So the load has been lightened by 6.5 pounds. I've sent back 2 shirts, 2 pairs of socks, 2 pairs of underwear, sleeping pants, camera carrying case, 35mm lens, Nintendo DS and cord, travel thermos, teas, one front pannier, backpack, front rack, and a BC and Alberta license plate. The handling without the front rack and bags is a lot less sluggish but I adapted quickly. The bike is also very back heavy so I have to be mindful of how easily the front likes to rise up. Overall I'm enjoying the setup much more. This puts my gear returned now at 13 pounds! It's amusing that I lugged all that useless stuff through BC. Oh well, makes you stronger.
So back to the day. It was nearly 1pm by the time I set off with my newly lightened load. The wind was mostly in my face all day with overcast and 20° temperatures. Around me were rolling farms as far as the eye could see. The hills were long and gradual, like very tame versions of their BC cousins. This felt like the perfect transition from the mountains to the prairies.
The farms along the way were very soothing to ride by. Cows, in massive herds, would usually gawk at me as I passed (those cows are up to something). The vegetation would sway like a body of water with the winds. One pasture had a mix of cows and horses that were really beautiful. The horses all came trotting up to greet me with at the fence but ran off before I could get a photo of them looking my way. One calf had somehow gotten outside the fence and a truck driver honked at me to point him out.
Well sir I'm no cattle rustler but I got that little fellow galloping down along the fence for a ways while I followed him on the bike until he found a spot of fence where the barbed wire let him slip back to the safety of the herd. Cowboy, this guy right here.
I pushed on until I hit 90 or so km and turned off the highway and into a small town called Cluny where I setup in a corner of a quiet church yard. As I've been typing this the weather went from calm and comfortable to a raging thunderstorm in a matter of seconds. What sweet timing I had to stop here. I was setup and did a little lap around town to see the train that passes through before the storm hit. Barely 20 minutes.
The walls of my tent are being put to the test by high winds as the tarp fights off sideways rain while everything lights up every few seconds from the thunder and lightning battles overhead. It sounds like chaos "outside" but I'm sitting happy in my little environment. Bit of reading and sleep is in order, stay tuned for more bicycle cowboy antics!