Another Out & Back

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Another Out & Back

Saturday, 14 July 2007

This morning there was a parade in town. Something called “Fun Fest”. It’s not mentioned in any of the tourist publications, nor in many places in town either. I’d only known because the librarian said that although the library was normally open on Saturday mornings it would not be today because they have a float in the parade. I’d thought they’d maybe start at the Fairgrounds, not too far from here, because I’d noticed quite a few pick-ups pulling horse trailers. Bob found out at the restaurant this morning that it was supposed to start at 11 AM, so I hoped to be gone by then, and it seemed to be happening more “downtown”.

The Trans Canada Trail doesn’t come through here. It’s mainly a sort of half-way point with accommodations, avoiding some of the less-developed parts of the trail, on the way to Neepawa, where the TCT does go through. So today I decided to try the route shown to me yesterday by Bob, only going about 30 kilometres heading west, then returning, essentially by the same route, to get my 60 km, stopping at the library then, to check email. At least I knew I wasn’t going to be getting surprised by any huge hills on the route today (as I’d been in Russell!).

The first hill (and really, the only hill of significance) was demanding enough, especially as my ride was just beginning, but Silver & I made it up alright. Heading towards the west, I did face a fair amount of headwind, and winds from the side on occasion, but they weren’t as bad as some I’ve already encountered.

Had the opportunity to snap some photos, more abandoned buildings (I’m sure a “shrink” could put some analysis to my penchant for those) and more yellow fields of canola (also called rapeseed). There’s something about a large, fairly uniform expanse of yellow flowers contrasting with the green of wheat fields (or rye or barley) and shrubbery which really appeals to me - the yellow is such a cheerful, optimistic color! Alas, the smell which seems to emanate from the fields is a bit off-putting, especially after the better part of a couple of hours. Bob says it reminds him of the smell of rotting radishes; I have never smelled rotting radishes & don’t really want to. There IS a bit of a cabbage flavour to me in the smell - and the plants may be related to broccoli - have to look it up next time I get online.

It took about 30 kilometres to reach a small village called Newdale, which is just off the highway, and they seemed to have a picnic ground, so I went there for my peanut butter & jam sandwich - mmm, a picnic! After eating, I hit the road again, heading back on highway 16 towards Minnedosa, the reverse of the route I’d taken, this time with the winds more or less helping me. The statistics will speak for themselves - I clocked the two trips separately, just for comparison purposes. The only big difference is I went to the library on the way back, which added a little bit to that total distance.

DAY 22: Heading towards Newdale: 30.4 km, in 2:06 hours, ave. speed 14.4 km/hr, max. speed 23.5 km/hr
Heading from Newdale to Minnedosa library: 30.6 km, in 1:27 hours, ave. speed 20.9 km/hr, max. speed 38.0 km/hr (going down that hill at the end)

Total: 61.0 km, in 3:33 hours, ave. speed 17.7 km/hr, max. speed 38.0 km/hr

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