"It's like I'm inside an air freshener!"

This morning Priscilla said goodbye to Beth and Lexie, her hosts from last night (in the bottom picture yesterday), packed up Woodrow and hit the road. She stopped at Walmart and some other store early on and stocked up on fuel (granola bars, mostly), and then carried on. The ride was a bit better than yesterday. Still very hilly (and she's been told there are actual mountains ahead), but most of the time the road was lined thickly on either side by evergreens, which served as a natural windbreak and made everything smell all piney-fresh.

Remember how yesterday Priscilla said she's not an ax murderer as of yet? Well, that's still the case, and let's all hope it remains so. However, this trip does seem to be changing her, and not all for the good. A most sinister event this afternoon has caused me considerable unease. In one of the towns she was riding through, she saw a McDonalds and thought (are you ready for this?) "Hmm, McDonalds sounds kind of good..." Priscilla Driscoll actually thought that! But the worst is still to come: she actually stopped, deliberately locked up Woodrow, sauntered into the McDonalds, and ordered French fries. And ate them. With relish (as in gusto-- but really, I wouldn't be surprised if she buys pickle relish tomorrow... and then probably some corn syrup and an ax)!

Tonight Priscilla is staying at Pam's house, in the guest bedroom, somewhere between a town called Milo and another town called something else (which, lo and behold, I've forgotten). How did this come about? Well, if you'd stop asking questions, I could just tell you! OK, so late this afternoon Priscilla was riding through Lagrange when, unbeknownst to her, she was spied by Pam's eagle eye. Pedaling along obliviously, Priscilla was beginning to pray about a place to stay for the night, and beginning to think she didn't really want to pedal much farther today. Well, Pam drove back to the town where she lives, and before long spotted Priscilla biking along again on the other side of the street. She called out to her, and Priscilla stopped, and Pam asked her where she was headed and if she needed a place to stay. Priscilla said she was headed for Chicago eventually, and yes, and now she's sound asleep and all toasty warm in a house. Hooray!

Ugh, hills.

So remember how Priscilla camped in the yard of some nice family last night? Well, I don't have a picture of them, but I do have a picture of their blue house. They were very helpful, found a nice flat spot for her tent, and invited her in for a supper of sloppy joes and tater tots and fries and interesting conversation. This morning she told them goodbye (one of them was Steven, one was... darn, I forgot the others, but for now we'll just call them Mrs. Steven & their daughter Stevenette and a baby, Lil' Stevie, maybe), and set out.

The riding today wasn't so pleasant-- very very windy (and in the wrong direction, too) and very very very hilly. And not just a lot of hills, but steep! On one hill she had to bike zig-zag style just to make it to the top. The memories of Nova Scotia look downright flat in comparison. It was also rainy in the morning, which is less nice when you're a biker (as opposed to, say, a thirsty plant-- thirsty plants just love rain).

But the view remained gorgeous, and maybe even grew a little gorgeous-er, and in the afternoon the roads dried out. Priscilla also found more wild apple trees from which she plucked more wild and crazy apples. One of the trees was dangling its apples tantalizingly out of reach, so she climbed it and got the apples anyway (Priscilla 1, That Apple Tree 0). You saw Priscilla's apple collection in one of the photos at the top.

Still, after about 42 miles Priscilla was pooped, so she decided to stop in Lee instead of Lagrange. There she found a house that looked promising. She knocked on the door and a lady opened it. Priscilla explained that she was biking through and asked if she could camp in the yard. The lady looked at her. "You're not an ax murderer, are you?" she asked. Priscilla smiled. "Not so far," she replied. And so the lady told Priscilla she could certainly camp in the yard, and welcomed her into the house too... I'm a little sleepy & forgetful tonight, so I'm sketchy on the details. The kind lady and her daughter (very kind too) are in another one of those pictures above.

A lane of her own

I forgot to mention it yesterday, but Priscilla stumbled upon the mother of all bike lanes. She was riding along a highway with a fairly large shoulder, which was rather nice and all, when she (and the cars-- boo, cars!) encountered some road construction. The cars all jammed up, and after a few minutes the active construction ended but the left lane (freshly resurfaced) was still blocked off for a several miles. As Priscilla passed the final construction worker (a flag lady), she gave a jaunty wave (maybe) and the flag lady motioned for her to ride in the left lane (definitely for real)! Oh, yes, she had that whole perfect lane all to herself before all the cars could come and scuff it up and leak toxic fluids on it. And you know how newly resurfaced roads have a bit of leftover tarry grit that kicks up and makes a prickly rain sound on your car? Can you imagine the sort of mess that must have made on Priscilla's gear? Except... when she set out that morning, the road ahead looked misty and drizzly, so she wrapped everything in plastic. It turns out it wasn't misty at all, but the plastic kept everything clean. So hooray for all that.

Today Priscilla might not have enjoyed a lane all to herself, but she did enjoy a thoroughly lovely day. She started a little late (11:45 or so-- she didn't say why, but we could pretend she was watching the soaps-- ha! What kind of friend am I? Spreading rumors about her watching soap operas... tsk tsk tsk). Her route was mostly along back roads, through woods, along rivers, under trees that are turning all sorts of colors. After a while she started to see signs that said "USA 10 kilometers" and then "USA 5 kilometers" and then "USA 600 meters" and then "USA 100 meters" and she got inexplicably excited. So much so that she even took pictures of the signs! Unfortunately, once she crossed the border (and that went fine-- unlike the ushers at the movies, the border guards were totally cool with her bringing in her own food), her phone lost all signal and hasn't had any since, so she can't share said pictures with us. Canada, she said, was positively swarming with signal. But Maine, not so much.

She carried on biking and eventually arrived at Lambert Lake, where she is spending the night with some very nice people who gave her dinner and use of their land line (thanks, people!). Tomorrow she plans to head out along Rte 6, through much more densely inhabited areas than originally planned (the original route had included a stay in a "town" that appears to consist of one road crossing another, but no actual houses or buildings or indications of human habitation), aiming to reach LaGrange tomorrow night.

The rain in Maine falls plainly...

"So, Priscilla, where are you now?"
"Ummmm....."

Well, she's either in Oromocto or Frederickton or Fred-something. What we can be more sure of is that she's staying in New Brunswick with some sweet souls, the sister & brother-in-law of one of the people in the picture to the right. The pictured people are Donna & David Watson, her hosts last night.

And just to be needlessly confusing, let's talk about her hosts from the night before: the five guys. It turns out that one (who's parents are the pictured people) of them biked across Canada (the whole thing) with his sister. So maybe he had some helpful tips for Priscilla-- she didn't tell me, and I didn't think to ask. Another one of the guys used to play street hockey with the kids in his neighborhood, and of those kids grew up and became the captain of some famous hockey team that recently one the Stanley Cup, or whatever very impressive Cup one dreams of winning in hockey. And another one grew up in the Yukon. As in tundra & taiga, polar bears, White Fang and abominable snowmen. I'm not sure if he personally encountered all of those, but his dad worked a trapline, so I'm sure the experience was sufficiently & authentically Yukon-ish. How cool is that?

So, today. As one might imagine, Priscilla biked! She also stopped every hour or so to give her bum a break from the bike seat and to fend off her ravenous appetite with a granola bar or peanut butter sandwich. Adventurous cyclists have to take the good with the bad-- sure, uncanny gut instincts and ...well, I was gonna say windswept hair, but their helmets kind of squash that, don't they? So yeah, gut instincts and grand adventures but also helmet head, callouses in rather unusual locations, and ravenous appetites. Today her ravenous appetite kept saying "Excuse me, dear girl, I seem to have developed a wee craving for pizza, or if not pizza, then some other bit of restaurant food to nibble on. Might you be willing to assist me?" For a ravenous appetite, hers is surprisingly polite. Well, Priscilla put the kibbosh on the pizza idea, but the idea of restaurant food made her mouth water a little. So you can imagine her delight when she learned that her hosts tonight have a bagel restaurant, and they even took her to it and treated her to a sandwich and soup for supper! They even gave her some bagels to take along tomorrow, as she sets out for Maine, where, as Eliza Doolittle can tell you, the rain falls plainly on the Spains!

Priscilla & God riding in New Brunswick

Today Priscilla woke up after a good night's sleep and said goodbye to her five kind hosts (Charles and David are in the picture with her). Many thanks, many hosts!

She pedaled 57 miles today, and probably didn't coast at all. I think it's partly because of that bike computer-- if you could find out your average speed for the day, and also your top speed, wouldn't you want to try to make it impressive? Maybe. Then again, she's never been much of a coaster... people are always trying to set their drinks on her, and she just pushes them off! Heh heh heh. "Put your dumb drinks on the table, people! Honestly!"


So anyway, this morning she met Harold, a fellow cyclist with reams of helpful information, including how to navigate the Moncton area. If you read his comment and follow his link, there's another photo of Priscilla in full biking regalia. Very cool-- thanks Harold!

She followed a lovely trail along the river, and stopped beside it to munch some lunch and be munched upon (by the slightly less lovely mosquitos). Amidst all the munching she met Kathy, yet another biker. Kathy was excited to hear about Priscilla's trip, and Priscilla was excited to hear about Kathy's planned trip (trans-Canada two years from now-- yowza!).

It rained a bit, wetting Priscilla but not her gear (those finicky New Brunswickian rain showers). Really, a delightful day's ride, rain included, and a wonderful time with God. Priscilla says thanks to everyone for their prayers!

She arrived safely in Petitcodiac (a charming town named in honor of its founding father's beloved, but rather small, pet Kodiak bear), where she is spending the night with David's parents. Tomorrow she plans to bike to Oromocto (so named because it's ridiculously fun to say "Oromocto," as well as fun to write on envelopes because you can turn the o's into little faces or eyes or something... too bad Chicago doesn't have more o's) and stay with David's mother's sister-in-law.

She crossed that bridge when she came to it.

First an email from Priscilla about this morning:

"I made it across the bridge and so did Woodrow on the shuttle.
I stayed in Mrs. Leary's yard last night.
She was very nice.
She offered me tea last night and we sat and chatted for a while.
Her son, Jeff, was there too and and it was fun.
I have a picture of her, but it's not very good ... sorry.

"It rained most of the night so I had a late start waiting for the tent to dry up enough to pack up.
"Woodrow is currently all loaded up again and waiting for me right outside the information center.
I will be on my way to Sackville in a few.
It's pretty windy here, so it's a good thing I only have about 40 miles to go.

"I got a map of New Brunswick.
I'll take a few minutes to study it and then be on my way.
I decided last night to take a different route than I had originally planned when still at home.
This way, however, I'll be going through more habited places.
Since not many people from Warm Showers have gotten back to me about staying with them, I would rather be near towns to camp in people's yards."

And now the rest of the day:

So Priscilla made it safely to Sackville, and once she figured out where she'd put the address of the Sackville person she planned to stay with, she rode over to his house. His name is David, and he lives with four other guys. They're all very nice, also Christians, and they take turns cooking. Tonight was Johnny's (one of those guys) birthday, so Martin (another one probably) made barbecue wings, lemon pepper wings, corn on the cob, mussels, and a traditional Canadian bread thing (right, I think that's the technical term). And David made a baked pumpkin cheese cake. It all sounds very tasty, doesn't it? I'm getting drool on the keyboard.

Speaking of tastiness, the other day Priscilla found raspberries growing alongside the road, and munched on those. Lucky girl.

On a not so tasty note: Priscilla's lunch today, which was leftover corn on the cob, soybeans, and peanut butter sandwiches. Edible, palatable but not quite up to tasty.

And for some thorough untastiness: Remember those cans of food Priscilla had transferred into baggies? It seems the plastic was a little less preserving, and so she inadvertently brewed a few batches of bean wine, corn wine, etc. Don't think there's much chance of marketing that, sadly.

Back to tastiness though-- fruit! She had some of that today, too. A pear and an apple to tide her over until supper, as biking against all that wind makes you hungry.

So tonight she's sleeping indoors, and her sleeping bag is in the dryer as I type. Tomorrow night she plans to stay in Petitcodiac, at the home of David's parents.

And that's about it.

Wait! I forgot! Remember how she was (hopefully) going to take advantage of the opportunity of a police escort across the PEI to New Brunswick bridge? Alas, the biker who told her about that was misinformed. Instead there's a shuttle set up to take bikers and pedestrians back and forth. You only get a "police escort" if you try to illegally walk or bike across the bridge without the shuttle. Then the police catch you and escort you to the shuttle, throw you inside, and send you across that way. So. She went to the shuttle place and waited. The shuttle driver walks in, looks at her, and says "you look cross." Actually, Priscilla was looking more shocked than anything. "What, I look cross?" she asked. And the driver replied "Yes, you do, and maybe you're looking to cross... the bridge... too." Priscilla burst out laughing, and from then on, they were friends. Which is almost as good as a police escort.

Raining frogs and toads

OK, so it's not Crapeau after all. It's actually Crapaud, which means toad, and is thus mildly funny, I guess. But still not nearly as fun as Crapeau. Maybe there's a giant statue of a toad in the middle of downtown Crapaud-- that would be edging towards moderately funny. "And here we have the celebrated statue of Horatio, the beloved pet toad of the founding father of Crapaud..." But Priscilla didn't specifically mention any statues or lack thereof.

She did mention that she attended a church service (in Cavendish). She arrived a little early, as she walked there with the church organist (the organist's dear husband Herb is still busy recovering from a knee replacement, and so he stayed at home with his beloved pet toad, who is called Adalbert). It seems it was quite a show (the church service, not the surgery).

After church she prepared to set out, first rain-proofing her gear as much as possible against the drizzly day. She prayed briefly about her ride south to Crapo, hopped on her bike (I mean, her trusty steed, Woodrow), and began pedaling. And almost immediately she stopped pedaling, because what to her wondering eyes should appear, but a visitors center! Which is always a treat, as not only does it offer copious quantities of colorful brochures, but it also has brand spankin' free internet access! Hooray! Priscilla checked her email, maybe perused the brochure selection a little, and headed back out. When she did so she ran into a girl named Lindsay, a fellow biker but... a biker with a car! And Lindsay was also headed south, and offered to give her a ride if Woodrow were able to fit in the trunk. He was, and off they went, Priscilla most grateful to be avoiding the rain and traveling in style. Thanks, Lindsay! And thanks for Lindsay, God!

Priscilla ended up going a little beyond old Toad Town, and will be setting off across the bridge to New Brunswick tomorrow. She sent the photos you see above, which are, starting at the top, the couple who own the Cavendish farm in whose orchard she camped last night, a house in Cavendish, Priscilla and Lindsay in front of a piece of the bridge (we're hoping that's an extra piece, or else a piece from over a very shallow bit of water-- also, notice the menacing grey clouds in the background), and a bit of PEI with the sea in the distance.