Distance: 149km
After a night of restless sleep on rocky ground, we awoke looking forward to breakfast in Gander today. We were around 15km away from the town and we passed a very tempting roadside food joint that had a sign saying $4.99 breakfast! We pushed forward to the promise of grocery stores and restaurants in Gander.
When we rolled into town, we were surprised to see the streets of Gander lined with people! Were they awaiting our arrival into their town? We could only wish.. We had stumbled on their town’s annual celebration of Gander Day, and the crowds were waiting for the parade to pass through town. To our dismay, the library was closed due to Gander Day, so we weren’t able to use the computers as we had planned. We decided to take this letdown in stride and to join in on the parade! We pulled out our banner and Gander residents even invited us to follow behind the parade through town. Banner in hand, Sam and I slowly biked behind the last car shouting “Happy Gander Day!” as we trailed behind. We had a great reception of our banner and enjoyed the free, unplanned publicity as the crowd took pictures of us. As we slowly rolled through, Brad helped us take videos and pictures, so there is some great footage of us! It was so exhilirating to be a part of this event and we thank the town of Gander of being so friendly to us.
After the parade was over, we headed over to Subway for lunch, but we still needed groceries for the day! Each grocery store we visited in town was closed because of Gander Day! Turns out Gander Day was a blessing and a curse, and we were forced to buy food from Shoppers Drug Mart in the end. Food choices were very limited. After the unexpected wild goose chase for food, we were finally ready to hit the road.
The road ahead was riddled with steep rolling hills, especially when we entered Terra Nova National Park. It was starting to get late in the day, and the park was a lot longer than we had expected due to the hills. The problem was that we needed a place to stay, and the only cheap way we could do it is if we exited the park. There is a hefty fee for camping in a National Park, as we had learned from our previous experience in the Lake Superior area. Resolute to get out of the park, we pushed very hard to get out as fast as possible. We were so relieved to finally reach the signs exiting the park and we could look for a place to camp guilt free.
Running out of daylight at this point, we were getting desperate for a place to sleep. We turned into a side road, but the sides were lined with heavy trees! Luckily for us, we passed by a resident having a barbeque out front and we jumped at the chance to ask for a place to rest. We were allowed to camp by the road outside their house because they didn’t have much yard space. The moment we started setting up camp, the rain clouds opened and soaked us quickly. We were determined to make Kraft Dinner that night, so Brad cooked on his stove and I fixed his bike in the pouring rain. Well worth the trouble because I went to bed with a warm and satisfied stomach. Good night!
-briant.
