I'm sure there were a few good days of riding in the very beginnings of this trip, but unfortunately my memory is clouded by incessant rain storms and remote backwoods ATV trails. This was something of a “coming-of-age” milestone. My 20th birthday was on May 24th, and I started pedaling eastbound on May 25th. When I turned 18 and graduated highschool in 2022, I walked 2,500 kilometres from Vancouver, BC to San Francisco. Back then, I wanted to do something big that I could look back on fondly. A milestone to mark the death of the boy and the birth of the man. That was two years ago, and it was a trip on foot— something of a pilgrimage. The reason being was that I wanted to keep everything as simple as possible. Start with the capabilities of my bare bones and flesh, setting a precedent for the rest of my life. My idea to bikepack came as the natural next stage of my intentional evolution as a tourist. What's easier than walking but harder than flying? Biking. What's the opposite of west? East.
Ontario: A Humble Beginning
I started in a small 4-corners town in Ontario you've never heard of called Brechin, which is a 2 hour drive north of Toronto. The thing with this area, like most rural communities, is that the landscape is divided into a grid of fields. I had to zig-zag for a bit before accessing rail-trails that head east out of the city of Peterborough. It was smooth sailing for a while after that. I remember looking at the map every few hours and marveling at how far I was going. Technically, these pristine rail trails were part of the Trans-Canada Trail, which—as the name states— is a network of trails patched together in order to span the country west to east.
I was in Hastings County when the rain came. It came and overstayed its welcome by a few days. I was wet, and it set a precedent of being terribly afraid of precipitation for the rest of the trip. Sand in my cogs, I crackled on down the rutted-out ATV trails and eventually ended up in Ottawa.
Quebec: Living Large
I was planning on meeting an internet friend who lives in Montreal, so I sent him a message and we figured I could stay at his apartment for a night on my way through. I rode into the city from the west and slugged up a big ol' hill on Atwater Street to meet my pal on his front stoop. He took me around the city and we went to a military surplus store. I remember thinking about bike shops because my tires (god knows how old they are) were starting to crack around the treads, and I didn't know this was normal, so I was in a bit of a panic. I did end up taking my bike into a Montreal bike shop (there are a lot of them), and the kind lady in the service bay told me not to worry about it. Say less!
I had a meetup scheduled with my girlfriend in Montreal as well. We stayed at her friend's apartment in Verdun for a couple of nights. During that time, I lived the quintessential gritty French-Canadian city life. Late nights on the town, and early mornings sipping espresso in busy cafes built before Canada was officially a country. We went to a drag show at a gay bar with our host and took the subway home after… or did we walk? I can't remember. The urban atmosphere of a city like Montreal after dark is almost as intoxicating as the cocktails it's serving. Time flies when you're having fun though, and before you know it I parted ways with Montreal and was on a paved bicycle highway called “La Route Vert” headed to Quebec City.
I hooked down south near the border of Maine through quiet tourist villages, and then toured up through some remote Quebec wilderness to my destination. I remember some creepy stretches of this route. Big old trees hang over the trail, and you have to take side roads for some parts. I popped out in a small town in I don't remember where, and got a bottle of blood orange soda at the general store. The shopkeeper was an older lady who said I was very handsome. “I'm old. I'm allowed to say that aren't I?” She asked with a Quebeqouis accent.
Quebec is a French-speaking province, but because they're in Canada, many people speak English. Once you go east of Montreal though, I found my bilingual friends became fewer and fewer. In the eel-fishing village of Kamouraska (yes, eel fishing) I stopped in the driveway of a couple who had just moved in. I asked if I could fill up my water bottles at their garden hose and they invited me to stay the night. We had spaghetti and wine, they taught me some French, I taught them some English. They let me into their homes, and I helped them move the fridge in from the moving van. I never did get any info on them other than their names.
On my way over the Notre Dame mountains (a northern offshoot of the Appalachian Range), I got a flat tire in a Thunderstorm on a highway and had to repair it on the porch of the nearest house. The owner of this house, an older gentleman named Earmon, was super gracious in letting me set up my repair shop there. He even fed me. He didn't speak ANY English, so it was mostly charades between the two of us. That was my first flat of the trip. One of only 2. That's an average of one every 2000 kilometers— either by my striking luck, or a testament to my Kevlar bead gravel tires.
New Brunswick: Pine Barren Angels
Crossing into New Brunswick, I was surprised people still spoke mostly French. It's an officially bilingual province, but Northern New Brunswick is where a lot of French colonists resettled after British colonists kicked them out of the Acadian region of Nova Scotia. Out of all the places I rode on this trip, this province was by far the most desolate. One of Canada's poorest provinces, the coastline I rode had little in the way of infrastructure. For the most part, I relied on gas stations as refuel stops. Not many people live there. There are 8 cities, and less than a million people. The province has a land area of about 73,000 square kilometers (28,000 square miles), which is close to that of the Czech Republic— a country in Europe with upwards of ten million people inside its borders. All this to say— I did a fair bit of wild camping in New Brunswick. Not much of a choice in the matter.
One thing I did start doing in this province was use warmshowers.com. It's a cycle touring website that lets me stay in other cyclists' houses or yards if I pass them. I had a good number of hosts— many of whom would even invite me to eat dinner with them, and prepare me breakfast in the morning. In a small village south of Miramichi I stayed with a French-Canadian fellow who was already hosting another bike tourist from France, but still let me pitch my tent next to him. We had Japanese beer, ate something fitting (I can't quite remember), and spoke “franglais” late into the night. I remember standing up and looking out his dining room window every 5 minutes to make sure my tent hadn't blown away in the thunderstorm that was roaring past.
PEI: Blood, Sweat, and Potatoes
While writing letters home, I got a text from my dad saying I should go to Prince Edward Island (PEI). It was a bit out of the way, but I had no schedule, so why not?! PEI is Canada's smallest province. It's also an island about twice the size of Moscow (sorry for all the European land comparisons). It's known for its potato exports. Anne of Green Gables hails from here. Ring any bells? Anyway, it's connected to the mainland by a 13 kilometer long bridge that takes 15 minutes to cross in a vehicle. You aren't allowed to bike over it, so I got shuttled by a government pickup truck. I got off the truck and started riding again (obviously), but this time on a managed rail trail! The province is connected by a rail trail network called the Confederation Trail. You can ride from coast to coast of the island without leaving the groomed path. I camped in fields as I rode. The soil on PEI is a rusty red, kinda like Mars. It gets everywhere, but I kinda liked that, being covered in iron-rich dirt. I thought that maybe a year from now I'd go to use a piece of my gear and find some of it. Like a keepsake. I really had fun on this little island. I didn't record as much as I probably should have, but I was trying to take it easy. Get a beer with lunch, ride it off in the afternoon, have an ice cream. Go to bed early in a secluded meadow. Wake up and get a coffee at the gas station and sit outfront watching the farmers gear up for the day. There was a serenity to PEI.
Nova Scotia: A Salt-Stained Oasis
Leaving the island, I had to pay $22 to take a ferry back to the mainland, more specifically: Nova Scotia, my final province. I rode for a long time on the Trans-Canada highway. Basically from the ferry terminal eastward until I landed in the university town of Antigonish. Well, I had a warmshowers host that night who lived on a reserve 20 kilometers east of Antagonish, so for the sake of a warm bed and 2 meals, I decided to put in the extra hour and detour there. The guy was Dutch, but moved onto the Reserve 30 years ago because he had, “an interest in Native American culture.” He married a band member and now lives there with her, operating a convenience store out of his garage. The next morning I bid him farewell and made my way south, into the center of Nova Scotia. I remember riding through an area with every other house seemingly abandoned, and I'd stop to walk through them. To me, these places do well to serve as museums. Most of them, long abandoned, had been rummaged through countless times before me, but it was still an experience that I remember fondly.
By this point I'd already traveled more than 3500 kilometers by bike and wanted to slow down. I was close to my goal, and had a stay lined up with a family friend who lived on the coast only a day's ride from Halifax. I stayed with her for about a week— first in her vacant RV, and then in her guest room for a couple of nights. I was well taken care of there in Musquodoboit Harbour.
The Promised Land
The day finally came that I set off to Halifax. There we had it— the culmination of a year long dream, and a 2 month ride. Joy to the world. I don't think there's anything spectacular about the destination in and of itself. It's the context that makes it special… at least to me. Looking back on that first night in Ontario with a long road ahead of me, I can take comfort in knowing I did something. I rode a bloody long way on my bicycle. I said I would, and I did. It makes you feel strong (even in spite of being 15 pounds lighter than when I set off). I had some late nights looking out at the St. Lawrence, growing. A spiritual growth you can feel in your bones and muscles. A fortitude that you pick up on the road that never leaves you. Breaking down in the rain, crying under the roof of a porta-potty on a washed out logging road— that's growth too. It may be somewhere close to rock-bottom, but I think those experiences changed my brain. Every setback afterwards seems all the more surmountable. I can make it through anything if I can pull through the hard days I had on two wheels. Add it to the resume. Keep all the sketches and journal entries I made— make a book with them. These were The Sweetgrass Chronicles: A Bicycle Tour East.
