Day 26. Tough as nails today!

Woodstock to Fredericton, New Brunswick

9/12/23. 59 mi. AIS: 5:50. 10mph. Elev 1919 ft.

There are days when 50 miles feels like 80…today was certainly one of those! When the All Trails route shows dozens of little ups and downs on the ride profile and Google says “moderate hills”… it turns out to be challenging… but there’s more! I will build the day as it unfolded. Follow along…

The nice motel lady met us at 8am to unlock Room 9 where they let us store our bikes for the night. Jim was taking care of lubing bikes this morning. Because the room had no coffee pot or microwave, we used our jet boil to make coffee and oatmeal this morning. Easy enough.

We didn’t get an early start.. thought we would wait out the rain and the weather radar showed the system moving east for the rest of the day… or so we thought. Anyway, off at 9:30… a light rain so jackets on for the start. Riding was comfortable up and down on the same highway as yesterday. Good and bad asphalt… comes and goes. Not heavy traffic.

Came to our first little rest stop at an Irving’s gas station in Meductic. Met Lisa the clerk. She loves her job because she meets people from everywhere. She said she got invited to Round Top, Texas yesterday. Amazing thing is.. we rode through Round Top last year and I distinctly remember it. It’s the place with the giant flea market festival… they sell all that chicken memorabilia you see in peoples yards! She also filled us in on the area and the side road with a swinging bridge we’d be taking from there.

After we left Lisa we came to a cul de sac (dead end) road then a bike trail to a walking swing bridge. It was just a few km.. but a nice departure from the highway.

Back onto the highway looking for a place to stop for lunch. Came across a pretty little campground right on the river. We decided we’d help ourselves and sat down on a deck of a rec building for the campground to make a sandwich and have lunch. It started to rain slightly so we scooted against the building under the small eve. As we were about to eat, the owner came up and asked why we were there. A quick reply “to eat a quick lunch”.. if that’s okay? He could have jetted us out of there.. but instead he said it was okay. Then he came back to visit with us for awhile. Pretty young guy, he and his wife left Toronto about 2 years ago and bought this RV campground. He said they’ve spent alot fixing it up (it’s really nice!). They are there from May-October. Spend their winters in Florida in a big bus size motor home. Carved out a nice life it seems. His name is Jimmy too! He let us use his bathrooms before we left. Very, very kind. Warned us that the campground we were looking at might be closed already!

Before we leave we lookup the campground and try to call. No answer and the voice message says they don’t take overnight guests. So much for that. Closest hotel is another 11 miles. Not thrilled by that news. That meant we had 30 miles to go! It’s 2:30…30 miles is 3 hours of riding… not to mention stops for whatever. In 3 hours there will be a few stops. My math says we’ll get to the hotel at 6 pm!! Ugh.

Off we go… steeling myself for 3 more hours! Then it begins to rain… again. Stop for rain jacket and rain gloves. It’s a comfortable temp to have bare legs. I still have on my rain booties. The rain is relentless for ALL 3 hours. And we are back on the highway with cars, trucks, dump trucks and semis. As we get closer to Fredericton we get 5pm “rush hour” so the traffic picks up from about 4:30 to 6 when we roll into the greatest, most beautiful, Korean operated little motel!! And they have a room for us! and it has a kitchen suite.!…and it’s the same price as yesterday’s gem. We are wet and tired. It took a lot of resolve for me this afternoon. It was not fun… what could have been pretty was not.

I have felt for the past 3 days like New Brunswick is just a pavement pounding transition to get to Nova Scotia! Jimmy the RV campground owner said exactly that today. No one comes to NB to stay and visit… just passing through… that’s us! I’m ready to move on but the rain is killing me… really takes the fun out of it. The forecast is bleak and Hurricane Lee is going to hit Nova Scotia in the next few days and ahead of it it’s going to stall out the rain we are experiencing. Horrible news for us on our little bicycles. Tomorrow we’re going to figure out what and where to go next. We think we’ll stay here another night (since it’s nice) and make some drier plans.

We’re alive and well… dampened spirits though. The door dash Thai food hit the spot after a tough afternoon!