Bike trip

I suppose my last post requires some explaining. It has been an emotional roller coaster week with some very low moments and some very good moments. It's hard to long and ache for the "not yet" when one is yearning and praying for certain things to come to pass. I found out some news this week that made me deeply sad and I came home and it was like reality hit me in the face without giving me warning. That being said, on Friday night I went to see Steve Bell sing and was totally uplifted by his words and music. I bought some of his older cds so you will start to see reflections quoting his music again.

anyways, my roller coaster ride was not what I wanted to talk about. Rather, I wanted to talk about my bike ride! Remember way back when I announced that I was going to do a bike trip. Well, one of my housemates and I set out on our bikes yesterday morning at 10:40am after visiting a bazaar at the local nursinghome where the Jeremiah Community has made a missional partnership.

The wind was absolutely brutal. We hit a few hills at the beginning that made me realize that I should have trained more for this trip in preparation but I am happy to say that I made it up every hill throughout the entire trip. Without shifting gears too! I have a twelve gear bike and the gear shifter doodads are too low for me to use while biking, so I wasn't able to adjust according to the road we were able to travel on. Between the hills and the wind, I certainly got a good workout.

Many people thought that going in November, it would be a cold trip. But it is amazing how much the body heats up. There were very few times that I was cold. Anyways, I announced my first need for a break after an hour of heavy biking. I was discouraged because I thought that we weren't even out of Toronto and Hamilton would just be completely out of reach as I felt at that point that I could do no more. But I was pleased when R. said we had made it to Mimico. Ok, ok, it's kinda still toronto. but hey it has a different name!

So here are two pictures from our first stop. It was a beautiful trip for the most part.

Around Mimico

Around Mimico

 We stopped in Port Credit for lunch. Cheese sandwiches never tasted so good - I was hungry! We took a forty five minute break and enjoyed the scenery until we were freezing cold.

Port Credit

 The sky during our time in Port Credit was just magnificent. The sun was so bright that I wasn't able to see what I was taking a picture of, but these pictures turned out well.

We continued down a very long road against the winds to Oakville and then when we reached downtown Oakville (about 45 kilometers counting the various curvy paths that the Waterfront Trail has you go on) we decided to call it a day. I wasn't in pain, but my right leg was acting up - I wasn't able to put much pressure on it, so pushing hard against the wind was getting harder and harder. I didn't think we'd make it to Burlington (our next stop). So we went for coffee and then took the train home. We missed the 5:30 train by two minutes so we picked up a subway sandwich and then caught the later train. I was honestly a bit discouraged that we didn't make the goal that I had set out for us. But R. encouraged me that if we didn't have the wind, we would have made it to Hamilton. So there are plans in the works for a bike trip to hamilton in the spring and then a two day trip to Niagara Falls sometime later.

I returned to Toronto and we had to bike home (not far, but it is uphill and something we were both dreading - it is so hard to be in pain and exhausted and get back on the bike! Much easier to stay on the bike and push hard then to have a break from it!). We returned to Camino House around 7pm.

I was in bed by 8:30, and between my sleeping meds and a wonderful robaxin-like med, I slept like a baby until 8am. Since we got home, I have felt thoroughly exhausted, every muscle aching, yet thoroughly good. I can't wait until the next trip.