Dingwall
15 September 2024
The events in this post took place on August 22, 2024.
I wake up refreshed. I feel different now. Relaxed. I glanced at the profile of today's ride last night. It's hilly again. I don't care.
There's quite the spread for us at breakfast, including hard-boiled eggs. Protein! The eggs are so hot that I dunk them in my water glass to cool them off before I try to peel them. I spend a lot of time removing the shells and the yolks (egg yolks taste gross). There's homemeade yogurt. There are oat cakes, but they're dry, not like the ones on the ferry. The coffee is free-flowing.
We're staying here for two nights, so I don't have to worry about having my suitcase packed and ready for the van this morning.
When it's time to start the ride, it's sunny in one direction and looking like rain in the other.
People are putting on their rain gear. All I have is a thin shell jacket, not really even waterproof. It's also worthless unless the temperature is between 45 and 55 degrees. It's warmer than that right now. I put it on anyway.
We set off on the long road that hugs the coastline. We pass an inlet with a dock piled high with lobster traps. A fishing boat is moored next to it. The water is still, reflecting the blue sky behind it. If I stop for a picture I'll cause a crash. I'll take a photo on the way back in at the end of the ride.
Oh, wait. This is a one-way route today. They're driving us back here. I guess I'll go for a walk in the afternoon then.
At the end of the road, Coady is waiting in the van. I hand him my jacket.
This ride feels more difficult than yesterday's. The hills aren't long slogs, but there are a lot of them. There's almost as much elevation gain per mile today as there was yesterday. The difference is that now I don't care. I've exhaled. I'm out of fucks to give.
We're shunted off the Cabot Trail road towards White Point, an outcrop of rock along the coast. A bunch of riders go right past an open view of the water. I join other riders taking pictures.
I follow the cue to turn onto another side road. I'm by myself now. Ahead of me is a bank of low clouds and a steep descent.
Some riders have pulled over halfway down the hill as it curves towards White Point. They're taking pictures, I guess. I keep going a little farther and stop at the edge of someone's property.
The van is down there. I guess that's where we're supposed to go.
My GPS is telling me that the next thing I need to do is make a u-turn. Are we coming back up this hill? I think we're coming back up this hill.
We're told to change into our sneakers for a little walk up to the top of the point. When I take my shoes off, I notice that the rubber padding on my left cleat is half off. I just put these cleats on before the trip! Good thing I have a second pair of cycling shoes in my day bag. Shoes I have. A change of dry clothes that would have made sense yesterday? Not so much.
I put on my ankle brace* and then my sneakers. I take out my camera and wander around.
It's not a coastal vacation until you take a picture of a gull on a rock.
Oh, we're supposed to be walking up to the point now? Whoops.
A bunch of people are already up there. I'm walking up with Elaine and Jackie. I ask Jackie what she did before she retired. I'm doing a lot of inserting myself on this trip. I have to. One of my big fears was ending up by myself for two weeks. I don't like myself enough for that sort of company. I'm pretty good at getting along with strangers; these folks aren't exactly strangers. Still, I feel the way I did in my early college days, before I knew who I was truly going to click with. Just gotta get out there and poke around. So far, things are okay, but nothing is really clicking. I don't feel like an outsider, but I'm pretty sure nobody would notice my absence.
We mill about at the top.
Is that the mountain that tried to kill us yesterday?
The guide Sarah verifies that we will have to climb back up out of here. She looks at the full route on her phone. "We're cutting out the last five miles," she says. "There's nothing to see there anyway."
We walk back down and change back into our cycling shoes. Rather than try to ride out of the steep driveway the long way, a few of us walk our bikes up the even steeper gravel end on the other side. When we push off, we barely have time to clip in before we're back on the hill we flew down on. It's a 14% grade.
We've had a lot of short, steep hills today. I'm glad I begged off of the North Mountain climb, because I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to climb this bastard here. I'm in my lowest gear again. I'm tempted to stop to catch my breath, but I know I can make it. The end is around the bend. This sucks.
Heddy is waiting at the intersection. A few of us gather and then turn left. I think we're still not on the official Cabot Trail. The road seems too small. We have another climb, a gentler one, and then Ginger is pulled over because we're about to plunge into the sea and we need pictures.
We roll along the coast for a while. Then Codey is drawing bikes and arrows in the road in front of us. He drives away as we approach.
So he's the one who drew that bike in the road two days ago. He's pretty quick at it, too.
We're back on the Cabot Trail road now. A few miles on, we see Jane's van parked at a turnout. We stop to take in the view.
"This looks like Maine," I tell her. "This photo is going to come up on my screen at work and I won't remember where it is." I say this because I want to remember that this photo is of Cape Breton, somewhere halfway between Dingwall and Ingonish. Slanted tree. Reddish-pink rocks. A little more sparse, a little less jagged, than the view from Park Loop Road in Acadia National Park.
Today is Thursday. Two days til Bar Harbor!
Now the coast is always on our left. Heddy's Garmin says we have two hills left, one at the end. "I wonder if that's the one that's being cut out," I offer.
We're five miles from the end when I see a sign for a shop called the "Groovy Goat." I'll have to tell Jeff about that. It seems like the sort of name he'd like.
Now there's a line of Codey's arrows in the road. This is where we're ending the ride, at Salty Rose's and the Periwinkle Cafe, right next door to the Groovy Goat.
There's a small counter where we place our orders, and the rest is given over to crafts and knicknacks. I'm in line next to a small display of books, one of which is a children's dual-language book of animals in Mi'qmaw. (By now, some readers of this blog might have noticed that I'm not being consistent with how I spell this name. The book of legends I brought with me, written in 1897, spells it "Micmac." Here on the cape, it's Mi'qmaw. Elsewhere, it's Mi'qmaq.)
In Mi'qmaw dialect, "tia'm" is moose. In Maliseet, another of the Wabanaki tribes, moose is "mus." Yes, we took their land and their mus.
I buy a dual-language book called "Kuhkomossonuk Akonutomuwinokot -- Stories our Grandmothers Told Us." It's in Passamaquoddy-Maliseet, and the editor is Wayne Newell, a name I think I've seen before, maybe at the Abbe Museum in Bar Harbor, or as someone mentioned in one of the other Wabanaki legend books I have at home.
We eat at picnic tables outside. The weather is perfect. The guides load our bikes onto the trailer.
Jeff is taken by the Groovy Goat sign and decides he needs to go see what's inside. He reports back that it's a goat farm that makes soap. He thinks he wants to go back to get a t-shirt. I go with him. There's a sorbet counter in there too. I think I might want some. Jeff picks out a suitably groovy t-shirt and we return to the benches. I go back to the Groovy Goat to get sorbet.
We've lollygagged enough. It's time to go back to Dingwall.
Now there are heavy clouds to greet us. After retrieving Janice, I get a shower. Then I fix my cleat with cyanoacrilate glue and electrical tape to hold it taut until the glue sets. Because I have these things with me. Rain gear? Not so much.
I decide to wash today's bike clothes. Why not? I'm not the only one with that idea. I have a 40-minute wait. That should be enough time to walk down to that fishing boat we passed this morning.
It's going to rain on me, isn't it?
Or mabe it won't?
Now the sun is in exactly the wrong place for a photo. Glen, who was near the back of the pack this morning, got a perfect picture.
Maybe if I wait a few minutes the sun will go behind that cloud. I'll try a few now anyway.
I walk on, feeling a few drops of rain.
This is a working little harbor.
Is that the mountain that tried to kill us yesterday?
Yet another inland lighthouse. This one is part of a museum.
I turn around and head for the fishing boat again. Now the light is a little more favorable. And dramatic.
So I guess this is downtown Dingwall?
On my way back to the inn, I take a few more pictures of the coastline.
Today is Dave S's birthday. His partner handed off a present to someone in our group before we left, and there have been rumblings of a plan to do something for him at dinner. I haven't been part of that process, but it seems the guides are in on it.
So when word gets out that they want us to meet outside the cabins half an hour before dinner, I assume that's what it's about. Soon after, I get a message that we're going to meet inside instead. "It's raining."
Of course it is.
It's 6:25, 5:25 back home. I'm uploading today's photos when my glassblowing partner texts me. Today is the first day of class, the day that we clean the classroom and participate in the mad scramble that is choosing our "lab" slots. I've already emailed the new instructor (sayonara, Colonel!**), and they're cool with my partner being my proxy. Tuesday nights is our goal. When he texts me, he sends a photo of a much-abbreviated lab slot schedule. "Can you do Wednesday night?" It's the only evening slot.
"Yes!"
"Done!"
Wednesday nights, eh? No more Premed rides.
When I get to the main lodge, I break the news to Jeff. "There are only three more rides left anyway," he says.
The guides are assembled in the front room of the main lodge. We're supposed to be tipping the guides right now, apparently. I fumble through my wallet. I don't have enough Canadian cash. We've been told they're okay with American money. I think that's crass and presumptuous, but right now I have no choice. Everyone is getting a mix, and it's probably stingy. I leave myself with $20.
Codey is walking around, taking our lunch orders for tomorrow. We'll be on a tight schedule.
The guides call us to attention. They're handing each of us a swag bag. There's a cycling cap, a car magnet telling drivers to give us "1 metre" of space, and a pair of Pedal and Sea cycling socks. We are all to wear them tomorrow for our last ride.
The guides thank us for being an easy group to work with. We have been, apparently, "better than average," according to Codey. He said this yesterday too. Elaine won't let him forget exactly how he put it: "Slightly better than average," she reminds him.
Dinner is a repeat of last night, only this time the guides come in with party hats and a candle on a piece of cake for Dave. Out in the lobby, a chicken sculpture is wearing a hat too.
photo by Dave S
Back in my cabin, I return to the routine: set out tomorrow's clothes (including the new socks), put my helmet and gloves near the refrigerator so I don't forget the water bottles, and get everything in or near the suitcase. This time, though, I bundle up a change of clean clothes, a pack of wipes, and a comb, and put it all in my day pack.
Tomorrow is going to be crazy. They're going to drive us back to Ingonish, to the hotel we were supposed to be staying at but for a renovation closure. From there, we ride up a mountain and down to Englishtown, where we are to change into our street clothes, wolf down lunch, and get back into the van. The guides will drive us some 40 minutes back to Baddeck, where we will shuffle our bikes and bags into our own cars. From there, nine of us will make the it-won't-be-only-7-hour drive back to Yarmouth, collapse at the same hotel we stayed in a week ago, and get up early for the ferry to Bar Harbor.
Bar Harbor. One more day.
(*12 sprains in 11 years, followed by surgery in 1992, and the need to wear a brace on uneven surfaces, because the proprioceptors in that ligament, which is now stapled to my bone, are shot)
(**For those who might be confused, I refer you to any of my Hot Mess blog posts from the fall of 2022 to the end of 2023.)
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