Day 52 Richmond to Chatham

It was a cold and chilly night with a low of maybe 50 and a heavy dew. The sky showed like it was to be another nice day though. There was quite the buzz in camp as this was the day we travel into Ontario, Canada, home and native land to about 100 cyclists and support staff.

Fred was on sweep today so I biked with Jason and Gresham V (AB) and Melinda B (SK) until we got to Marine City MI where we were to cross the St Claire River by the ferry there. We had time to kill so the local cafe was swamped with cyclists. The ferry crossing itself was nice and smooth and there were no hitches at either border station.

On the Canadian side, Sombra, ON, we were greeted by about 200 people. The tables of food and water etc were out and we stayed there quite a while as the ferries came in with cyclists and support vehicles. It was great. The greeting was put on by the CRC's of Wallaceburg and Sarnia.

One thing about the wind, it knows no borders or nationalities. So the headwind was here in Ontario too. Oh well, the sun is shining, we're getting closer to home (so to speak) so a little headwind on a shorter day is tolerable.

I got into Chatham at 2, again the cyclists were greeted by the people here and offers of shuttles to town, swimming pools, laundry, bike shop etc abound. We've had such great hosts along the way.

I'm at Ralph and Cynthia Aukema's now, having enjoyed a swim in their pool along with a number of others. Fred made it in from sweep now too and is here. The plan is to billet out tonight.

Totals for day: 92 k (55 mi), 3:30 cycling time, 26 kph avg (16 mph)