There inevitably comes a time in the life of a bike camper/tourer that they either get “the dreaded knock” or they find themselves in a situation that doesn’t feel safe. By the end of this day’s travels, I find my self experiencing both these things and pretty much at the same time…and because this happened close to the end of my fundraising bike tour, I’m going to leave out the location and any identifying information so as to protect people’s privacy and to allow me the freedom to share all the details with you….but let me start at the beginning-

We left the roadside rest area with high hopes that our next few days of travel would be interesting but without trial or tribulation. This was soon dashed as we started to see the weather changing for the first time in five days. The sunshine we had been enjoying was going to be replaced with torrential rains, winds, lighting and thunder and we weren’t quite sure where we would be when it would finally hit. So we headed for Wallacetown. Here I made a right turn to get on to Fingal Line, heading towards Fingal. I had been warned by my friends at Rondeau that there would be a hill that rivals Port Bruce. However, when we finally arrived at the top of this hill, we were really challenged psychologically. This hill was twice the size of Port Bruce!! The questions that go through my mind are: will we spill the bike again like we did on the Port Bruce hill two years back? Will my body have the stamina to make it to the top considering we will be pushing the rig up the hill. This pic does not do this hill justice. In the pic it looks totally flat. But what you are really looking at is the cliff like start to this hill’s decent as it curves around in an S shape before finishing on the upside of this valley. It curves so much I couldn’t get a pic of the whole hill! And after riding through the flat land of the Windsor area, this was quite a shocking hill to see. With the weather on my tail and this hill in front of me, there was little choice but to take one step at a time.

After the very pleasant downhill portion was completed, it was time to get down to business. The mental games I play with myself to “get the job done” are very helpful. On this hill, I counted the tar strips between the paved portions as I started my accent. I allowed myself to stop pushing uphill every 2 strips. This allowed me 6 rest stops to catch my breath and get my strength back each time before moving upwards again. When I got to the top, I got to rest for as long as I wanted. Food and water for sure. This is always my reward. I’ve found this keeps the mental panic down to a minimum when being challenged to this degree. Tying Dax to the trailer so that he walks behind my feet instead of in front really helps too. That way I’m not tripping over him or not getting good footing on these severe inclines. The best part of celebrating my hard work and success was while I was catching my breath at the top of the hill, a dump truck came up the same hill and as he crested the top he threw me the thumbs up!!! We both knew what we had just achieved and it was great to celebrate it together in that moment. 🏆😁

I continued on to Fingal stopping once to have a snack and water Dax. In Fingal, Dax and I took a rest stop under a shady tree by the side of the road. We had a nice rest and some lunch. Then we moved on towards Port Stanley.

This was going to be our stop for the night. We thought we might find a quiet little place to tuck away in for the night. By the time we reached our turn off to head down into Port, we realized we were done for the day. We had completed a very hard 44kms(one of our longest days). So we started looking for a place to rest and hopefully pitch for the night. It was nearing 4pm and the bad weather was coming on. We stopped along the side of the road in a grassy area, well away from the road and vehicles but unfortunately not out of site. We noticed a few homes in the area and decided to venture out for water. We approached one home when we noticed someone sitting on their front porch. It was strange though because the homeowner was in shade and we couldn’t see their face. As I got a bit closer but still on the road, I called over to say hello and ask if I could come on their property. The homeowner said yes and that’s when Dax started barking at him. The homeowner hadn’t moved from his chair and I still couldn’t see anything about him but his silloette. Between Dax barking and not being able to see who I was talking to, my spidy senses started to kick in. I wanted to let Dax know that I had it under control, so I ask him to be quiet and stood a good distance away from the porch. I started the conversation with explaining who we were and why we were here. I asked if we could fill up our water jugs with his garden hose. He explained he didn’t have one but could bring me water from his kitchen faucet. He brought out several pots of water to fill our jugs. We thanked him and then asked if he thought anyone would mind if we pitched our tent over in the grassy area. He said he didn’t mind and didn’t think anyone else would either. Then the conversation started to quickly take an odd turn.

He started to chat about the neighbours and how there were several farm hands living directly across the street from him. How he had run-ins with them over the years and they had called the OPP on him. His neighbour down the road who, when he had a stroke recently in his garage and tried to drag himself outside to get help, saw him laying on the driveway and decided not to stop to help because the neighbour thought he was just drunk. And talked about another neighbour down the other way who wasn’t too nice to his own wife, if you know what I mean.. and then started talking about his ex girlfriend who would show her boobs to everyone…I was starting to feel uncomfortable and was becoming aware that I was losing control of the conversation and started looking for a way to shut it down and leave.

Finally I told him thank you and have a good day and left to go back to my bike.

I sat down to have a rest and something to eat and within a few minutes Dax starts barking again. I see someone slowly moving towards me. It was the same homeowner. It felt like he had crept up on us. If Dax hadn’t alerted, I wouldn’t have noticed as quickly. He told me he had come over to invite me to come back over and go into his house to see all the renovations he had done over the years. My alarm bells went off and I said, “no. I’m too tired to go, but thanks for the invite.” He said okay and shuffled off back to his place. Several minutes later it started to rain, the wind came up fast and the thunder and lightning started. I had just enough time to get my tent up and cover the bike with my tarp. Dax and I crawled inside to get out of the storm. I closed my eyes and started to relax. But not really, my spidy senses just wouldn’t stop. I didn’t feel safe in this location.

We were in the tent just listening to the storm and still feeling a bit un-nervered when we heard a man’s voice calling out, “Is anyone in there?” He had to call a few times before I understood what I was hearing. Between the loud thunder, lighting, wind and torrential rain, I didn’t realize I had started to fall asleep from exhaustion. Dax started barking again which snapped me alert and I quickly unzipped the vestibule door to peek out to see who was there. It was two uniformed officers standing under the large tree near my tent trying to not take the brunt of the storm we were in. They asked me all the questions and told me a neighbour had seen my tent and thought I was a homeless person setting up to live there. The officers were really nice to Dax and me and I could tell Dax was totally okay with them, unlike the homeowner. And after our chat, told me that we could stay over night there because we weren’t being disrespectful in anyway to the property.

Shortly after they left, the rain started to stop and while I was sitting back inside my tent I just couldn’t shake my feelings of being unsafe. I felt very exposed and vulnerable and decided it was time to leave. It was time to call my friend, Joanne and get a shuttle over to Port Burwell to my friends Tracy and Rod’s place. I was really tired and knew that I wasn’t up for facing any more hills this day and wasn’t feeling safe to spend the night here either. So, I made the call.

As I was packing up my gear and getting ready for my ride to show up, Dax started barking again! Sure enough the homeowner came shuffling back over again to ask why I was leaving? And why were the police here? And wondered who had called them? I was so knackered and frazzled from Dax alerting so many times I didn’t care, I just wanted to get as far away from this guy as possible and any other guys that were close by or the neighbour who called the police..

So, even though outwardly I wasn’t threatened in any way, Dax continually barking alert to me about this homeowner he really didn’t like, and all the attention from the neighbours and police was enough for me to call it.

Joanne arrived within the hour, took me to the gas station and bought me an ice cream to calm my nerves. Then off we went to Port Burwell where Dax and I were greeted with big hugs a hot supper and a warmth safe bed. We stayed with Tracy and Rod for several more days taking advantage of having a home base to ride out of each day, before they drove us up to the Solitude Nature Reserve. We stayed the night there before riding the rest of the way home the next day to London.

Join me in my next blog where I’ll share with you more details along with beautiful pics and a short video of these final rides before arriving home.

And don’t forget to like and leave a comment. You being here and enjoying these blogs means the world to Dax and me!! We’d love to hear your thoughts.