The start of a new bicycle tour! This one is much shorter in comparison to my last - two weeks in the province of Quebec vs the 90 days spent traversing Canada.
Much of Tuesday evening was spent at home packaging my bicycle and gear for the trip.
...a few hours spent only to be undone about 12 hours later in Quebec.
My outfit is considerably the same as last time: camp stove and pot, tenting equipment, 8L camelback and a spare set of cycling and street clothes. I have added a frying pan to provide new cooking options.
Upon arriving in Quebec I ran a resupply mission into the city. The first day, however, with all its errands, meant I didn't cover much ground northward to Saguenay.
I ended up setting up my tent in the cover of darkness a short distance from the highway.
It was a very cold July night. In fact, when I awoke at sunrise the next day, there were icicles on my panniers!
Due to a rather unimpressive trek northward on Wednesday, I was left with an imperial century to Saguenay on Thursday - 160 km through the Laurentians. In anticipation of a long day, I got on my bicycle at 5:30 am. It was an extraordinarily taxing ride! I only summited 860m through the Laurentians, but in reality the total vertical ascension was probably close to 1400m due to the constantly ascending and descending hills.
At roughly 4:30pm, with only 35km to go, I hit the wall - "bonking" in cycling jargon. Bonking is when you've depleted all your readily available sources of energy, and you suddenly can't go any further. Fortunately, I still had a little more trail mix and vegetables with me. After a short break on the side of the road, I was able to ride out the final 20km of hills to the first restaurant in Saguenay. There, I got a proper recharge on calorie-rich chicken wings and cheese sticks.
Fifteen kilometers later I arrived at Martin and Nancy's place, where we all shared a meal... My second dinner of the night!
