After a delicious and copious breakfast at the Mystic Meadows Bnb, I headed east on the 2 towards Lancaster and then the Ontario/Quebec border. The stretch from Cornwall to Lancaster is quite nice with views of the St. Lawrence, a good shoulder to ride along and a bunch of ostentatious homes that have been built in recent years.
I figure it must be the Belgium effect-where rich French citizens relocate to Belgium to avoid the taxes of their home country. I'm sure most of these homes must be well-to-do Montrealers who have transplanted across the border to the relatively lower taxes of Ontario while still being within an hour of the city.
After Lancaster, the 'Waterfront Trail' runs along the 401 south service road. A good road with wide shoulder but no waterfront to speak of. If I was advising anyone, I would tell them to avoid the section of the trail between Brockville and Upper Canada Village, and take in the actual trails and road with shoulder between Morrisbourg and Lancaster. The fact that the promotion of the Waterfront Trail is, for large sections, along a road of moderate quality with traffic travelling at speeds in excess of 90 kph is disingenuous at best.
Another tail wind quickly brought me to the border.
I was happy to get back to the province in the forefront of cycling infrastructure. I followed the main road until I picked up the bike path that follows the old Soulanges Canal.
Along the way, I spotted a new postal station at Les Coteaux.
I wonder how something like this will fare in graffiti-happy Montreal?
It was nice to get away from the sound of traffic and ride along the old canal. They have some interesting panels along the way that explain the building of and life and work of the canal when it was in operation.
In no time, I was in Pointe des Cascades.
I pedaled through Ile Perrot without noticing too much the suburban bliss and then made my way across the Galipeau bridge with its fancy new bike path and circular ramp into Ste-Anne-de Bellevue.
At the base of the ramp is a market/cafe called the Coop du Grand Orme, which looked promising so I decided to make it my lunch stop. The vegetarian chili with homemade cornbread and the beet salad went very well with the local brew (ah, the joys of biking when you can burn off those calories right away).
After a scone and a cappuccino, I was ready for the last leg of the journey home. Having done this road many times, it seemed to take no time at all before I was rolling through the Lachine Canal and then up the Berri hill.
Ah, Montreal. Go away for a month and come back to find the streets just as torn up as they were the month before if not more so, and breath in the vibrating air of frantic drivers trying to make their way through the labyrinth of orange cones. You have to admire their determination to stay in their vehicles when so much conspires against them in the big, bad city.
All in all, a couple of excellent days of riding.
No matter how well you come out after a fall on the bike, like any shocking event, there is some trepidation when you get back on the saddle and ride again.
Finishing my work cycle on the ship, I am riding back to Montreal over the next two days.
Fortunately, there is a nice tail wind so I don't have to pedal too hard as I still feel a bit sore from the recent spill. For awhile I imagine every bit of gravel by the side of the road is a deep pit waiting to suck down my wheel but, after a few kilometres, I start to relax and enjoy being on the bike again.
My plan is to follow the signs for the Harbourfront Trail to see if it is as poorly maintained (or non-existent) as the section between Brockville and Iroquois.
I stop at a nice little park just before Mariatown that even had a portable toilet. I have passed this spot hundreds of times on the ship but not seen the perspective from the shore.
The trail takes you off County Road 2 through Morrisbourg, which has some wonderful brick homes in the Victorian style and a large green space near the water where I stopped to have an ice cream served by a morose teenager feeling her life was being wasted serving old farts in spandex in small town Ontario.
Once out of Morrisbourg, the trail follows the 2 again until just before Upper Canada Village. I have not seen another cyclist yet and it is not surprising. Even when there is a shoulder, you have to deal with speeding traffic and a surprising amount of large trucks. As I saw before, repaved sections of the road omitted to cover the shoulder so there is every sign that cyclists are not really wanted here no matter what the tourist information says.
The trail finally becomes one at Upper Canada Village and there is some nice riding along the islands created by the flooding of the river when the Seaway was created in 1959. The trail comes out at Long Sault Parkway, which has a good shoulder with even a few painted bicycles on it.
Not surprisingly, now that there is some actual infrastructure, I start to see a few cyclists.
Getting into Cornwall, there is a bad section of the trail where the damaged asphalt path has been poorly repaired by throwing down some crushed stone. This is often what happens to bike paths outside of urban areas when they are created with much fanfare and then ignored afterwards.
There was one spot of nice, new path that is along the shore where a new bridge to Cornwall Island has been constructed.
I won't quibble that the only reason the new path was built was due to a border crossing station being installed at the end of the bridge. New bike paths are good no matter the reason.
I make it to Summerstown where the Bnb I have reserved is located. There is one restaurant in the village and, back luck, it is closed for maintenance. Good thing I had that ice cream.
But the nice couple at the Bnb share their protein shake with me (some special diet they are following) and it fills the hole since I am more fatigued than hungry.
Another lesson learned: have some provisions in your bag just in case the expected resources in an area are closed.
Two thousand kilometers without a single incident and then a warm-up morning ride on County Road 2 puts me down hard.
And all because the fuckin' local township's idea of road maintenance is to push all the stone and sand on the shoulder into a nice little pile right beside the edge of the road.
I must admit I was pretty cavalier about wearing a helmet before today but I would have had scrambled eggs for brains right now without that bit of Styrofoam between my head and the pavement this morning.
Lucky, lucky, lucky.
Cyclists take warning.
It use to be sailors but the old canal at Cardinal is half filled in since the modern Seaway opened in 1959.
And, sure enough, by supper time there was a thunderstorm.
