The life of a cycle tourist is never dull.

Niel finding the problem.

Things always happen in three’s, I said to myself after I had my new wheel replaced and was back on the road again, but I didn’t want to tempt fate by saying it out loud. The third disaster has now happened, is something trying to stop us getting to the end of this trip?

Only 40kms from the Atlantic Coastline.

 

Niel’s bike ‘wasn’t feeling right’. He assumed it was the rear hub bearings, and there was a lot of sideways movement in the wheel. He really wanted to push on to the Atlantic Coast only 40kms away, but I convinced him to stay here in Bangor and fix it, and take the shorter route tomorrow so that we don’t lose any more time. We don’t have any emergency days left. It was the right decision, his rear hub was as cut up as my rim was. Luckily he kept my hub and spokes of my old wheel and he can rebuild his wheel using those parts, but my hub uses a different type of gear cluster, so he will have to wait till the shops open in the morning to get a new cluster and chain. Come back to the motel – fix it, and then we need to ride 155kms before the day is done. The life of a cycle tourist is never dull.

So all going well, we will be at the New Brunswick border this evening , ride up to St Johns along the Atlantic coastline the next day, and be on the ferry to Nova Scotia the following day. Surely nothing more could go wrong ?