Aug 16-22 - a big catch-up

Work was never this tough, or perhaps I was better organized.

On the 16th I headed to Oshawa, go organized, had dinner with Bob Kassel, Dick Felton, Jerry Christensen, Martin Cooper, Dave Hamilton but not Christine Laforce - Dick's daughter.  We ate at the Mandarin and she eats better food :).

Christine was our support person for the pre-ride; Bob did the first pre-ride.  The five us were the riders ...

It was a tough ride.  Three of us made the grade.  Dave H quit in Wasaga Beach, tired of the climbing and the rain, his heart and head just not into it.  Dick continued to lose a little time until he threw in the towel about 100km from the end, not going to make the time cut-off.

Christine was at every Control until Sharbot Lake, the last stop before the third overnight at Napanee.  She was busy tracking Dick and I told her not to worry about us.  Vytas and Colleen met us at Sharbot; we were on our own for Napanee, Colbourne and back to Oshawa.

We had 11 hours of rain that first day, never heavy but on and off steady.  We had fewer hours of rain the second day but they were sky-open-and-dump rains, especially through Algonquin Park.  We only had one short bout of rain the third day and in spite of some threatening clouds, nothing on the fourth.

We did get a lot of sleep with night stops of 4, 6 and 5 hours.  What the heck.  Besides, without sleep Jerry really drags.   I wasn't feeling really spiffy, dragged a little likely from LEL, but had no trouble.  Martin is very steady.

Finishing up on Sunday we waited for Dick and Christine and then had dinner; Christine heading back home to Windsor without dinner.  At 5 the next morning, Jerry and I were on our way to the cottage. 

Monday saw a lot of catch-up on Granite Anvil issues, lots of emails and organizing, a conference call.  The team is doing a great job.

Tuesday saw more of the same, emails interrupting things all day long.

Here it is Wednesday and I'm about to head to Oshawa again.  The trailer is hooked up; the car is locked and loaded (well, not really locked); we'll switch the trailer over to Jerry's truck once we're in Oshawa.  Dick will ride with me.

Everything is set.

It's show time !