KATY OWEN TRIATHLON: Week 2 Christina Lake to Bow Island (747 km)

This weeks update is brought to you courtesy of the Manitoba tourist board, who may also be responsible for the sweet tailwind that's blown me across the border from Saskatchewan. Great job guys.

This post is a little late for a few reasons: there is essentially no internet in Saskatchewan; I wasn't sure what to talk about and my iPhone magically deleted this post the first time I wrote it and annoyed the hell out of me. Gah.

Anyways, onto this weeks update. I have no desire for this blog to become one of those self congratulatory, obnoxious things along the lines of "look how far/fast I rode, I'm so amazing". Blurghh. Nor do I want to write about the mundane ins and outs of life on the road. No one aside from mum and gran actually cares all that much about what I had for breakfast and the last time I brushed my teeth (half a donut and about 2 hours ago). So what to write about. Hohum. Well, before I left for this trip my BFF Jen gave me a beautiful diary with some hand picked travel quotes written inside, and so far they've been strangely fitting. This week Ranulph Fiennes said "There is no bad weather, only inappropriate clothing.". He's clearly never been to the Canadian prairies. Since coming down from the BC mountains I've experienced baking heat, gale force winds, thunder, lightening, hail and most recently, fog. But just as varied as the weather conditions are the awesome people of all types and ages that I've met along the way. I could bang on for ages about the kindness and generosity of these people that have alternately given food, shelter and alcohol (or sometimes a combination of all three) to a random grubby foreigner, but I'll keep it to a brief list of honourable mentions. There was the elderly German man in Salmo who I shared luke warm beers (him), squashed peanuts (me) and bear horror stories with (both of us). There were Charlie and Judy in Creston who took me into their trailer and gave me wine and popcorn and sent me on my way with a giant bag of chocolate biscuits, all because their kids once cycled across Canada. There were Bass and Treble the labradoodles and their ma and pa (so sorry I forgot your names) who fed me fresh watermelon and donated to my charities. There were Cody and Maureen who let me crash their romantic weekend and share their beers and their campfire. And last but not least there was the Thacker family (Roxy, Roger, Kassie and stormin Norman the dog) who took me into their trailer, saving me from a huge storm and a mosquito plague, and giving me my first home cooked meal since Vancouver (on a plate and everything!!). All of you people are heroes.