Today, heading up Hwy 360, I can’t stop wondering what happened to the ferry. A few hours in, I pull up at a motorhome parked by the side of the highway, to ask for water and to chat with whoever is there. It’s an older couple; I tell them about yesterday’s ferry leaving early. They know all about it.  In another one of those Newfoundland things, they happen to be the parents of the deckhand who works on that very ferry. There was a medical emergency in Francois, they tell me. So the ferry, which came from Francois, upon arriving in Hermitage, turned right around and went back without waiting for its scheduled departure time. I think about it; the sick person had to wait 4 ½  hours for the ferry to get  back to Francois, pick them up, then go another 4 ½  hours to the nearest doctor, in Burgeo. Suddenly, my problems seem rather petty.

The rest of the day is long, tedious and exhausting. The road is flat, but I'm in the forest and it's the same, the same all the way. There are no towns or crossroads to make you feel like you've made any progress. Nothing much happens all day. 

Heart

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In my type of cycling, there is a tight brotherhood. We rarely meet but when we do, at the side of the road somewhere far away, we rush toward each other like lost children who have just found their mothers. After not having spoken to anyone for maybe the past 2 days, the dam bursts and we trip over our own tongues in the rush to get out all our cooped up thoughts. All are "individuals”, each a little bit off centre. I once met a guy in Quebec going from Alaska to Florida, after having crossed all of Europe and Australia. In Thunder Bay I met an old, white haired guy who had just covered 1000 kms in the past four days; he gets up at 4 in the morning to hit the road. Outside of Hartland, N.B., I ran into a guy who is bi-polar and weighs maybe 300 pounds. He managed 50 kms a day but it was good for him, he said, to see the line he drew on his map extend bit by bit. 

When we talk, we understand each other. When one speaks of his sore ass, the other lays a gentle hand on his shoulder and makes little cooing sounds in sympathy -"there, there, it will pass." When one asks about the hills ahead, he will get a metre by metre description of the number as well as the size and steepness of each. Ask the same question of a guy driving a car and you always get the same answer - "it's pretty flat." Best of all, though, none ever needs to ask "Why, why are you doing this?" They know. If you need to ask that question,  you already don't understand the answer.