the weather forecast was for something similar to yesterday in terms of fair weather in the morning and a chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon. i packed everything up and went downstairs for breakfast.i see in my notes around breakfast that i observed that when i travel alone, i become more acutely aware of the awful piped-in music that so often accompanies meals. that it is often disconnected to the experience and can in fact be distracting, even irritating is a given in many people’s experiences. why is it that with that knowledge, restauranteurs continue to provide the cheesiest aural filler alongside their culinary creations? i also noted that i become more attentive to conversation around me. on this morning there were two middle-aged women who were hashing out a set of discussions that are common to the experiences of many travellers:
- how things in one place don’t match up to their experience of the same thing in their own home.
- the relative costs of items on the menu.
- whether items on the menu will end up enhancing their already well-enhanced physiques.
with the breakfast ritual done, i checked out and rejoined highway 2 for the last stretch through to kingston. there is a route - actually the preferred route if you follow the directions of the waterfront trail. in retrospect i wish i had followed those directions if only because i later found out that it’s a much much prettier route, but hwy. 2 served the purpose and seemed more logical given the possibility of heavy weather at any time.
before i left belleville, i rode over to a spit of land that juts out into the bay of quinte and admired the view. i stayed for a while, listening to the sound of the waves washing ashore and the clinking of rigging against the various little boat’s masts. i could never tire of those sounds. it really is lovely there. here’s a shot back to the hotel and marina . . .
and here’s a shot of early morning me with bits of helmet hanging over my ear . . .
it takes a while to get out of belleville which takes you past a typically suburban landscape with strip malls, large nursing homes, a hospital and then the road opens up and while there are houses on either side and small businesses, they are set back enough that the trees on either side frame the view down the road nicely. along this stretch there was a paved shoulder which was not really there for cyclists but i took advantage of it all the same.
eventually the road narrows and becomes much more rural with lovely old farms . . .
sitting side-by-side with absolutely pristine horse racing stables. fields filled with cornflowers . . .
and then in the middle of almost nowhere you come across one of the top racetracks in the country - shannonville. the community is very small and as is typical of most rural communities is actually made up of much of the surrounding area. there wasn’t much happening at the racetrack that day in the way of testing or racing so i took a picture near the entrance and moved on.
i should mention that this was one of those stretches of road that has what i think are termed “expansion strips” . . . little cracks that extend across the road that are filled with a rubbery tar-like substance. if you’ve ever ridden a bike across them for ten or twenty kilometres, full-in-the-inescapable-knowledge that every two and a half to three metres you will know that you feel a resounding kerthunk go through your entire body, starting with the palms of your hands which are firmly planted on the handlebars which transmit every change in altitude - especially the sudden ones - and then right through your body. it is numbing and leads to a lot of time standing up on the pedals as your lower back eventually starts to complain.
the road passes through tyendinaga mohawk reserve which has lots of gas stations, smoke shops, and even a hot rodding outfit called “rez boys”. i wondered if they’d be able to do anything for the bike . . . . there were a lot of gravel trucks along this road which meant that i had to watch both in front and behind me in case they approached from opposite directions at the same time. it’s far better to get off the road when that happens because they don’t usually slow down and on a skinny single-lane road a bicycle runs a real risk of either getting hit or blown off the road.
the weather was holding up although at this point, the beginnings of cloud mass was developing on the northeastern horizon. this is something that i really love about being on a bicycle - the heightened awareness of the weather and especially how you become intuitive about what wind changes and cloud movements signify immediately and also in the near future. i didn’t really have a sense until today of the wind and how for the most part it had been blowing from the northwest which is usually where it comes from in peterborough but in the kingston area i am told it usually blows from the east. with that wind behind me - and it never amounted to anything gusty - usually puffing along at 10 kilometres per hour, i was given a nice push and was rarely fighting into the wind.
my next major metropolis was napanee. napanee is a good-sized town of around eighteen thousand people. Tree-lined streets with lovely old homes lead to a main street that has a mix of renovated old store fronts and newer shops. The ubiquitous tim horton’s coffee shop sits right across the road from gibbard furniture, canada’s oldest furniture manufacturer. gibbards has been making furniture since 1835! i wandered through gibbards a year or so ago just to have a look at what they craft behind the plain facade. it is predictably conservative but astonishingly well-made. crafted would be the appropriate term.
i had debated stopping for some food and decided instead to suck back an energy bar and a big drink of water and motor on. i stopped under this bridge which is on the outskirts of town.
after you pass under this bridge you come to this lovely climb which when i rounded the corner presented itself replete with stormy clouds . . .
the ride from here was often within sight of the 401 which i could hear even when the road i was on deviated from its parallel course as far as a couple of kilometres away. you may have noticed that i haven’t mentioned any other cyclists and the plain and simple fact is that to this point i hadn’t seen any! i honestly imagined i’d meet up with a few cyclists along the way, but none! who knew?! however, on this day i passed a guy out on a road bike as he sucked back some nutrients. he later passed me and then i passed him again. there was nothing more than the usual wave, so when i saw him pulled over at a gas station on the phone i figured that my pace must have cracked him. yeah right!
soon after that i arrived at the big kingston sign.
as with most of these signs they don’t actually indicate that you are in the designated jurisdiction as much as you are in the general vicinity of the destination. i rode and rode through suburban sprawl until finally the mother of all hills rose before me. they do this at the olympics and on the tour de france as a final slap in the face of the poor knackered cyclists so why not here? through sheer bloody will power i hauled myself up it and there spread before me was the glorious site of kingston in all its urban sprawling splendour! that was when the rain started. i pulled into a tim hortons and had an engaging conversation with a gentleman who was interested in knowing all about my journey. the rain slowed up a bit after an hour or so and suitably recharged and refreshed i went back out onto the road which is called princess street.on previous visits to kingston i have always enjoyed long leisurely walks along the lower reaches of princess street
which has the most spectacular range of cool and wonderful shops i’ve seen in such proximity to each other in all my travels. happily, this stretch of the ride was almost entirely on a downhill slope and so i was able to cruise at an impressive speed through downtown kingston until finally i reached the bottom of princess street. my destination in kingston - and the stated purpose of this trip was to visit the black dog pottery. a left turn onto bagot street at which point i walked the bike across the street and there it was . . . 
i locked the bike up, grabbed my wallet and made my way inside. the black dog pottery is something of a regular fixture for me on trips to kingston. each time i visit the town i pick up a mug or a plate or something. on previous visits it was necessary to step across the namesake of the black dog pottery, a beautiful black dog named boston, but boston died three years ago and has since been replaced by another lovely black dog named sasha. sasha is a black lab / border collie mix and has a similar character to boston although some of her border collie heritage apparently shows up as little neuroses. there’s no shame in being neurotic says i!
inside the shop it’s always warm because the kilns are right there. the owner marc is always friendly and willing to gab about his work, your life, his life and whatever else comes up. here’s a little bit about marc that i found here.
“marc lemieux runs black dog pottery. a kingston native, lemieux graduated from queen's university in 1993, then worked in construction for a couple of years. during winter, he took pottery classes. he found these so absorbing, he decided "to give it a go full time" and enrolled at vancouver’s emily carr institute of art and design, earning a bfa in studio ceramics, before returning to kingston.
he does a great deal of glaze research and testing. lemieux will mix, combine and apply various natural elements, such as copper, silica and feldspar, to his pieces before firing them in the kiln. by layering, spraying, dipping and overlaying his pieces with a variety of glazes, he achieves unique finishes.
lemieux often uses a natural gas kiln to complete his work because of the unique glaze effects that are produced.
“there's something neat about fire, playing with the variables," he says. “it’s more of a surprise when you open it up next day. it's a wonderful process. the natural gas kiln gives you colours you can't achieve otherwise."
i could’ve spent a lot of money in there because i love his work. i had to think of carrying these items all the way back to peterborough though so i left with four small cups which will be used for wine. marc and i discussed the similar feelings we have around drinking glasses. they’re too fragile, they are always getting knocked over, and they don’t have the right “lip”. lip is so critical to enjoying any drink. so i picked up these four cups . . .
which will go nicely with the collection of coffee mugs i have assembled over time from black dog. i have a small ritual - well several - but this is one i will share from my morning routine. i open the cupboard door and select a mug that matches my frame of mind for that morning based on the colours and textures of each mug. here’s one of my faves . . .
and this gorgeous plate . . .
marc also gave me a heads up on bike touring with one tour in particular that he recommended in quebec which i can see might be in the future . . . .
with the day more or less at a close i nipped over to the lcbo and picked up some nice beer. then i picked up two subs and headed over to my relatively spartan lodgings at the super 8 hotel.
there’s nothing wrong with the place but it did bring mixed memories of university residence flooding back into my mind. it was absolutely pouring at that point and continued to do so throughout the night. i watched the olympics.
an 80 kilometre day. tomorrow, back to belleville.
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