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Angle One – Nostalgia Click Here To Comment!

There are a number of different angles from which I can speak about the Manitoulin Bike Tour last week. I'm going to start with nostalgia.

How is it possible for a trip through a part of the province that I've only visited once, briefly, 20 years ago, to trigger nostalgia? Well … the nostalgia is more for the atmosphere, ambiance, and activity. Last year, when I bought my bike, I posted about how riding it made me feel like I was a kid again. I still get that feeling every time I get on it, even if I am on my way to a meeting or to do adult things like errands. I feel like I'm about 10-12, a little bit giddy and unpredictable.

However, most of my biking, in the past year, has happened in the Big City, amidst cars and pedestrians and noise and concrete towers. It kinda dampens the nostalgia, really. For example, when I was a kid, I would bike up this road, often, to buy pop and chips, or to play softball.

My first photo above is NOT from Manitoulin Island – it is the Kerwood Road, southwest of Strathroy, Southern Ontario. This is what it would look like on a late summer day heading to Fred Woods' store, one of those old-fashioned country stores that combined hardware with canned soup. Fred Woods' store also possessed a pop cooler that opened from the top and you pulled your glass bottle of pop from the water and dried it off with a towel, or on your shirt. (Glossary for Americans and Europeans: pop = soda, carbonated beverage.)

So, put me on a bike and point me down a country road surrounded by cows, hay bales, the scent of sweetgrass, the occasional pick-up truck roaring by, farms in various states of repair and disrepair … and I am suddenly, instantly, no longer truly adult.

We non-biologist cyclists decided this is peregrine falcon nest. We are completely making this up, but it sounds good. And a fun discovery to make along the way.

When I was 10, I didn't "need" the following items:

  • helmet
  • gloves
  • odometer / bike computer
  • iPod
  • totally dorky but totally awesome orange vest
  • padded bike pants
  • padded gel seat
  • shock absorbers under my ass
  • shock absorbers under the front handlebars

But now, apparently, these items are essential parts of the experience.

Some of the buildings on Manitoulin are aging more gracefully than others.

I love living in downtown Toronto. In so many ways, it is perfect for me. Lots to do, easy to get to everything. What one might hear me mumble about, from time to time, is the absence of a country vista – that need that I have to sort of stretch my eyes across a horizon, to see long distances with very little impediment.

Here is something you don't see often in downtown Toronto …

My diet took a real beating this trip. As has been pointed out to me, cycling 35-40 KM a day isn't all that much. Three – four hours of steady effort. But, I ate as though I'd been running a marathon each day. Mistake. There were too many carb temptations (brownies, potatos, french fries) and too much exposure to the peanut butter / chocolate ice cream @ Farquhar's Dairy. THE BEST peanut butter ice cream EVER!  Too little protein.  Upping the protein in my diet tends to keep me away from the carb temptations, so the lack of serious protein (eggs in the morning, tuna or chicken @ lunch, red meat every few days … ) was A Problem. I was really feeling it at the end of day three when I ordered this.  This is seriously one of the best burgers I've ever had. Granted, I was really really hungry …

However, I'm back on track now … I hope … 🙂

This was a terrific way to begin the wind-down of both my summer, and my year away from faculty work. True, the summer is not yet over and there is lots yet to come.  But what a wonderful transition time … more on this to come …

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