Swamped!

By Pico Triano

Photos: Pico Triano

Training runs are usually not memorable enough to warrant getting written up but all the kincyclists agree that last Sunday’s run was special.

I was hoping to make this one a little more demanding than usual because I thought we needed it. The plan though was to head east and with a rather powerful wind coming out of the west we decided that was not a good idea. The new plan was to push west against that wind until we’d had enough and then let the wind bring us home. Great plan except we are not very familiar with the roads that direction. No big deal exploring new places is half the fun of it so it did not concern us much.

Pulling Wesley in the trailer against that strong of a head wind was challenging to say the least. I had to ask the gang to cool the pace a little a couple of times. We made good time though and the ride through the countryside was quite pleasant. The road we were on came to an end at a more major road after about eleven or twelve kilometres and we decided to head south until we found another road heading back roughly the way we came. We should have been a little more patient. We came across a small gravel road and because it had a stop sign on the end of it we figured this was our route home. It was a pleasant ride through the forest only our road was slowly petering out to more of a tractor path. That is not what we had in mind so when we came across a slightly better road heading south we made the turn. There was a barrier on the end of this road that had a sign saying water over the road but it was pushed to the side so we figured we were alright. Guess again. We started squeaking by some rather large puddles. They got a little worse finally we passed a couple that were very difficult to get around/through and thought we were out of it. A little further on we came to the worst one and it was too wide to go around and too deep to ride through. Rather than turn around and go back we figured that it would be better to take off our shoes and wade through it. Not necessarily the brightest thing to do but we got away with it. Sheldon went first and then came back to help me with my rig. Sheldon walked the bike while I lifted the trailer clear of the water. Everyone got across fairly uneventfully except Brandon who managed to sweep a leech away before it got attached to his foot. We scrambled to get our shoes and socks back on and get moving because by that time all manner of biting and stinging insects had found us. Thankfully there was only one more puddle that we were able to go around before our escape was complete. Francine took note of the name of the road just to be sure we never went there again. The rest of the ride rolled with the wind and we made excellent time all the way home. Finished with a little more than twenty-eight kilometres on the clock.

Francine has forgiven me for that ride and is still training as hard as she can on her own in the evenings. The kids although only Brandon will likely admit it loved the whole adventure and I don’t think I would get any flack from them about exploring some other corner. We are ready to go on more serious day trips. I would say we have a range of about fifty kilometres round trip. Hopefully this weekend will co-operate weatherwise because I’d like to go with the whole gang for a picnic somewhere (Somewhere dry).

More Stories From Pico's Cycling (Photos and titles are links to the full stories)

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