Day 46 – Sault Ste. Marie to Iron Bridge (T.D.: 115km; S.T.: 6h19min)

We bid adieu to our Soo family, and got back on our beloved Trans-Canada Highway. How we missed you, TCH, with your narrow shoulder and waves upon waves of blistering traffic! Things weren’t so bad, actually. Today was good because there is a crazy cycling man in Sault Ste. Marie who owns a bike shop, and he had plotted out a less-trafficked route alongside the TCH for touring cyclists like us. We took this route through Echo Bay, where the Canadian Loonie was designed. Here, a man at a convenience store watched us go by and hollered, “Woohoo!! Lance ARMSTRONG! Yahhhhhh!! Woo woo woo!!!,” which made us feel quite good about ourselves.

Otherwise, it was an uneventful, but pleasant day, which brought us all the way to Iron Bridge, where we set up camp, and then treated ourselves to a classy meal at the Red Top Motel restaurant. This place was started by a couple of effete Toronto intellectuals whose desire it is, apparently, to bring some fine dining to this rugged Canadian landscape. We also learned that fine dining does not equate to a full tummy, particularly when you have just burned 3000+ calories. Luckily, our waitress seemed to intuit this, and brought us baskets upon baskets of fresh bread to supplement our meager, gourmet fare.

Stats:

Av. Spd.: 18.2km/h

Mx. Spd.: 43.6km/h

Emotion felt upon being compared to Lance Armstrong: Pure elation

Possibility that comparison was mere mockery: Quite high