String of Friends

Static map: https://ridewithgps.com/trips/413711367?privacy_code=MTCReJZd2NIpR7lRiD2iRnQIi6HZUHxm Animated map:  https://www.relive.com/view/vPOp7ZGAdEv Today's entry is starting at 8:04 am! Before the ride! Thanks to spending the night at a bed and breakfast, I have some down time. The weather forecast improved. It's not raining. I could have camped, but I am thoughtfully enjoying the easy time. I'm sitting at a coffee shop. I even read some of the Great Gatsby. It's my New York book. I have not been reading much this trip. I prefer learning about the new places I am traveling through.  Port Stanley is an old beach town and has long catered to people coming down from London. A plaque on a building next to the B&B mentioned it had the biggest dance floor in Canada in the 1910s. There was a train line to bring tourists. It's a tourist train now. There's the beach party side and the old town side. I'm on the old town side. I'm about to head...

Static map: https://ridewithgps.com/trips/413458996?privacy_code=wAYczJWjcEzXDnAZUFttUwbLfn8rquot Animated map: https://www.relive.com/view/vNOPLoGzX2O Around 12:30 I woke to a flash and massive boom. For the next hour the storm rolled overhead with pounding rain. My little tent held. I'd put it guy lines, but the wind wasn't strong, a mixed blessing because it storm moved slower. After the lighting and thunder moved east, the heavy rain continued behind it for another hour then light rain the rest of the night. I remembered my friend Kate's observation that the lightning gets you through the ground. How much insulation does an air mattress have? Not a lot.  (Yikes!) Despite not recalling sleeping, I woke with a snort. I felt damp. Oh! I was sleeping on my wet swimming trunks. How did they get there? Except for that and an occasional mystery drip, everything was dry, but the heavy rain splattered the sides of the tent with fine sand mixed with dirt. ...

Static map: https://ridewithgps.com/trips/413237562?privacy_code=tW2o6OszbZurHfddMXkQ7Y1LCOTVldWO Animated map: https://www.relive.com/view/vrqo7ke4JKq I woke with the pleasant feeling that I don't have to hurry out of camp. Yesterday had been one of my highest mileage days at 83, but also my highest average riding speed, a whopping 12.2 mph! Today was half the distance. I woke up to the sound of a flapping tent fly. This was the forecasted wind. I was actually surprised how well the trees in this flat area blocked the wind. The fly was just fluttering. I hung out and did the 21st century things one does in their tent: Wordle, Connections, checked emails, the usual. When I got out the wind was pretty mild. I was assuming to be at a coffee shop and bookstore at 9 when it opened. I opted to eat at camp since I didn't have other plans. I was flying dark because cell reception was so poor, Google search wasn’t working. Jesse was my phone-a-friend to find a place that mi...

Static map: https://ridewithgps.com/trips/412999088?privacy_code=y4U1RI5TG7BZCi3BqcIK43hfsAo8Beqm Animated map: https://www.relive.com/view/vXvLD2Kpg7v This morning as I sit at my windy, secluded campsite, eating instant oatmeal, Detroit seems far away. Still, it was yesterday that I left my Warmshowers host. She was leaving for work at the same time I was leaving so we biked 4 miles through the city together. Detroit has a strange vibe with lots of empty land next to a revived downtown filled with megaprojects that previously failed to revive the downtown. I passed into an industry area along the river that seems to be doing well.  (The Gordie Howe Bridge and Fort Wayne ( After a short journey I spotted the Gordie Howe bridge. Immediately before you get to it you reach Fort Wayne, an old Fort Lawton-ish post. I wheeled around in a drive by sightsee, then it was on to the bridge. A long, covered tunnel for bikes and pedestrians led to the bridge. Trucks queu...