Day 95 Eagle to Port Burwell 81km

The sound of rain upon a tent is never a good sound to wake up to, it means packing up a damp sleeping bag even if your tent doesn't leak, it means cold fingers, no where dry to sit and eat breakfast, and worst of all packing up a soggy tent, hoping that the opportunity to dry it comes along before you need to get into it again. But within 30 minutes on the road we could both refill our empty water bottles and take off our raincoats, and a day of perfect riding was to follow. Our experiences of Sunday's in the US had made us wary, the spooky, suspicious and deserted feeling you got from most towns was unsettling, but Canada proved to be much more lively. Even the small one stop towns were bustling with locals, socialising and smiling. The names of some of these small towns had us smiling too, not quite the same as the original but quaint never the less.



Our weather luck continues to hold and although at times today the skies looked particularly threatening we enjoyed great riding weather, dry and warm but not too hot.



Our good fortune in other areas shone today as well. Just as we were approaching Port Burwell, and our intended destination, the provincial park, we were passed by a gentleman rider traveling in the opposite direction. We did our usual big smile and wave for a fellow cyclist but were surprised when he turned around to join us. He immediately and without hesitation offered us the use of the camper van he had parked out the back of his place. We gratefully accepted, especially for the use of his shower, and even got a bicycle escort and flying tour of his off grid, self sustaining castle, before he had to dash out. Laughing at this next experience of spontaneous hospitality, we used a bit of ingenuity and wind power to dry our tent, feeling that this was entirely in keeping with the philosophy of our unknown benefactor.



We introduced ourselves to his friendly, chatty chickens, his friendly, well loved cats and were impressed by his solar energy use, his wind power generator and as invited helped ourselves to some veggies from his enthusiastic garden for dinner. Hoping that the opportunity to get to know our host a little better would present itself tomorrow. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPad