East from Winnipeg

I have been blogging this summer about chipping away at connecting my Winnipeg-the Pacific route by cycling from the Alberta/Saskatchewan border to Saskatchewan River Crossing, Alberta, which I have now cycled half of (Red Deer to Saskatchewan River Crossing).

But I still intend to do a full cycle trip that will further my way across Canada.  In terms of distance (but perhaps not difficulty) my planned route is the most aggressive I have undertaken: Winnipeg, Manitoba to Thunder Bay, Ontario.  For the most part, I have ridden my across-Canada route east-west west of Winnipeg, and west-east east of Winnipeg, and I have decided to continue that direction with this trip.

My trip began auspiciously last week.  At work on Friday (August 11), I was chatting with a co-worker, Aidan, (literally in the men's room) and it turned out he is an even more serious cycling than I am, having previously raced with the Alberta provincial team.  One thing led to another, and eventually he told me he was heading over to Western Cycle (a bike shop down the road) and would ask if they had a box for me to use flying my bike to Winnipeg.  I had already confirmed with Greyhound that they had a box I could buy, but Western Cycle was more convenient, and Aidan told me they often had packing material with their boxes that would help protect my bike in transit.

An hour later Aidan showed up in my office, and said, "call Western Cycle up and they'll get a box ready for you and it'll only be $10."

"Perfect," I said, "I'll call them right away."

Then Aidan told me how he had had to return a tool and was given store credit he had not entirely used.  He handed me a slip of paper.  "This is the credit for $10.19, you can use it for your box.  Maybe you'll owe them 30 cents [for the GST], but anyway it's most of the way there."

He generously refused the $10 cash I tried to hand him and told me he was happy to vicariously participate in my adventure.

I went to Western Cycle after work, and there was the box, complete with useful packing material.  When I went to the cashier to pay, I handed her the slip for $10.19 and pulled out some change to pay the tax.

After a minute of punching into the till, the girl looked at me and said "Oh, it's all good, I just made it so $10.19 covered it."  She punched the price of the box in as $9.70 instead of $10 so that the $10.19 would cover it perfectly!

I am pretty sure these small but generous gestures of support bode my trip well!

The box barely fit into my rental car, but I managed!

I flew to Winnipeg on Wednesday.  Air Canada delayed my flight over three hours, which ticked me off pretty good, but what are you going to do?

I picked up another rental at the airport and drove downtown.

There I delivered my still-in-the-box bike to MEC to tune up.

From MEC I headed over to the University of Winnipeg campus where I am staying at the McFeetors Hall dorm.

That evening I went to Shaw Park to watch the Winnipeg Goldeyes beat the St Paul Saints at Shaw Park under an amazing prairie sky.

Today I ran around the city, preparing for my bike trip, getting a hair cut, and visiting the human rights museum.

Around 18:00 I picked my bike up from MEC, just in time to ride it to Investors Group Field to watch the 7-0 Edmonton Eskimos play the 5-2 Winnipeg Blue Bombers.

Unfortunately, the game did not end well for Edmonton. :(