I was waffling a bit on whether on not I would do it. Last Thursday night I stopped my pussyfooting and started packing my bags and preparing my bike for the ride to Ottawa. I would start after work on Friday and arrive by the end of the daytime on Saturday. I wanted to have a good chunk of the long weekend left to enjoy there. I know that sounds all very inaccurate, but I had no strict deadlines.

For specifics: the total trip, as I had mapped it on Google Maps was 392 km (244 miles). I wanted to aim for 140 km on Friday night, leaving an attainable distance of 252 km on Saturday. By “attainable”, I mean based on an average speed of 20 km/h, I would arrive before dark. I really didn’t know if I could physically handle the distance, since I had never done a century ride, or a “metric century” for that matter. My attitude was that if I can ride my bike comfortably for an hour to work, and comfortably ride for 2 or 3 hours around the city, I should be able to handle it for 4 or 6 or 15 hours. (My attitude was adjusted slightly during the ride.)

Lots of the ride involved me hunched over handlebars spinning my feet, admiring the hills to my left and right and fearing the ones ahead. Every 20 to 40 km, I stopped in a General Store for water, gatorade and food. Instead of a linear play by play, I’ll take a Tarantino-like tact (sans-blood) and tell you some of the slightly more interesting parts and let you piece it together.

The big screw ups were on Friday night. Google maps and the gmap-pedometer are wonderful tools, but they have their limitations.

I picked a route using minor roads that quickly degraded from wide paved to narrow paved to dirt. On the bike, this wasn’t a problem at all, and I even liked most of the dirt roads better. On the dirt roads, washboards were rare, and fortunately cars were too. The problem came when I reached the end of a long road, where my route said to turn left, but the sign on my left said “Unimproved Road … only for farm equipment”. I could have turned around and pedaled 6 km out of my way, or use this 2 km road at my own risk.

I decided I would push my bike up the hill and check things out. I got to the top and was happy to be able to ride down the other side of the hill. As I reached the bottom of the hill, the road turned to sand. Not gravel, not dirt, sand. My 700x28c and 700x25c tires were as useless as dress shoes on a hockey player.

At this point I didn't have much choice except to push my loaded bike for the rest of the 2 km through the sand. Being the only big animal around, the swarming mosquitoes were an added bonus. After reaching the end of the sand, I was starting to seriously question my route selection.

Friday night featured some serious low points, but it wasn't all so bad. At one store, a friendly guy in a John Deere cap told me my machine would kill him if he tried it out right now. He had some sore legs from a day of work. When I told him about my ride, he gave me an emphatic "super-dooper". That all it takes to get me moving.

Here's a view looking back at a hill I went down (and climbed up). This was where I reached my top speed on the trip of 71.4 km/h.

As it started to get late, I missed a turn and ended up in the middle of the Ganaraska Forest. The dumb part here was that I didn't believe that I could have missed a turn, and I was sure I had to continue on to look for my turn, even when the road turned to sand, and a couple in an SUV pulled up behind me and recommended I turn back. "I'm fine. Thanks for asking. I have a map. Don't worry about the dark. I have a tent. No really, I'm fine." So I trudged on, walking through the sand for another kilometre before turning around.

I got back on track, and eventually found the town of Millwood, a town that was marked on my provincial map. Picking up a provincial map before the trip was the smartest thing I did.

Major roads were sparse in this area south of Peterborough, and I managed to get lost one more time. When I found a town on the map once again, I immediately looked for a spot for my tent.

Originally, I was hoping to reach a park in Hastings, on the Trent River, where I could set up a tent. I lost interest in this goal. I found a corn field that looked dry and set up on the edge of it.

The grass was soft, but not quite level. Nighttime in a cornfield can be surprisingly noisey. Bugs, frogs, racoons chatting with each other, and the odd car on the gravel road made it difficult to fall asleep. It probably didn't help that my heart was still pumping from getting off my bike 25 minutes earlier.

The Saturday ride had different challenges. I had only completed 115 km of my route on Friday, and I was off track, so I knew I had to do 300 km that day.

I woke up at 5 AM, as soon as the sky started to brighten. Riding a bike a 5:30 AM on empty country roads can't be beat. Rolling over the crest of a hill and down into the next valley, then parting the early morning mist with your front tire is a perfect way to start a day.

I cruised through many small towns that day. Ontario has a lot of small active towns that I don't know anything about. Many have surprisingly large and beautiful brick or stone churches. Unfortunately, I didn't take the time for many photos.

I did take a couple photos of myself though! Here's one of them. I'm the guy with the curved glasses (they make me go fast). The sign says I'm in Ottawa, but there's no sign of a town or city for another 30 or 40 km.

I did eventually complete and survive the ride, but there was one more major low point. This was when I arrived at about the 200 km point for Saturday. I can now conclude that 200 km is my maximum for a day of cycling, and I'd much rather do a bit less.

As Saturday went on, my breathing was getting more difficult, and it seemed to get better when I drank more water. I can guess that I was dehydrated, even though I was drinking a lot of fluid.

So at the Saturday 200 km mark, when I reached the town of Westport, I was exhausted. I bought a big bottle of water, drank a whole bunch and layed down on some soft cushy grass to check my maps. I woke up about 15 or 20 minutes later, hearing a teenager say to his friends "check out this guy!" I raised my head and asked them for directions to Perth.

I arrived in the city of Ottawa just as the dusk turned to dark. You'd think this only happens in movies, but just as I pedalled into the city people were starting to set off their fireworks in their front yards. Really, I was hoping for a marching band, but fireworks are good too.

Here are some numbers:

Total distance - 423 km
Total time (including camping) - 29 hours 5 minutes
Total time (without camping) - 22 hours 5 minutes (includes stops for food, drinks and rest)
Supposed number of calories burned (from bike computer) - 8250.4 cal (I'm still hungry)

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