec city. It will help us rest up for another busy week of biking. We've biked about 1000 km so far. About 6000 km to go...

Day 6 - The Elevation Factor

Hi everyone,

As our faithful readers know, we are often one day behind on our blogging, because when we don't have access to a computer - especially when we camp - it is quite difficult to write a quality blog at the end of the day.  I am going to start incorporating quick roadside blogs into the repertoire for next week.  But until then, we have this blog for yesterday, and another one coming for today, on our off-day tomorrow!

Ice Fill up @ McDonalds

Yesterday, we flew all day.  It can be summarized in a few quick statistics: we did 30+km/hr consistently.  Once we would get up to 30, I would push it to 33, then 35, then 38.  We made great advancements in drafting and just rocked it the whole day.  The other statistic is the climb: total elevation change of about 140m over 155km.  That is less than one metre per kilometre, or one millimetre per metre.  Immaterial, as Kyle Martin, CA (pending) calls it.  I'm sure we won't see those kinds of numbers until the prairies.

Crossing the Railroad Tracks

A few other anecdotes from throughout the day: when we woke up at our campsite in St Canut, a raccoon had stolen our lunch!  At one point late in the day, the 138 was under complete construction, so we had to cross a one-lane railway bridge and scale a gravelly ravine to avoid a 15km detour.  We ended the day at Trois-Riviers, which is actually named for the fracturing of the Saint-Maurice and Saint Lawrence rivers (only two).  We ended up in a motel, where we caught a bit of the NHL entry draft, and did some grocery shopping on pannier-less bikes. 

Pics are coming for this blog, but I'm writing on IE, and installing a new browser is not a battle I think I am going to win.  They will be up soon!  Thanks

Grocery Shopping!

Day 5: Special Delivery

I am always happy to be asked to blog on here, especially after spending the last couple days with them.

Let me backtrack for a minute to Wednesday night when I arrived in tow with my handy camera man (Jason) to Lisa's house in Ottawa. I brought the very exciting brand new working Blackberry with me, more camera mounts and a eagerness to see how they were doing. Stay tuned for tons of pictures and videos!

Day 5 started off with an early breakfast thanks to Lisa and Family, again thanks for the wonderful hospitality you showed the boys! It was then off to Parliament for a special treat, where the guys would meet MP Harold Albrecht for a quick picture. He is a busy guy and we appreciated the time! Beautiful as always, the scenery in Ottawa never disappoints.

The boys were off and cycling while we ran around to get some last minute things that were missing. First stop was Mountain Equipment Co-op where an extremely nice employee was quite helpful. He ended up giving us 3 mounts for free to take to the guys to try and mount the Drift cameras better. The biggest challenge of the store was deciding which spork to purchase for the guys. For those that might not know, a spork is a spoon and a fork and the plastic ones that had originally been purchased were just not cutting it. Sporks bought, mounts in hand we headed out to try and "catch" them. Knowing they had gotten a head start, we followed the road they were cycling on and hoped to catch up with them sooner than later (seeing as I was going East and home was West).

SPOTTED! 3 young guys outfitted in Marin/Royal gear taking a water break on the side of the road. Quite happy to receive their sporks and mounts they sent us off on one more errand before we headed home. It was off to McDonald's we went, armed with 6 water bottles, a camel back and FREE smoothies coupons that were generously given to the guys by Perry, the owner of McDonald's in Stittsville. Many thanks to Perry, as you can tell the smoothies hit the spot for the guys!

It was goodbye all over and the boys hopped back onto their bikes and prepared to cycle another 100km. I had a chance to talk them again this morning and here is what they have to say about the ride yesterday

" We floored it all day. Quebec Roads are excellent, very flat Ottawa River Valley. We were doing 30km/hr just cruising easy and hit upwards of 40 km/hr sometimes. We pushed it late into the day, 8:00pm. We could have stopped at 150km in Lachute but went the extra 20 to St Canut to a campground we found. We had a delicious treat of sausages and called it a night. Special thanks to the staff at Pecco's cycle shop in Ottawa for the tune up"

I must say one thing  before I sign off here and that is I am MORE than confident that Jordan, Kyle and Tyler will indeed cycle across Canada successfully and that they will raise a lot of money for Heartwood Place. They feel great, they look great and if anyone can do it, it's them. Thanks to the guys for sitting through a million questions while we filmed them and GREAT JOB thus far!

Day 4 - Hazeldean

We don't have many pictures from today,
so here's our 9:30am lunch.  

Where do you even start with a day like today?

Let's start at the end , where late tonight, we get visitors from back home - Lindsay and Jason - with a special delivery.  It was great to see some familiar faces - but what prompted the drive to Ottawa?

The deal is, if Grayson ever cycles across
Canada, we'll buy him a pitcher and nachos.

Well, today had been another great day physically.  Much hotter than yesterday - 35/42 with the humidex, so we made sure to stop early and often for water and rest.  That's how we ended up taking a 1.5 hour lunch break at 9:00.  In total, we did the 115kms in about 7.5 hours, again with little ascent and straight routes.  We are completely on pace, having done just over 500kms in four days.

We finished the day in Ottawa, which is special for a few reasons.  Again, we were blown away with the hospitality: first, with Kyle's cousin Lisa and her family, who took us in and pampered us with food, care, and beds.  Second, we got a chance to visit our good friend Grayson, finally, because he's been living in Ottawa for almost a year.  He took us out for drinks and to show us a bit of the city.  Also, it is Tyler's first time in the city, which is surprising given the circumstances.

McDonald's in Stittsville, ON.
Thanks Perry!

But getting back to Lindsay.  Great day, but it was largely shaped by one simple factor: no BlackBerry today.  Strange circumstances - the alarm went off this morning, but then before we could send out yesterday's blog, it quit.  And I'm not talking about the battery - I have three - the device just failed.  It wasn't so bad, because the day was again mostly Highway 7, but it is also our principal camera.  We decided to roll on, and figure it out later.  We inform our home crew about the situation, and Lindsay works this Twitter magic:

@BikeForBricks we can and want to help! What a seriously #BoldMove you guys are making! Follow & DM us ASAP 4 more. ^MS
— Research In Motion (@BlackBerry) June 20, 2012

WOW!  So RIM donates $500 to the Heartwood Place to get us back up and mapping.  Crazy!  But we're still on the ground, pedaling, with only verbal directions.  Which brings us to our final anecdote, which is the namesake of this blog.  


As we're heading up Highway 7 towards Ottawa, our instructions are to follow 7 until the Hazeldean exit.  Simple, except that 16km before that exit, Hwy 7 becomes a closed-access, divided expressway.  What!  But as a cyclist, you don't actually realize that until it's too late.  So we're just in the shoulder of major highway.  We want to exit, but it is just so gorgeous - wide, paved lane, no stops, no close traffic at all - and also, we would be completely lost if we do.  So Kyle convinces us to stay on the 7, which is exhilarating - we're doing an easy 35-40km/hr.  But all we can think about is "gotta get off...gotta get off...Hazeldean."  And then we see it:

A google streetview caputre of the sign.  Couldn't pull out
the cell phone camera there, for obvious reasons.

This sign was the highlight of our day.  And so Lindsay makes the commute all the way from Kitchener to Ottawa to bring the BlackBerry and some new mounts for our Drift HD cameras, so we're all set for tomorrow: Parliament and Quebec!

On a related note: my new PIN is 29B76242.

In case you missed it, click here to see yesterday's post.

Day 3 - That wasn't so bad!

This is a fun blog post to write, because it is somewhat outdated.  But chronological we will go, so here's day 3:

We bonded.

We started the day right at the Koning Keelan's in Peterborough, and rolled out around 8:00am.  On an overcast day, we were slowed by city traffic for the first hour, but quickly found our groove.  And by groove, I really mean we were really motoring.  We hit average moving speeds of 22-30km/hr, which is great but I am surprised that we are already at those speeds this early in the trip.  We breaked early and often, to refill, refuel, rest and stretch.

The route was almost exclusively Highway 7, which was very favourable as for the most part it has pavement to the right of the white line.  We were surprised by how precisely Google estimated our Garmin distance; two possible factors are less elevation change, and basically no turns.  In total, we did the 151kms in 9 hours, including 2.5 hours of breaks.  Factors affecting our dramatic increase in speed/efficiency from the day before include elevation (total climb less than half of the day before), conditioning and learning, and the overcast skies.

Ontario Provincial Parks FTW

The unanimous feeling is: "great."

That night we spent at Sharbot Lake Provincial Park.  It was our first night "roughing it," but it really wasn't that rough.  After being pampered for the first two nights, we were finally responsible for our own food and accommodations.  The tent went up for the first time in about 5 minutes, but the water on our tiny stove took about 30 minutes to boil.  We jumped in the lake and collected a $20 donation from a fellow camper.

Bedtime stretch

Special thanks to Roseanne from the Havelock East End Market for the strawberries and water, and Louis from the campground for sheltering our bikes from the rain.

More to come from from Day 4 later tonight...

Ottawa list

Just a quick list of chores for our overnight in Ottawa tomorrow.

- pick up mounts
- mail memory cards
- stop by Parliament
- groceries: tomato sauce, snacks, bread, produce
- new sporks
- towel and gloves
- bike shop
- notepads
- leave stuff with Grayson
- playing cards

Thought you might be interested!
Sent wirelessly from my BlackBerry device on the Bell network.
Envoyé sans fil par mon terminal mobile BlackBerry sur le réseau de Bell.

Day 1 Departure Video

Thanks to Holeshot we have an amazing video of day 1 departure! Keep following us here for more to come!

Day 2 - The Long Haul

Hi everyone, hopefully this is going to be a quick blog post today, because believe it or not, we're pretty tired!

Leaving Amaranth.  Thanks Pauline & Family!

Recap:
We started the day with a phenominal breakfast at the Lennox's.  From there, we started on an average-long ride of approximately 180kms.  The morning was filled with a number of equipment-related mishaps, including: forgotten gloves, two chain derailments, two camera mount failures, a shattered rear light, and a jammed clip.  All part of the learning, and we moved quite well. 

Arriving in Peterborough.  Thanks Val and Bryan!

Again today, we hit an early-afternoon wall, which we can trace unexclusively to the heat.  We ended the day in Peterborough, welcomed by the family of Kyle's friend Jeff: Val and Bryan Koning Keelan.  What great hosts!  We were treated to a fantastic meal, our own rooms and bathrooms, and we're watching the Jays game right now.  Tomorrow will be the first night in the tent. 

In total, the day was 167kms (which is longer than any of our individual lifetime highs!) in about 11:45.  I would estimate 8 of those hours were cycling, and up to four were breaking.  We are taking more breaks now that we expect to later in the trip, as our conditioning and efficiency improve.  That puts us approximately 20km/hr.

Numbers:
We haven't had a chance to do a Garmin upload, and I suspect that will have to wait until July.  Until then, there are a few things I can tell you.  Yesterday, our 69km was neatly 1% of the trip distance.  On reflection, we were very happy with our half-day on the first day, having left at 11:20am.  Today we stepped it up to 167kms, which is only slightly longer than the average day! 

One big learning experience is using the Garmin 800.  We have only been playing around with it since Saturday, and the two most notable obeservations are the speed and odometer.  For speed, all we have known pre-Garmin is our average trip speed, maybe subtracting breaks if we were diligent.  Depending on the day and the method, we made 20-30km/hr.  Now, we have the added benefit of knowing our instantaneous speeds.  We vary from 9km/hr up steep hills into wind, to 65km/hr pushing it down hills.  I would say our average moving (instantaneous) speed is around 24-26km/hr, which is obviously discounted by traffic and stop lights. [Edit: sorry, forgot the odometer.]  To this point, we had mapped exclusively in Google products, but now that we're on the ground with an actual device measuring what we're cycling, we find Google to overestimate the distance by anywhere from 5-20%.  This has saved us a little bit of time each of the first few days, as we were slowing down at the end of the day.


Contact:
The best way to keep up-to-date on B4B depends on what you're looking for.  The daily recaps and the bulk of the information gets published right here on our blog.  The photo sharing and most of our fan interaction happens on our facebook page.  We added some new photo albums today: Here they go... and Photos from the roads.  And every little on-the-road update happens on Twitter - jokes, current city, maybe even some complaints.  Here's a selection from today:

The last time I was in this city, it was a City Lights kind of night.#foodofthegods twitter.com/jordandschmidt…
— Jordan Schmidt (@jordandschmidt) June 18, 2012

Things we have learned: 90% chance of thundershowers is better than 35 degrees and sunny.#sweatingthroughmyshorts ^TC
— Bike For Bricks (@BikeForBricks) June 18, 2012

This just in.......$11,153.95 raised so far! Keep it coming!
— Bike For Bricks (@BikeForBricks) June 18, 2012

 That's pretty much it for now.  Tomorrow, we will end up at a campground between here and Ottawa.  Nation's capital the next day!

One...Two.....Three.....and there they go!!!

When I woke up Sunday morning, it was just another day. Except my alarm was beeping, it was 5am and I quickly realized this was not an ordinary day. Today was the day we were going to send off Jordan, Kyle and Tyler on their cycle across Canada! This was the day we had all been anticipating for the last 3 months. The big "send off" from University Stadium at Laurier, where the guys would suit up in their new gear, strap all the belongings they would need for the next 7 weeks to their bikes and ride off.....into the pouring rain. What...rain...who said anything about it raining! As I drove to the stadium in the thunderstorms I prayed this was not a bad omen.

With Heartwood Place, Dave FM, Holeshot Productions, Royal Distributing and Marin Bikes all set up and ready to take some pictures of the guys, bikes and gear, we waited.....and waited. The moment arrived when all three of them came into the stadium, nervous smiles on their faces, friends and family surrounding them and this was their moment. Besides the obvious last minute rearrangements of gear, modifications to "booties" (Tyler I am using your words here), and minor adjustments, the trio was ready to go. A generous announcement by Dave FM and The Waterloo Classic Road Race sent lots of spectators our way to talk to the guys before they left. Typical questions included "are you nervous", "are you crazy" and "you're sleeping on what"? Great thanks to all who came out and supported us.

After posing for what felt like a million pictures and "feeling like celebrities (Tyler)" the guys gave one more goodbye to their families, hopped onto their bikes and hit the track for one lap around while the crowd shouted encouragement. This was the first time they were biking with the full weight of all the gear they were taking. A little wibble and wobble (just kidding) and as they came around the last corner I felt a little teary. Here they were, three young men off on an adventure of a lifetime all while raising money for a great cause.

Jordan, Kyle and Tyler are now off, free to cycle this country with literally "all they have on their bikes". They have trained for this for months, they have prepared their minds and bodies and they will succeed!

Follow the trio for live updates on twitter here

Our goal of raising $69,000 is still a ways off and we need your help! Donate here to help build more affordable housing!

Day 1- And we're off!

Oh my what a day.

The three of us arrived separately at University Stadium between 9 to 10 with our bikes and equipment. We had the goal of leaving at 11 AM after the 10 K Waterloo classic was complete, but we had a lot to do. Say our good-bye's to friends and family, pack stuff on our bikes, and have videos and pictures taken of us.

At around 11:15 all three of us mounted our bikes and headed off. We biked around the track, waving at race participants/volunteers, family and friends. At this point we were trying to get used to the large amount of weight on the back of our bikes as it was the first time we had really biked with weight. Also, for Jordan and Tyler it was the first time they had used clip in pedals. All these things we should have been familiar with, but here we were experiencing them for the first time.

After we left the stadium and biked outside we realized we didn't know where to go next. We knew we were going to the Caledon area, but we hadn't drawn out the map yet. This ment Jordan had to pull out his Blackberry and look at the best route to Caledon. While Jordan was looking at his Blackberry we had race participants make some jokes about us taking a break so quickly.

Tyler making wheel adjustments on Kyle's bike at Harvest Moon.

After we got our route we biked through St. Jacobs to Harvest Moon to see Jordan's sister Lahring. All four of Jordan's other siblings were at the stadium, but Lahring had to work. Jordan had tried seeing her in the morning by going to Harvest Moon before he went to University Stadium thinking Lahring was working. However, Lahring was at home. Anyway, the three of us got to say our good-bye to Lahring. Very sweet.

Next we cruised to Elora feeling good that we were free to bike across Canada. We stopped at a  Cafe Creprie to see friends of Tyler's and then got bread for peanut butter and jam sandwiches in Fergus after visiting a grocery store.

The next part of the bike ride was frustrating. We wanted to bike about 40 km on a trail to take us to Caledon. After arriving at the trail, Jordan- the one with the GPS- noticed our speed had dropped. We were averaging about 25 km/h on the roads, but we had dropped to 15 km/h on the trails. Too slow! After biking 16 km we abandoned the trail and hit the roads. No more trail riding for us.

Food!

We also realized that biking to Caledon was going to take a while. It was 4 PM and we were 40 to 50 km away from Caledon. Biking 15 km/h it was going to take another 3 hours. Also, Jordan just wasn't feeling it. Biking much slower than he had in previous weeks when training.

Picture of Kyle writing this blog.

We knew we had another option than biking to Caledon. My friend Pauline- who lives just outside of Orangeville- had said she and her family were willing to host us for a night if we were going her direction. With this wonderful option in mind we made the decision to abondon the idea going to Caledon and go to Pauline's.

Pauline's family welcomed us with open arms offering us a place to sleep and wonderful meal. Thank you Pauline and family!

Because we cut short our bike trip today, we are biking far tomorrow. We are going to Peterbough and need to bike about 180 km. None of us have done this before- nevermind that we are going it carrying equipment. Also it is suppose to feel like 40C with the humidity so we'll be hot. Should be fun...

Promo video by Holeshot!

Take a look at our first promo video:

Filmed in Guelph, ON by Holeshot Media.  We look great!  But seriously, thanks for watching.  You can learn more about Heartwood Place here.

Geared Up

Brakes

Tyler has identified our two biggest overall needs as "knowledge gaps" and "equipment gaps."  As of yesterday, we are finally at the point where these gaps are closed, which is handy timing...

Final tune-up 

We were back at Royal for the final time yesterday to pick up our Marin Lombards.  Our bikes were in their shop all week, getting some final TLC before the send-off tomorrow.  There were some nervous moments as our new brake calipers and pads did not appear to have arrived, but then around 5:00 the box was located, and they were able to install them on all three bikes in less than an hour.   We also have our new lights, GPS, racks, and panniers installed and ready to go.  What a gorgeous sight!

Fully loaded

Today we are tasked with:
- Experimenting with the Garmin
- Fitting all of our gear into the bags, and cutting the slack
- Acquiring a few loose ends (rain pants, cable lock)
- Coordinating a common-chequing account
- Saying goodbye to friends & family
- Getting a good night's rest

Tyler and I also have a lot of work left at our offices.  Some vacation, huh?

How are we feeling?  Anxious, excited, nervous, pumped, ready; all of the above.

Can't wait for tomorrow, rain or shine!

Last ride!

Spotted at Tyler's work.  We still think he's a legend.
(Our original date of departure was the 16th).

Well, we are only two "sleeps" away from the big Send-Off.  With that comes all of the last-minute preparations.  The general consensus of attitude is a mix of nervousness, excitement, and anticipation.  Can't wait!

Wednesday evening marks my final ride of any significant distance.  My friend Catherine joined me for the Linwood-Crosshill route that I have been cycling weekly over the last months.  It is also my last stop in at Crosshill Kennels, where Pete, Peggy and the dogs are always happy to chat and help me refuel.  Thanks!

Today, we are heading back to Royal to pick up our tuned bikes, as well as some of the other equipment for the first time, including the Garmin 800 and the panniers.  We have lots of work to do this weekend.

Guest Blogger: Chad

[Guest blog #2 from our good friend Chad, who joined us for a training ride on Friday]


I have been following this blog since it began and last Friday I was following Tyler and Jordan around the Woolwich/Wellesley countryside. 

I learned 3 things on this biking expedition: 
1. I hate wind,
2. I am not even close to in proper shape to bike across Canada, and 
3. My hybrid generic road bike might as well be a small tricycle compared to the Marin bikes that my fellow bikers were sporting. 


I was battling the wind all evening and losing spectacularly while my friends were faring much better. The first 25 kilometres of the trip was mostly straight into the wind and broke my spirit along with devastating my upper body as I attempted to hold myself on my bike. My active lifestyle has not prepared me for the riggers of a 50km bike ride let alone 7 weeks of approximately 150km per day rides. 


I was able to try out Tyler's Marin bike on the trip from Crosshill to St Clements and it made a considerable difference. I was able to keep pace and not fall back like I had been on the first half of the trip. Our speed did improve considerably with the wind at our backs and once I returned to my bike I fell far behind Tyler and Jordan while they raced to Wagner's Corners at 34km/hr. The trip drained me physically and mentally and I don't think I would be able complete a cross Canada trip and I tip my hat to these gentleman as they are about to embark on this monumental journey. 


Jordan did joke about inviting me to join them on their trip but I don't think I would make it as far as Quebec and would have to do the "bus home of shame". I will just have to keep my pride and continue my far less impressive lifestyle of soccer, hockey and squash games. 


Good luck guys!


[You can read Tyler's account of the day here and Jordan's here]

And the taper begins...

So we're one week out from the beginning of our journey.  Here's the latest:

Tyler and I did Linwood/Crosshill on Friday
and Floradale/Elora on Saturday.
I did Preston/Breslau on Sunday.  

- We "broke-in" our Lombards this weekend.  I would say between the three of us, we put in just over 500kms, which works out to about the average day.  To the right is a composite map of my three half-day rides this weekend.  We're taking the bikes back to the experts at Royal tomorrow for a final tune-up this week.  Check out Tyler's account of the weekend here and our guest-biker Chad's account here.

- We also got some great videos while experimenting with our Drift HD cams.  They will be posted to the facebook page as soon as they're ready.

- This week, the training winds down.  After putting in over 3,000kms for the year so far, this week we're going to take it easy, with no long rides, and also no long runs.  We have to be fresh for Sunday!

- Speaking of Sunday, come join us at our big send-off!  We are leaving from another Heartwood Place fundraiser, the Waterloo Running Series' Waterloo 10km Classic.  It is at University Stadium in Waterloo at 11am.  Join the facebook event here.  We would appreciate your support!!

One week and counting!

First off - we're within striking distance of 5 digits for our fundraising. Please donate to help build affordable housing for those in need of it at the Heartwood Place website! Biking across Canada is a lofty endeavour, as is our fundraising goal of 10$ for every kilometer. Please help us reach it!

The B4B team had a great weekend. We received and tested our new beautiful Lombard bikes from Marin Bikes California and all I can say is WOW! These bikes feel as great as they look. The weekend started with a few hours at Royal Distributing getting our bikes perfectly fitted to our individual body types by their bike experts, shooting a pre-trip promo and ordering all the bike related equipment we'd need. After this I took the rest of the day off work to play some some softball with Jordan, his family and friends. Despite the 35 - 0 trouncing we took it was a still a fun way to spend the afternoon and topped off by the inaugural ride on our new bikes. The ride was fantastic and the difference between our Marin bikes and our Fuji Touring bikes was noticeable and exciting. I could definitely picture myself biking across Canada on the Marin's easier then on the Fuji's.

The next day Jordan and I went biking and were joined by our friend Chad Hepburn for a good 70km around Wellesley township and this is when we felt really, REALLY good. Chad, an impressive athlete struggled to keep up with us all day (read Chad's account here) due to in equal parts the training Jordan and I have been putting in and the quality of our bikes vs his road bike. It's interesting to note that I did switch bikes with Chad for an 8km stretch that saw him pass me on the first hill we came to for the first time that day! It was a little demoralizing, but I managed to keep up until we switched back to our normal bikes. We also used this opportunity to test and take video with our brand new Drift 1080p video cameras; They work great and have provided us with our first of many biking video's. After finishing the day's ride we briefly broke from each others company before grabbing dinner with more of Jordan's friend's and family. After some tasty adult beverage I eventually went to sleep feeling very good and eager to get on the bikes the next day.

On Saturday Jordan and I went on another little tour of the surrounding area, during which we put in about 80km total and both biked in the rain for the first time. Biking in the rain wasn't nearly as uncomfortable as I presumed it would be and doing it definitely marked a mental hurdle and I'm no longer so nervous about the rain we're sure to encounter over our 7 week journey. The rain did clear up and we ended up having a great day going from Conestoga, to Elmira, to Floradale and eventually over some good hills to Elora where we broke for lunch and a quick stop at the Cafe Creperie where the Owner (and nicest man) Jacques Dion provided us with water, some very tasty chocolate mousse and a couple good stories. After we pulled ourselves away from Elora we made our way back to Conestoga via the picturesque Kissing Bridge.

All in all, the first couple rides on the new bikes were amazing and having put a solid 200km on the Marin Lomabrd's my confidence is at an all time high and my legs feel fine. So, here I am, listening to the Last Waltz enjoying the end of the weekend and counting down the days until departure.

7 days to go.

Bikes are in! Thanks Tim!

Beautiful machines: Marin Lombard.

Tyler, Jordan and I had an exciting three hours at Royal Distributing today. The main activities included helping make a video for Royal’s facebook page, taking home the bikes we’ll use and ordering the biking equipment.

The video that was taken had the three of us talk about why we are biking across Canada, why we’re raising money for Heartwood place, and the support we’re receiving from Royal Distributing and Marin Bikes California. The video is being edited and will appear on Royal’s facebook page via YouTube. The video is part of a plan to have videos of our adventure across Canada posted to Royal’s facebook page. To capture our adventure we will use two Drift HD cameras that we’ll mount to our bikes and helmets.  

Tim making adjustments with Tyler on the bike.

Today we also got to take home the Marin Lombard bikes we will be cycling across Canada. Tim Crosby- Royal Distributing's bike expert- fitted the three of us on our bikes. The plan is to bike a few hundred km’s on the weekend to break the bikes in. We will bring the bikes back to Tim on Tuesday so he can add the racks and make other adjustments.

While we were at Royal we also discussed with Tim the biking equipment Tim will order from Royal Distributing’s supplier. Tim told us his opinion on what we should order. Since the three of us have no real biking knowledge, we agreed with everything Tim said. Equipment should be in when we bring in our bikes next Tuesday.

Lots still to do.

10 more days…