Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Tour ATlantic - Day Six

Sorry for not posting - we had no access to the internet. I will post the pictures and the other information later, but here is the stats for the day.

Note my battery died about 6 KM BEFORE we got to the end and it was mostly climbing. DRAT - so yes - look at that hill and note that it was NOT the end.

Tour Atlantic Stats - DAy Six


OK - here we go - I typed this information up a couple of days ago - otherwise each day just blends into each other.




 

While we saw lots of covered bridges or signs leading to covered bridges - this is the ONLY one we rode across. That is Mike and George and Brian crossing the bridge.

 
I was having trouble downloading the data from the Garmin, so I did not post the blog. Now I am sitting at another camp ground and NO INTERNET. So better get everything written up or the days will blur into each other.

We road as a group out of Saint John and it was awesome. I know for some of the group that the pace was pretty slow, but as much as I like to ride on my own, it does break up the day when the group rides together.

It was interesting to get out of Saint John but not as bad as I suspected. A few big hills, but nothing that we couldn't handle.

We did come to some interesting sections of roads - like "ROAD CLOSED" signs. Hmmmm - what does that mean? Closed to cars - or completely closed????   We took a chance and ended up on some gravel road, but nothing that our bikes couldn't handle.

The consturction zone


After a bit the group started to take on their own paces and I ended up riding with George and Mike AGAIN!!!!! Why does this happen - they say it is no problem to slow down their pace, but then I have to be on my best game to somewhat keep up to them. And they laugh when I try to let them get ahead - they keep me in the middle!!!! It does break up the day when I do have company for part of the way and I feel that I am getting stronger so keeping up is less an issue.

I think some of the issue is mental - I think I can't ride at that pace and yet with a bit of effort, I could.

The other thing - I hate to ask them to stop, yet they do it themselves. I guess I feel too "girly" if I say I need a break so then you have to come up with excuses. I need FOOD - that is better than saying I need a break!!!! We rode all the way into Sussex which was about 80 KM from camp. That was quite a hike for me to not really have a break, but after a couple of bites of peanut butter sandwich, I was fine to get into Sussex where we stopped at Tim's for lunch.

We rode on many different road surfaces from bad..............




to good................






After lunch at some point, they did pull ahead and I was fine to ride on my own. The first part of the day was not bad riding, but the afternoon we started UP to Fundy National Park and it involved some climbing. The first climb was the worst - pretty steep - well nothing over 10% which is becoming a non issue and the rest of them were pretty tame.

And I FORGOT to charge my Garmin the night before, so I knew I was going to run out of battery power at some point. Around the 100 K mark, the Garmin tells me it has low battery power. Then at 128 K - it tells me again and then shuts down!!!! I was 6 K from the campground so it wasn't a big deal, but I missed collecting the last BIG hill.

So while I didn't get the data on the Garmin - here is proof.......


The height of land - 366 meters and we started pretty much at sea level.


It was a long day to say the least - 136 K in total, but again - my legs are feeling great. I don't push too hard, but hard enough to make it challenging.

And the camp ground is absolutely amazing. The Fundy National Park is gorgeous. Not close to the water, but lots of trees and very quiet. I need a good sleep as I did not sleep well the night before.




Then we are sitting around after an amazing dinner of CHILI and guess what - it starts to RAIN. I mean - does it ever get nice around here?????

So we sat under the canopy in the rain, drank beer and chatted. It got dark and we were off to bed. Oh yes - it did stop raining by the time we went to bed so that was great.

The weather today was pretty weird. It didn't really rain, but why was I absolutely FILTHY when I got to camp. Well there was some mist, and in lots of places the road was wet so I assume that we were just missing the rain - which was OK by me. But every time I coasted, then I had the spray from the wheel on my legs. They were wet and FILTHY!!!!





And so ends another day on the Tour Atlantic.

Have a great day!!!!!!!!!

Ciao!!!!!!!


Have a great day!!!!!!


Ciao!!!!!!!!!!

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