Bikely map

When I woke up it was raining hard, so I went back to sleep, hoping that the rain was brief, and would taper off before I woke up again. Repeat that a few times, spanning about 2h. Note that I was close enough to the road (though certainly not the closest I’d camped), and the granite bedrock was shallow enough, that the vibrations from passing trucks made falling back asleep a relatively easy decision, as the sleep I’d gotten at night wasn’t as restful as in other ditches.

When I finally decided to get going in spite of the weather I took a little extra time to break camp, owing to my efforts to do as much as possible in the relative shelter of the tent, and to provide as few opportunities as possible for the bugs to get in while I did so.

By the time I was fed and packed (apart from taking down and packing the tent itself), I saw another touring cyclist (one in the general neighbourhood of retirement age) ride by and waved hello to her. I finished up, got to riding, and caught up to her when she was taking a rest a little ways down the road. I stopped to chat a bit and, while doing so, another two touring cyclists rode up and joined the resting party (they being closer to my age).

After getting going again, I decided that I should force myself to take a picture in the rain, just so that I’d have a picture for the day:

I then happened upon the two riders-near-my-age while they were stopped at a diner up ahead (and I was looking for any semblance of civilization at which I could get a current weather forecast). I couldn’t get an optimistic forecast, so I stopped to dry off a little, and got going just as the other cyclist arrived.

Noting that this rain also came with significant headwinds, I felt obliged to properly document some of the climbing immediately out of the stop I had made:

Though by the time I’d made it to a descent, the weather had also broken for a spell, allowing for some nice pictures:

Now since I was cold and wet, the roadbuilding standards in the area are somewhat questionable for cyclist safety, and there were a number of substantial hills (though certainly not mountains), I started to feel my mood shifting in the general direction of what it was climbing to Paulson Summit. Noticing this, I decided to ignore the relatively short ride, pull off in Rossport, and seek accomodation where I might be able to warm up with a shower, and make sure my clothes dried out properly.