Life is a highway , no , life is the open road !!!: Day 62

August 27

And so here we are on the last rest day of the trip , 7,043 km after that first day way back on the on the 23rd of June and seven provinces later, and rest I did with a certain sadness that it’s almost over. Up to now it has been possible to ignore the end but now with just the last push to go the end is upon us , 971.6 km left ( as per the maps ) .

So time for reflexion starts , even though it’s not over yet , and the fact of finishing is by no extent a certainty , many of us are struggling with bike troubles doing our very best to keep them together for one more week, many of us listening to every noise the bike makes with paranoia fearing the catastrophic failure , by now we have faith that we can do it no mater how tiered we may be , no mater how much we have to climb , how much it may rain or how hard the winds may be against us , we have come this far and we can do more , but can the machines hold up that is the biggest uncertainty and the cause of much anxiety . And by no means do we want to battle the elements this week , on the contrary we are wishing for good weather so we can enjoy the finish, relish in our accomplishments, witch none of us gloat about, but all respectfully and with trepidation acknowledge as quite a feat .

And now slowly we start to slip back to reality, the world once again exists and we have to fit back into it, I am not sure I can define what these last two months have meant to me , that will probably come later , for now all I can say I’m glad I did it, I have seen a lot of the country and I love it and appreciate it even more now then before , I think I have a better understanding of it , I also want to see more of it as it is a beautiful land and there is so much more of it out there to discover. There are many places I want to return to and spend time at and share with my family. The cycling has been great , it surpassed all my expectations, and I have been very pleased with my own cycling abilities , it’s been fun to not worry about getting from A to B , to just get on the road and do the distance and the climbs and enjoy it , I don't know if I’ll ever again be this fit !!

Today we slept in , I did the usual laundry and bike cleaning and then pulled out my chair and read the book ( The Stone Angle ) I purchased way back on the 20th of July back in Manitoba , the first time I’ve done so as I didn’t feel like doing much else today.

We did ride out to a nearby restaurant this morning for an all you can eat brunch only to find out there was no food left ( we were not the first there ! ) eventually more food came out and we eat our fill. And this evening we rode into town for an excellent dinner there ( picture at bottom ) , and now it’s off to bed as tomorrow is a long day again (148 km ) very scenic they say so hopefully I’ll have lots of pictures to share.