160 miles
Total around the world bicycle miles 23,233 (37,389 km)
July 21, 2016
In my last post I forgot to mention a bike repair we had in Indian Head. A few days ago Jocelyn told me about a vibration from her rear wheel that traveled up to her saddle. I checked it out and noticed a side play in that wheel and figured something was loose in the rear hub. I mentioned this to John and Linda who guided us a few blocks to the town’s bike guy Bruce who works out of his home. It turned out the rear hub cones were loose so Bruce and his son fixed this problem and a few others. Indian Head is such a nice town and great community of people.
Since Andee was leaving on Saturday from Winnipeg we had about 600 km to ride in 3 days. John and Linda found a person driving east to Brandon (about 250 km) on Wednesday afternoon with a truck so they arranged a ride with Rhonda. We really wanted to be in Winnipeg when Andee left so this made it possible.
Rhonda drove us to Turtle Crossing Campground in Brandon. When we arrived there it was very wet with many trees and fences down. The manager told us a huge storm with tornado winds just hit there 10 minutes ago. We rode around and tried to find a dry site but they were all wet so we settled our tent in the mud and swarming mosquitoes. After pitching the tent Andee and Jocelyn made a delicious spaghetti dinner and fortunately we still had some red wine left. The night turned cool and refreshing, no rain, but occasionally a loud crack was heard as tree branches crashed to the ground. The next day we found nine hail dings on Andee’s rental car. This was probably from the storm in Indian Head.
Today was a long day and we made it to Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. Along the way we met a Canadian family of three cycling from the British Columbia to Montreal. Andee was driving point again and found an excellent campground on an island called Portage Industrial Exhibition Campground. This has been our best and cheapest campsite yet plus with the best facilities. Tomorrow Winnipeg.
July 22, 2016
It was a quick fast ride to Winnipeg. Upon entering the outskirts Jocelyn heard a loud crack from her crank and had to jump off her bike. She could not peddle and move forward anymore. She called Andee who went in search of a bike shop. Andee found two several miles ahead and suggested Portage Cycle and Sports for the repair. We walked our bikes several miles and found Dave who described the problem of stripped cranks caused from loose pinch bolts which connect the crank arm to the crank. He suggested changing the entire crank set including stem, bottom bracket, arms, and chain wheels as this assembly comes as a kit. We went to lunch and Dave had the work done an hour later.
After over 23,000 miles this has been only the second failure when we could not ride. The first was in Montenegro, on the Balkan Peninsula, where my rear wheel rim cracked from a large pothole in a fast downhill and was unrideable. At that point we had to get a ride back to Podgorica for the rim replacement. There are only two bikes shops in Montenegro. Tonight we are in a Winnipeg Hotel near the airport as Andee is fly home tomorrow.
July 23, 2016
We took Andee to the airport this morning then returned to the hotel expecting to ride out but the weather was storming with flooding rains so we decided to stay put as the weather is expected to clear tomorrow. In fact, tornadoes touched down here yesterday and Long Plain First Nation people (an indigenous American Indian community) evacuated to this hotel through the Red Cross.
