Waiting...

You'd think we would try and sleep in as many beds as we could before leaving for a 3 month trip....We've slept in our new tent for the last 3 nights in the back yard and are in love with it!  It's so clean and not covered in a million squished bugs from years of pre-bed time slaughter.

We're off to the cottage tomorrow bright and early to work on the boat if the weather holds, also to take the bulk of our row boat gear up.  Really just to try and catch the massive pike that we've seen swimming under the dock.  We'll be back for one last visit with family and friends before the ultimate departure and we're just champing at the bit for it.  Our food boxes are mostly sorted for Quebec and Labrador, we're really just puttering on trivial details.

Sunday will come soon enough, but until then.....we dream of all the peanut butter and jellies on the horizon.

Homeless, but Happy!

Drizzle, rain, drizzle, drizzle, rain. We're hoping mother nature gets her beans out in the next 6 days so the skies will clear for at least our first day.  We know we're going to see lots of liquid sunshine over our 3 months out but at least one sunny day would be great to start on!

We're a little bit more homeless today than we'd bargained for.  We've officially moved off the Danforth (YAY!) and are houseless, bouncing between all of our kind family members doing laundry, sending emails, making phone calls.  Unfortunately we got word from the gear store in Peterborough that the Nemo tent we'd ordered a few weeks ago is so back ordered that it didn't get here for May 14th.  It's unlikely to show up even before July......it's looking like we're going to have to find a Canadian Tire special after all our shopping around and research.  It will be a heck of a lot cheaper though!

So's life.  We're still smiling and not worried in the slightest about what shelter we'll end up in for the trip.  We hear blue tarps are nice!  Surely all this rain will breed enough bugs to keep us company while we sleep.

THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!

Thank you!

So many wonderful people have offered their advice, thoughts and encouragement through the planning of this trip.  We know the list will only get longer as we move through the expedtion.  Thank you everyone, we are incredibly lucky to have so many great people in our lives.

Schwaib at MEC- The first person we ever talked to about this trip...thanks for all the advice in biking!

Marla Black- For the hand-crafted, Canadian-made, travel-sized backgammon board.  We have no idea how to play the game, but we've got lots of time to learn :)

Ken Bouchard- The super awesome fellow Rossiter rower who has lent us 18 nautical charts that will take us from the cottage all the way to Quebec City!  THANKS KEN!!!!

Mum and Dad Rawley- Endless support, and never saying we were crazy. Really helping by mailing all the goodies we bought on ebay up from Maine.  One day, we'll have money to support local businesses. 

Mom and Dad Greene- SO much encouragement, lending us the Rossiter, brain storming, flares, VHF radios, a place to store our junk while we're gone, taking us to Costco...etc.  Thanks!

Joe Connoly- What a guy! We have you to thank for getting us addicted to Twitter. Also all sorts of incredible ideas.

The Grand River Keepers- Volunteering their time to shuttle our canoe for us in Labrador and lending us maps and a guide book for our canoe trip down the mighty Grand River.

Vena and Horace Goudie- For sending us Horace and Horace's mum's autobiographies of their lives in Labrador, what an inspiration!

Steve and Sandra- Two of our best friends who are driving our bikes and all our gear to Quebec City for the start of our cycling portion of the expedition.  We'd be toast without them!

Ryan Benson- For his canoe paddle and continuing the unofficial explorers book club with Dave, and also for keeping the dream alive.

Jacqueline- Thank you so much for helping us FINALLY find a tent that works for us.  What an adventure it's been just finding a tent! 6 months of research and testing and it all came down to 6 days before we leave for the expedition to find the right one.  Yay Jacqueline, good luck with school!

T-Minus 10 Days!

Soon we will be into the single digits for our countdown to shove off into the great unknown! We went for a second trial bike ride with our new gear set up and rocked it.  44 kms from Markham to Unionville, camped out and rode back 44 kms the next day.  Our food rations seem to be great and we're feeling much more confident about the whole bike-tripping thing. 

We bought a new tent!  We're super excited about a new company based out of New Hampshire, small and grassroots, Nemo Equipment is their name and simplicity of design is their game.  Just the way we like it! 

All 347 of our meals for the expedition are ready to go, weighed, sorted, rationed and packed.  The apartment is full of boxes all destined for the East.  All's left is to pack up the apartment and move, no biggie.  Rest assured, this will all get much more interesting once we've hit the proverbial road.

Happy Earth Day!

Well....time to see what this bike-tripping thing is all about.  We can't think of a better way to celebrate Earth Day then to head north for the weekend and have a trial run with our tuned up bikes,panniers and gear loaded up for the first time ever.  We'll be riding the gravel rail trail in Haliburton. We really have no clue what we're doing, but we figure we'll learn pretty fast.  We're hoping to cover as many kilometres as possible and test out our food rations and see what adjustments need to be made.  Oh, and it's supposed to rain.  A LOT.  We'll have to remember our water wings!  2 nights in the tent should tide us over on this last sprint to the finish line of city living.  Time to pack!

R.I.P little food dehydrator

Signs point to it being time to start packing the food and mailing it to Labrador......because the dehydrator simply can't make any more food.  The lid has melted and the trays are all breaking down.  Only 2 of the 5 original trays remain in almost passable condition.  We certainly got our $40.00 out of the little guy!!  We spent almost $300 at COSTCO this weekend buying kilos of instant potatoes, rice, pasta, instant soups, nuts, hundereds of granola bars, etc.  Our calculations put us at about 8 dollars a day to feed both of us.  Over 3 months, with no rent or bills....that's a pretty appealing cost of living!  There may be lots of cold fingers, ferocious bugs and sore behinds, but have 3 kilos of chocolate...will travel.

Radio Tidbit on The Grand River, Labrador

CBC.ca The Story from Here April 13, 2011 Greetings All! For a preview of the political fire that surrounds the Grand River in Labrador, please listen to the powerful clip that starts off Part 1. Just click the link above and it will redirect you to the correct page. The Story from Here is a great Newfoundland/Labrador-based show on CBC radio that talks about all things in the "outskirts" of this wonderful country. Interestingly enough, this was aired today, 6 weeks before we begin the first leg of our trip. Much of our motivation to paddle the Grand River stems from this debate over the potential damming of Muskrat Falls. We know there will be many differing opinions along the way to, through and from Labrador about the hydroelectric project...this may be a good taste of what's to come. We have already spoken with Elizabeth and Roberta, both the women interviewed, months ago. Their passion and distress over this river is no less on the phone than on national air. It's difficult not to side with them, as you will hear for yourself.