When I woke early this morning I heard the pattering of rain outside my window. I didn't really want to get up, but my bladder made me. After a nice breakfast I went out to clean some of the mud off my bike—the culprit of the grindy sound and bad shifting from late yesterday. To my surprise, I found rust on my pedals, gears and chain. Water alone shouldn't have done that. It was very strange. I hosed the bike down to clean it and spent some time trying to degunk and relube the chain. As I finished the sky began to clear and the sun came out. Yay!

J.P. Allaire, outside his home in Rockland.

When I crossed over from Hawkesbury to the Quebec side and turned onto Highway 344 my mood changed drastically. I've thought it over, and I think it's because of the trees. I'm a tree person. They convey a sense of security. They provide shade. The provide... cover. They offer an opportunity for free camping. And they also give more of an impression of movement. The road was great, and I loved the small towns built close to the road as I went through them. Although my knees and ankles took turns aching, they weren't that bad. My butt got a bit sore, though. Shoulda known.

Finally, past the lovely town of Oka, I came to the Oka Provincial Park. I felt a bit awkward being in Quebec because I haven't practiced my French in a long while. My French kinda sucks. So I walked in the office and asked the girl somewhat nervously if they had a campsite—I hadn't, of course, made a reservation. Two surprises: Firstly, I did quite well in French, and secondly that this park has—I kid you not—over 1000 sites judging by the map. And lotsa free ones.

I set things up and walked a long, long way down the road to the beach. Big. Unfortunately, the sky was beginning to cloud. I saw a phone, but hadn't brought anything to make a call. So back to the campsite... grabbed my bike and pedalled back with the right stuff (standing the entire way lest my rear have to endure any more sitting). I forgot my PIN number for the calling card back at the site. Damn. Used up $4.00 in change for a one minute conversation with Richard. I'm also not sure if my knee brace did anything other than give me a white leg with a tanned kneecap. And I'm not sure if the ankle brace did anything other than cut off circulation to that part of the foot. [sigh]

Back at the campsite I did typical campsite things. Showered (ah!), laundry, and finished up Bev's lunch, which had been enough for all my meals today. As I sat down to write in my journal a park ranger came to my site and told me that I had to move my tent somewhere in between the yellow dots on the ground. You see, I set mine up on a flat, leaf covered piece of land just beyond those dots. He wanted it on the harder, rock strewn ground. What's more, to move my tent I have to move everything back outside, take the entire thing down (because it isn't freestanding) and set it back up a few feet in. So I'm sitting in my tent now waiting for it to get dark, at which point he probably won't be able to see that I haven't bothered to move it.

The mosquitos, I might mention, are despicable little creatures. Once while I was riding I stopped under a tree to take a drink: as I raised the bottle to sip, my eyes opened wide at the swarm of them in the air around me. Then I started to feel them. Boy, can I move that bike when I want to. In the park I've made generous use of my Off! Skintastic. Why oh why, God, did you put those abominable bloodsuckers on this earth?

I'm glad I pushed on today, because in persevering things got much better. I didn't want to go so far, though, but that's done. Soon I won't have any preset meetings with friends and it'll be easier to do as much as I feel like it. Although I'll have to remember to persevere when things don't seem all that great. I know that it will probably take up to two weeks to build up a routine that makes this seem comfortable.

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