Day 30: Brandon to Portage Au Prairie (122.69 km)

Today should have been a simple, carefree ride. Like so many things, it didn't quite live up to expectations.

The day turned out to be more of a bicycle obstacle course, without the fun bits like goodie bags.

To start things out, we got nailed with a strong headwind for the majority of the day. This really did a number on our wrists as we tried to keep the bikes steady and it kept our speed around fifteen km/h on flats.

Slowing us down further was a train blocking the path into what we thought was the only town on route with a grocery store. We were afraid to go on without extra food, especially with the headwind and ended up waiting about forty minutes for the train to clear. It actually started to get a bit comical. About three or four times the train slowly advanced until the last car was halfway across the road, but then abruptly reversed and backed once again, over the road. Also, after spending a total of an hour detouring for overpriced food at a general store, we found a much more extensive grocery store just off the highway about twenty kilometers down the road.

The last challenge of the day was the roads themselves. For approximately twenty kilometers of the ride we were forced to ride in traffic due to a rough gravel shoulder. For the most part, this stretch of the ride has been quite nice but inexplicably the shoulder completely dropped off outside of Portage Au Prairie and earlier out of Brandon (our feelings toward the gravel are highlighted by Vanessa's thumbs down above).

Of course no day is all bad. Challenges are what a trip like this is all about. Also, the detours we took brought us into some pretty neat, small towns we would have totally missed otherwise. When all is said and done, we made it through fine and can be proud of that.

Regardless of what we hit tomorrow, the destination should be a lot of fun! Vanessa and I will be taking a rest day in Winnipeg and meeting with staff and past participants of a local rehab program.