"Rest Day" did not describe today very well. We packed up VanGo fairly early and headed into Winnipeg from the campground just west of town.
The first stop was Continental Car Service where we picked up a new door release cable for VanGo that we broke in Golden, BC. Bob and Brett at Continental did a great job of finding this part for the 28 year old VanGo and helped us out with a couple of auxiliary bits to put it all together. As it turns out the cable was just a bit too long and the door didn't quite open. A stop at Home Depot came up with slight modification of the system and now the door can be opened from the inside AND outside! The door works better and smoother than when we got it!
Stop number 2 was lunch at The Forks. A funky marketplace with retail shops and little food shops in some old, refurbished industrial buildings. It felt much like Granville Market in Vancouver. We met with Margaret Switala, a talented ArtSites artist, and had a great lunch and conversation with her.
From there it was shopping at various places. We stopped at Mountain Equipment Coop to pick up some new tires and have the bike looked over. $250 later, the bike is in pretty good shape although with well over 5000 km on it since I bought it 14 months ago, it's getting pretty worn. At least the rear wheel does not wobble any more and the rear breaks and shifters work a lot better. I also replaced the 4 week old chain as it was just about worn out already. I bought an extra chains as I will need it before the end of the trip. It turns out it's costing considerably more to keep the bicycle going than VanGo.
It was really windy today and we had a couple of heavy but short downpours. If I had been cycling, that wind would have been head on.
When we got back to the campsite, I installed the new rear tire and added some new lights. I now have 5 sets of extremely bright blinking LED lights on the bike. You can see me coming from a long way off! My rear view mirror on the left handlebar was not working as well as I would have liked so I now have a helmet mounted mirror too. Let's see if that is more effective.
Last night we made some major revisions to our route. We had originally planned to head south east from Winnipeg and towards Duluth, MN, then east over the north end of Lake Michigan, and finally turning south towards the Detroit area. I had some concerns about limited services along that route including almost non-existent cell coverage. I had a new look at other routes and noticed that going around the south end of Lake Michigan, passing near Chicago would only add about 100 km (1 day) to the route and had a number of benefits. These included being able to drop in on some people we thought we would miss, as well as travel though some more populated regions and have much more consistent cell coverage.
Tomorrow, it's back on the bike and heading south. The goal is Emerson, MB (130 km), right on the border with North Dakota. If winds are not favourable, we might only get to Morris, MB (86 km). A hot and sunny day with west winds are expected so it looks like more cross winds from the right again. I think that my tires are wearing a little extra on the right side from leaning into the wind.