September 13, 2003
Day 15: Upper Musquodoboit to Halifax Airport
It was a chilly 8C when I got up at 7AM. The tent was soaking wet because I wasn't camped under a tree. I was out of cereal and milk so I made tea and ate cookies and bananas. On the road at 8:25. The sun was shining and the temperature was rising rapidly.
I continued west, in a relatively populated valley. Rural but there are a lot of houses alongside the highway. In Centre Musquodoboit I found out where all the log trucks were headed. On my right is a huge pile of logs and a giant crane to unload the log trucks. The logs are chipped and transported across the highway in a conveyor.
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On my left is a paper mill. Fortunately I was upwind from the paper mill and didn't smell a thing. But the big plume from the paper mill was visible in the sky for many miles downwind.
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I continued on to the town of Middle Musquodoboit which is the main town in the valley. It has a supermarket and several other stores as well as a high school and a junior college extension campus. No restaurant, though. I stopped at the supermarket to buy donuts and some rope. The high school is very unusual looking.
The countryside became gradually less populated as I traveled west. At Elderbank I turned west on a road that has no traffic and no houses or power lines. After a few km I took the turnoff for Dollar Lake Provincial Park. The 3km road to the park climbs 100 m and drops 100 m. Half the distance is gravel. I didn't see any cars on my way in but a few people were there when I arrived at noon. The lake is very beautiful and has a nice 300 meter long crescent beach. The temperature was 22C and rising steadily. I walked around for a while and even went swimming. The water was chilly but tolerable and it felt good to wash off a bit after not showering last night. By the time I left there were 30 people at the beach. The temperature was forecast to get up to 27C (81F). This is probably the last good 'beach day' of the year.
I got back on the road at 1:15 PM, biking in short sleeves for the first time on this tour. I need to ride steadily with no more long stops to make it to the Halifax airport in time for my flight. The road climbs steadily for several km and I had a bit of a headwind. The airport is at 150m elevation. I got to the southeast corner of the airport at 2:25 PM but it took another 30 minutes to ride around the perimeter of the airport to the passenger terminal
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While changing clothes in the bathroom I talked briefly with the Australian touring cyclist I had met 11 days earlier in Sherbrooke (he saw my bike outside the bathroom and came in to say hi). I got a bike bag and it didn't take long to pack up the bike. Definitely faster than taping up a bike box. There was no line at the check-in counter so I was all checked in at 3:45. By then I was very hungry because I never found a place to stop for lunch. So I wolfed down a Burger King meal at the airport. I departed at 5PM, changed planes in Toronto, and arrived in Chicago at 8PM. I was home by 9:30PM (11:30PM in Nova Scotia). Everything went smoothly. I was glad to have at least one summer-like day on the tour.
Distance: 78 km (48.4 mi)
Climbing: 540m (1782 ft)
Hiking: 2 km (1.2 mi)
Today's ride: 78 km (48 miles)
Total: 1,287 km (799 miles)
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