Bikely map
Chris put in an early start to the day while I was busy noticing that, in spite of the broken spokes not being drive-side, they were still more difficult to lace in than I cared to deal with, without removing the freewheel, so I went back to Big Sky to hire Dan to pull the freewheel, lace the spokes, and true the wheel. He did all this, and cleaned my drivetrain too, and then still refused to charge me for it, so since my handlebar tape was getting into pretty rough shape, I bought some new tape from him (though I didn't put it on right then). Also, while the back tire was off for the spoke replacement, I swapped it with the front tire, since the back tire was carrying a good deal more weight, and had more wear to show for it.
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Bikely map
While I was waiting out the bad weather in Tompkins, Chris (another cross-country cyclist with friends who'd been at a party back in Vancouver with Graydon and Frances, and who had subsequently been put in email contact with me) arrived in town and was also put up for the night at the Buffalo Bean. Though I'd originally heard that the storm was supposed to pass over by Tuesday (the 27th), and that there would then be non-headwinds, the forecast changed to predicting light headwinds for the rest of the week, but no more rain starting on Monday. Figuring that this was good enough (especially having someone with whom some drafting could be done), we set out on the 26th instead.
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Bikely map
The winds continued to be strong headwinds, and I slogged out (mostly riding) the first 15-20km or so on gravel, but did get a neat picture of some alkali beds where some ponds have fairly recently dried up
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Bikely map
I got up, and had an interesting interaction with someone who had become concerned that those food-containing panniers not brought into my tent had been abandoned and, either completely failing to notice my tent, or completely failing to figure that it might in some way be related to the panniers, had loaded them into the back of his truck to take down to the police station for safe-keeping (and noted to myself that, when in a population centre that isn't smack in the middle of bear country, the food panniers should be kept in the tent vestibule with the other panniers). Fortunately, he'd just gotten them loaded up when he saw me emerge from the tent, and start looking for my bags, so he let me know that he had them, and gave them back to me.
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Bikely map
Dreading the forecast weather, and having put away a reasonably long day the day before, I slept in a little, ate a hefty breakfast, procrastinated with weather reports, and got a late start.
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Bikely map
I got a good timely start (around 8am) in substantial rain, but had strong northwesterly winds which pushed me along quickly enough that I really didn't care if I was getting rained on. The rain lightened up, and it then rained on and off pretty much all day, getting heavy again once I got close to Medicine Hat.
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Bikely map
It was raining when I woke up, so I took my time packing up to allow the rain a chance to lighten before getting ony my way (which I eventually did at around 10:20). Through the foothills, I seemed to taking about 3/4 of the time to cover a given distance as I'd been averaging in the mountains, and by the time they were gone (and it was just still-frequently-rolling prairie, with coulees and ravines and the like), I was making close to one and a half times my mountain pace.
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Bikely map
Figuring that I wanted to catch another shower (the daytimes were starting to get pretty warm and, still having bits of mountain to climb, sweaty) before leaving Fernie, I again took my merry time waking up and breaking camp, and got myself to the public pool at around 11:00am. It was due to open at 2pm, so I wandered around town a bit looking for a place where I could get a pocket Alberta road atlas, and for an internet terminal to use (guessing--correctly--that there ought to be one, even on a holiday weekend, since Fernie is something of a resort town).
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Bikely map
Not yet having seen that the Cranbrook Library was closed for the entire weekend, I figured on getting a slightly later start to the day, in order to cut back on the need to otherwise amuse myself in town. Consequently, by the time I'd fed myself breakfast, broken camp, and checked out of the campgrounds, it was pretty much dead on 11am (the check-out time). Having done 3 riding days since Nelson, it was time to reprovision, so I swung by the grocery store and did so. Then I swung by the library, actually checked the hours rather than the mere open/closedness of it (like I had the previous evening), and discovered that it was closed for the entire long weekend.
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Bikely map
I woke up at around 4:30am, figuring that I mist be in Mountain time already, and it must therefore be 5:30am already. It was cold enough, and I was trying to reach Lethbridge late enough on Monday (or any time on Tuesday) that I decided to catch a little extra sleep (my paper record keeps saying that I have a short enough day ahead, but then I keep overshooting my distance estimate and making it wrong, so I've changed the wording here).
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