What a day. We started late today, around 11am actually, after hoping that the rain would clear at least a bit. And it did, sort of, for a bit. We had a great ride from the campground to Hope. From Hope we started the uphill grind. How painful. Oh, and what was more fun is that the rain picked up around this point too. Anyhoo, from Hope to the Hope Slide was about 15km. Over the course of this distance we gained an altitude of about 750m. It took us about an hour and a half. I was seeing a lot of 5-7km/h on my computer. Quite depressing, but at least we were getting the job done. I admit that at this point I was wishing we had more opportunity to train on the hills in Gatineau.
Randy and Joanne (Warren's parents and our current designated drivers) passed us a couple of times along the way in the motorhome and blew the horn which was quite fun. Actually, we had 3 random cars beep friendly at us as well. I'm also told that we had quite a number of truckers wave at us, though I missed them all as I was focusing. I think they were encouraging us, and must of realized what we were doing, as no one else in their right minds would have been riding in that weather. It was so nice!
We finally reached the Hope Slides rest area where we were going to meet up with the RV. At this point it was about 3pm. We were all pretty tired, soaking wet, and getting cold fast. We decided that we would only continue onto Sunshine Valley as I felt I couldn't finish the remaining 40km to our destination in Manning Park (and 500m more of altitude gain). I am so happy I'm riding with such laid-back, understanding people.
I have to make special mention of the Taylors' here. They have been so wonderful, particularly today. We showed up and they had hot water ready for us, then when we decided to end early they dashed around and found us a place to stop for the night while we stayed inside the RV getting warm.
Not exactly the day we had planned, but we knew today was going to be tough.
We shall conquer on the 'morrow. Hope for blue skies.
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