The wind really howled over night. There is a small hole in the popup tent part of VanGo's roof and the wind was blowing right through that and onto me. It got me a bit wet when it was also raining. The variable wind, rain and wave sounds kept waking me up so it was really hard to drag myself out of bed.
By the time I got going, it was raining again. It rained almost the whole day except for a bit around the time that I stopped for lunch. I was drenched for most of the day but it was fairly warm so I wasn't cold. I think that this is the leading edge of hurricane Leslie that should hit tomorrow.
The terrain was very hilly today. Between Stephenville and Corner Brook the road rose considerably and then had a lot of hills followed by a long drop into Corner Brook. The highway does not quite go down into Corner Brook but runs around the edge of a mountain and then starts to rise up again. It was very strange that for a 2-3 km stretch, the air temperature dropped considerably. I was concerned that if the air temperature stayed that cold, it would make it difficult later in the ride. But once I was a little ways away from Corner Brook I hit a wall of warmer air (and more rain!) I guess that cold air was coming in off of the ocean.
The road did the same slow rise to a hilly plateau followed by a drop into Deer Lake and our campground for the night. This is where you would drive north up to Viking Trail. I'd like to go up there but would add another 1000 km to the ride. Maybe another time!
We have had constant rain all evening and there is an expectation that hurricane Leslie will hit Newfoundland tomorrow. It shouldn't be so windy where we are but I expect a lot of rain. I've already done one day of riding in the tail end of a hurricane (Isaac, last week) so I'm not all that excited to do it again. I have ridden the last 8 days straight (4 that were very rainy) without much of a break other than the ferry ride so we will likely take tomorrow off. That will leave us with about 650 km and 6 days of riding before reaching our goal!
Because the last couple of days have been so rainy and Internet connectivy has not been good, I've not shown many pictures from Newfoundland so here is a selection from the first 3 days on "The Rock".
This sign pretty much sums up the rest of the trip.
Twin Hills:
Sunset over the Gulf of St. Lawrence:
Costal Mountains:
One of the oddest things seen all trip: Septic tanks with cartoon characters!
And a Rainbow:
