The Patio Table is Complete

Since I could not ride my bike, I took the week off work and spent it in the basement playing with tools. I finished the patio table. I also have got a good start on a couple chairs so that we can sit at it soon.

Your mission is a failure

Karina and Jason showed up early Saturday morning to send me off.



Unfortunately I was back on Sunday. I rode out feeling great. 30 minutes on the road and my knee was starting to feel weird. An hour later I was sitting in the ditch in excruciating pain being barked at by a bunch of junk yard dogs. I did manage to roll down the road a little farther to some woods to camp for the night.


After a good day and nights rest I rode home Sunday morning, taking the O-train about half the way to give the knee a rest. This is the third time I have been foiled on this Halifax bike ride. I am beginning to feel that this is not supposed to happen.

Here I go

Here I go. I have no confidence in my knee but wish me the best... with luck I will not be back tomorrow. Just got to put the bags on the back of my bike and ride off into the sunrise...

I have a feeling that Emily and Karina are planning some sort of surprise send off... hopefully it is not too embarassing! :-)

Two days to departure

Well, two days to go. The knee feels fine but I have not been using it much as I have only been walking to the bus stop every day. On the weekend I rode some errands by bike, but the mileage did not amount to much. Saturday will either be a grand success or an ultimate failure. Fortunately if the later occurs I have had several offers from kind people to pick me up by car from wherever I get stranded.

Our expectant crow is still sitting on her nest. No babies yet. The geese on the other hand have had quite a successful set of litters. There are packs of gosslings everywhere, being herded around by watchful parents, who get angry by hissing at you if you walk too close.

Assuming the trip does not get aborted, I will try to update the blog with my progress once in a while. Probably will not be too frequent though, unless I find free internet connections in remote places.

Knee

It was a beautiful weekend here, so after a week of no knee problems biking to work, I struck out to ride 160 km on Saturday morning. I got to Orleans (30 km away) and my knee started hurting. I turned around and by the time I got home I was in so much pain I was riding with one leg and walking sections. This is not good.

I visited the doctor last night. He thinks I strained a tendon. Stay off of it. Take a bunch of anti-anflamatories, and I might still be ablke to ride in a couple weeks. Unfortunately I lose the training time between now and then, but such is life. I hope everything works out.

My plan now is to ride 3 days to Bromont, Quebec. See how the knee is doing by the time I get there. If it is good, I continue to Halifax. If I have trouble, I can probably get a ride back to Ottawa with a friend in his farm truck. Argh. The weather is finally beautifully sunny and warm, and I cannot ride.

Crows

My office is on the second floor of a concrete building in north Kanata. Outside the window is a pine tree. Earlier this week a pair of crows built a nest in this pine tree in perfect view. Now the expectant mom is sitting on a bunch of eggs. She gets upset whenever we approach the window so we have closed the blinds and now peer through the veneers. She does not seem to mind that as much.

I have never seen baby crows before... it should be interesting.

Two weeks to go for the bike ride to Halifax. The knee is still giving me trouble but seems to be getting better. I am both excited and aprehensive. Many what-ifs are running through my mind. What-if my knee blows out in the middle of nowhere? What-if my bike breaks? What-if I cannot find a place to sleep at night? What-if I cannot communicate sufficiently in French as I ride through Quebec? Well I guess that is all part of the adventure. Once on the road I am sure the worries will disappear as things are taken care of one day at a time. I think part of my problem is that this is to be my first solo tour of more than 2 days duration...