Day 21 – June 28 – The “George” leg

FROM: Gateway Motel, Minnedosa
TO: Best Western Charter House, Winnipeg
LEG DEDICATED TO: George Zullich lives in Winnipeg and owns a beautiful pink pickup truck that might come in handy this 200+ leg. It wouldn’t be fair to ask him for a ride though since he has been supportive in so many other ways, not the least of which is a generous anonymous donation (and not, as he claims, a decimal failure ). His company has also kindly offered to act as our web host and George has personally been very helpful in setting up this blog site. All the things you love about it are from George. All the things you think should be improved are from Lori, while the labour is Nancy’s contribution. The coolest thing would be if we could take George (and his pink truck) along as tour photographer because he’s pretty gifted with a camera, but he does have a day job, alas. Anyway, we are more than pleased with all he has done for the cause up until now and hope we can thank him personally when we ride the ‘Peg leg.

EXPECTATIONS: No hills, and that’s a good thing since this is the longest day of our trip distance-wise, but we are stopping mid-way at Portage la Prairie for lunch at the Boston Pizza so we will be able to fortify ourselves with a good healthy lunch thanks to the generous folks there. Altogether we will be riding 215 kilometres from Minnedosa to Winnipeg, and we will be hoping for weather that doesn’t include rain: fortunately, that is likely as the POP on June 28 is 45%. Clear skies are also expected, and the average high of 23 ° C and low of 13 ° C would make our ride very comfortable. Extreme temperatures for this day are 6 and 31 ° C. For the former, we will have our arm and leg warmers. For the latter, we will be looking for plenty of opportunities to fill our water bottles. If it does get really hot, we can hope for record winds of 31 km/hr from our backs, but even the average winds of 15 km/hr should be from the west or we will be fighting to get to the Best Western Charter House for a good night’s sleep and a much needed rest day! Thanks very much to John Savard, GM at the Charter House, for generously offering us the extra night too!

ELEVATION: start 523 m, highest 549 m, ascent 92 m, descent 370 m
DISTANCE: planned 215 km, actual ________, lost > 5 km detour _______
SPEED: average _______ , top (downhill) ______ top (flats) ________
WEATHER: rain _______, temperature low ______ temperature high _____
headwind _______, tailwind ________ other _____________
FLAT TIRE: Lori ______ Nancy ______ other mechanical ______________
PROBLEMATIC ANIMAL: wild ____ domestic (dog) _______ human _____
We made it and the winds weren’t as bad as we had expected. We started off flying down the road with our freshly pumped tires, courtesy of Camil, the hobby bike mechanic we met yesterday. He had a go at everyone’s bike over a beer and some great conversation, and he can certainly use a frame pump! We got to Neepawa in just a touch over an hour, and stopped for a snack at a highway restaurant. We parked our bikes against a window, went inside and sat at the table beside the window. Just as the waitress was about to take our order, there was a huge bang and a puff of white smoke wafted up from the bicycles. I figured it was a tire and wasn’t wrong – Lori’s rear tube had exploded and was lying in shreds under her bike!
We had our snack anyway then went out to repair the tire. We had been told there was a tire store around the corner so Lori shouldered the bike and we walked over. She put a new tube in under the shade of a big manitoba maple then asked the guys in the tire shop to check the air pressure in the other tire and fill new tube. Camil had managed to get 135 psi from that little pump. Probably the one that blew was even fuller. He filled them up at our insistance so we don’t blame him at all. We are just so surprised that he could get such results from such a tiny pump.
The part of Manitoba we saw today was very flat and very wet. The Assiniboine River has no where to go so it just spreads through the woods that surround it. But it is not supposed to rain for the next few days so hopefully things will dry up.
We didn’t get many photos today as we had a lot of distance to cover but we have a rest day tomorrow so we can look around the city amd take some photos here.