We woke up around 8:00 and made some oatmeal in the microwave at our motel then got packed up and ready to go. We knew almost instantly that it was going to be a long day because of the wind. It was SOOOO WINDY!!! We rode fighting the wind for a few hours before coming to the town of Simcoe, which was pretty populated compared to what we had seen the last few towns we went through. There was a really tiny Walmart and quite a bit of other stores. We decided to stop for an early lunch at Subway to use up one of the gift cards Grammy got us, it sure was yummy! After lunch we hit the road again, still following route 3. The traffic on Route 3 was beginning to get worse, so we pulled over to look to see if there was a different way to go. As we were pulled over looking at our map, a man pulled over and showed us his handy dandy Ontario map book that had all of the back roads on it. He gave us some pointers and then proceeded to give us his map book! This book sure came in handy and we ended up following the back roads the rest of the day. It got to be about 4pm and we only had ridden about 45 miles. The head wind all day long was so strong and exhausting. We planned on making it to St. Thomas but were pretty sure that wasn't going to happen because of the wind and us being so tired. As we rode along looking for camp spots, we weren't' finding anything. All we saw was fields and fields and a few houses here and there, and everything was pretty flooded from the rain yesterday. As we kept riding it got to be later and later, and soon became pretty cold. Somehow, we ended up making it to St. Thomas just as the sun was going down. We rode right into the city and ended up seeing a Salvation Army church with the lights on. I went inside to ask if we could camp in the back yard of the church. There were a few ladies of the church having a meeting and they were all for the idea. The Pastors wife, who was leading the meeting, even dropped her marker after she heard we were riding all the way to Alaska. The ladies were a lot of fun. We were allowed to use the washrooms in the church to change and get ready for bed before the ladies left. It was definitely nice not to have to try to change in our ity bity little tent! When the ladies were leaving, the even gave us a $10 gift card to Tim Hortons, which I can't wait to use! Shortly after we changed out of our cycling clothes, we made some mac and cheese for dinner and went straight to bed since we were exhausted and it was so cold. We ended up riding 69.26 miles and it took us almost 9 hours because of the wind (well it took me that long, Joey spends a lot of time waiting for me to catch up =D )
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