I see no Bears !

All the hard work, the planning, the logistics, the packing, are done! My bike should be approaching the Canadian coast by now and I’m just sat waiting for my good friend Paul to collect me for the first part of my journey; the 25 mile run down to Carmarthen to pick up the 1.55am National Express coach to Cardiff and thence on to London Heathrow for my Lufthansa flight to Halifax, Nova Scotia.

It’s a relatively short flight of just 5 hours to the East coast of Canada. I discovered on my first visit to Canada last year, when I flew into Calgary, that Canada is one hell of a big place. In fact it took as long to get from the coast to Calgary as it did to get from UK to the Canadian coast. If all goes to plan I will be met by David George, a fellow biker, who works at Halifax airport who has offered to show me around Halifax and take me to my hotel. Yet another small illustration of the kindness of strangers. As well as being a biker, David is a fellow Facebooker and traveller to whom I was introduced by that world famous traveller, Tiffany Coates. It seems David makes something of a habit of welcoming incoming British Bikers to Halifax.

I can’t quite believe the amount of kit I’m taking out with me, bearing in mind that all my camping and cooking kit is securely stashed in my panniers on “the Beast”. To be fair, it does include all my bike kit, clothes, maps and paperwork, to say nothing of my “tech”… Like I said, we’ll say nothing of my tech, except that there is too much of it… far too much!!! Although it will, hopefully, make it easier to stay in touch with friends and family occasionally.

Today has had an interesting little twist as I answered an SOS from a biker friend in Carmarthen, about 25 miles away. He suffers with MS and had managed to drop his bike, a beautiful Triumph Tiger, whilst pushing it out of the garage and simply didn't have the strength in his legs to pick it up. Always happy to help a friend it also served as another practice session just in case I drop my best on the trail.

The house is clean and tidy, the grass it cut, I’m fed and watered! All that remains is to turn off the last few electrical bits, turn off the water, lock the shed and the front door, and close the gates as I leave. In less than 24 hours I will be in Halifax and the start of my next ADVENTURE!

The picture below was emailed to me by my Canadian "friends" ! It had the caption...

"Canadian Meals on Wheels"