Day 42. Today was a most beautiful day! 🙌

Port Hastings to Mabou, Nova Scotia

9/28/23 40 mi. AIS: 4:13. 9.5 mph Elev. 705 ft.

Today was the kind of day you’re hoping to have when you plan these bike rides. Scenic, interesting, favorable temps and it’s fall, so it’s quieter. Of course you’d like them all to be like today, but realizing it’s not possible, you relish the good ones! To my powder hound friends… today was like one of those really good powder days. All the stars aligned. Sweeeet ride today!

The little motel we stayed at last night worked out just great. We had a pizza and salad delivered and were happy and warm. It had a basic kitchenette so we made our camp breakfast indoors.

Celtic Shores Coastal Trail

From our start we were on the highway about 3 miles. Then we went left and hopped on the coastal trail. It’s existed for about 25 years. It wasn’t busy today, but I imagine that it is in the summer.

The trail ran followed along the coastline all morning. You could smell the sea. We haven’t had a lot of salty sea smell yet. It’s such a distinct smell. It gives me good memories of other coastal places I love.

It was nice being off the highways after several days and back on the trail. You can just relax your mind a bit…, look around more. Stop more easily to take a picture! Which by the way, you are going to get some pictures today.. haha.

Aside from stopping to take pictures and soak in a few views our first destination was to check out The Celtic Music Interpretive Center. It’s in a town called Judique (“Jude-ick”). Inside was a nice cafe and then a gallery room with Scottish music history from Old Scotland and Nova Scotia. At noon there were two musicians (piano and fiddle) playing Celtic music. That was fun!

I learned about the word Ceilidh (“Kay-Lee”). It’s a social event. Scottish or Irish Singing dancing and story telling… often referred to as a “Kitchen Party”.

After lunch we were back on trail for a few hours (3). In the morning we saw about 10 people total in 30K and the afternoon people were out walking and ATV-ing, and a couple bicycles. Back to our scenic views. Now it was smaller islands off the shore and little calm river outlets. Peaceful, quiet water shelters. Makes you wish you had a canoe of kayak to paddle around in there today.

We eventually left the coastline and headed inland toward Mabou (“mab-boo”). We had to trail ride climb (less than 4%) up and over a hill. This uphill section had soft loose sand on the trail. It was slow going for a few km. Then I lost it… I had no momentum in the sand and my front wheel slightly turned…and I was sideways. Fortunately I fell into soft grass off the trail… my bike on top of me of course! But the panniers kind of frame the bike so the bike doesn’t actually land on your body…that’s helpful. It left me with a little PTSD. After that I rode in my Moab sand aggressive mode! I put my weight on my front wheel and picked up my pace. That worked much better. Good thing was the loose sand didn’t last too long.

And again… so many friendly people. They take the time to chat a bit. We met Shaun, his dog and his partner. He knew all about the Rawdon Hills that tormented me so last week. (There’s a future story about those hills). They gave us local intel on places to eat down the road.

Down the other side of the hill we came into the Mabou River valley. The seasons have changed and the river and the meadows were so beautiful in fall color. Pictures tell the story about how scenic it was today. If you’re thinking of riding in Nova Scotia you have to DO THIS TRAIL!!

It was pretty evident today of the season change. We’ve felt it in the air. The mornings are cool. It gets light about 7am. We start our rides with headband or hat under our helmet. Lately we’ve both worn leggings with our bike shorts. These last until about the 1st, 2nd or 3rd climb. By about noon the day begins to warm up (maybe the sun peaks through some clouds).

We’re staying at a nice little motel up the hill but just outside of town. Walking is easy to the Cape Breton famous Red Shoe Pub. Music nightly. It’s the most hopping place we’ve witnessed in several days… maybe weeks. They have good food, nice atmosphere and the music tonight was a nice young Cape Breton couple. They came to sing and play both guitar and wooden box percussion.

All in all it was a really, really fun ride today. And the evening was quite fun too!

Quirky things…

Out in the middle of nowhere on the small climb we had today this place called Mikes E-Bikes shows up. There’s an old red container type building. And an old small Airstream camper, little wooden hut where he does his business, and about 6 big fat tire e-bikes to rent. Mike is no where to be seen but he has signs at his wide open hut to call or text. It was so damned Nova Scotian! Talk about unpretentious… but he’s there to-rent you a nice e-bike out the middle of nowhere. Simple sign is all.

Tomorrow…

We ride to Baddeck. It will be a little trail and then back on the highway. Baddeck is the start of the Cabot Trail. We have a layover on Saturday to get prepare for “the Biggie” starting Sunday!