Day 62 Petit Rocher
Campbellton to Petit Rocher
Distance: 100 km
August 24, 2006

Since our distance was short today, we were beside ourselves with glee, added to by the winds blowing kindly in a favorable direction, plus it being my birthday making the day pretty special.
We got a late start to the day since we knew we had such a short distance to cover, and got into the nearby town of Dalhousie by approximately 10:00am, the time at which Tim Horton’s is even more typically rammed than usual.
We are used to some odd stares from people, accompanied by the odd comment, but the attention received this morning made us feel like minor celebs.
Probably more owing to one of our riders who rides a recumbent bike, or tricyle that draws all kind of attention wherever he goes.
He usually comes into camp with stories of people flagging him down only to pepper him with the standard questions, “is there a motor in it?” (no) “What is it made of?” (carbon fiber,) and the like, but this morning he was swarmed by people fascinated by this alien looking craft with three wheels.
Lewis and I were also surrounded by the friendly folk in Tim’s, who were obviously only too happy to have a distraction from their daily lives (usually we are mostly ignored, or given a narrow-eyed, suspicious sideways glance followed by what is presumably a wise crack made to their equally smug looking friends.)
As it turned out we were chatting with the mayor of Dalhousie’s wife, who was very excited to learn about our adventure; she made a prompt call straight to the mayor’s office, who then in turn came trotting over to meet us at Tim’s, where we were all invited for a group photo op at Town Hall.
We were only too happy to play into the role of welcomed and esteemed guests, and puffed out our chests, and clicked and slid our way over to the Town Hall (cycling shoes are difficult to walk in,) where we were met by the town photographer who had us pose in front of Town Hall, with the Mayor, who was the friendliest of the friendlies in Dalhousie.
He invited us into his office (quite grand) and gave us a tour.
We learned that he used to play with the Boston Bruins and played against whom else but Tim Horton himself!
I have become so used to using that name as a means to tea and yummy treats that I had forgotten that he was an actual person, a famous hockey player at that.
We ended up spending quite a while with the mayor, chatting about this and that, (it was also his wife’s birthday today, which was reason for a big hug from the mayor) and left feeling quite chuffed with ourselves (the photographer is also the local reporter who was going to publish a story about us.)

Shortly after we left, we rounded the corner and came face to face with a 13 degree hill, probably the steepest of the tour; luckily it was relatively short, as had it been any longer I fear I would have had to get off and walk as I was feeling especially lazy and tired.

We had a wonderfully fun day riding with a good crew (Vancouvermike, Englishmike and Alex); we mostly spent the ride doing impressions of other people on the tour, as we have good fodder and people who can do good impressions-this was worth many laughs as we sailed along, coming into camp relatively early, due to our short day.

What a lucky day it was for me; I had ‘happy birthday’ sung to me twice by the group (once in the morning and once at dinner,) and in two languages, English and Dutch.
I was presented with a group card, and a cake, with my name spelled correctly-a rarity.
The Aussies and Tom (also Australian) also gave me a card and a gift, which was really very sweet, as I have no idea where they would have purchased it from that day, as we passed no stores of consequence. I’m led to believe they had the forethought to get it the previous day, something that must have taken extraordinary effort, as this trip really reduces one to thinking only of oneself mostly, so I was very grateful for their thoughtfulness and effort.