Day 46- A long, wet day with two flat tires !!

Day 46 Wednesday, June 23, 2010 Distance 102.37 km. Time 6 hr. 20 min. Total so far 3128.34 km. Elevation climb 1392 ft. We forgot about the time change when we said we would get up at 6 am because yesterday that was 5 am for us. John, a retired teacher, opts to get up early to play tennis. Norma, also a retired teacher, usually opts to sleep longer but did get up to say goodbye to us. So guess what John noticed as I was packing---a flat tire on Silver's rear end! That's number 7 !!!!!!! He was amazed at how fast we changed it. When I checked the tube later, it turned out to be two tiny little holes side by side. John and Norma are heading to Sault Ste. Marie on Monday for a couple of weeks with their daughter, Jill who we know from the YMCA. Jill and hubby, Dan, have twins Devon and Paige and older sister, Morgan. Every family we meet seems to have twins somewhere. Norma will bring a few items back home for me. After photos and thank yous we were off again under overcast skies. Near the end of Hwy 127, I stopped to photograph a mailbox and noticed---you guessed correctly again---a flat on Silver's rear end and I had checked the inside of that tire real good earlier. The problem this time was with the valve. Another fast change was required. After an hour and ten minutes, we made it back to Hwy 1 just in time for the rain to start. It's a good thing we put on all our rain gear because it rained for the WHOLE day- no thunder or lightning---just rain, rain, and more rain.. At one point, I had to take off my glasses because I couldn't see at all. The bad thing about rain, besides getting very wet, is that it is too hard to take pictures so I only got a few today but saw several opportunities that I would have taken if the weather had been good. The other bad thing is that it is hard to go to the washroom and just because it was raining and I drank a lot of tea yesterday , I had to go twice my normal times. Thank goodness for a few overpasses to stop under. We passed St. George and Prince of Wales. We saw a few motels but figured that since we were wet already, we might as well keep going. We wanted to get as close to St. John as possible to make the 12 o'clock ferry tomorrow. Well, we made it to the St. John visitor center and I marked Sault Ste. Marie on their map. Then we headed off to find a motel. We finally settled for the Econolodge and are drying out after wolfing down a pizza as we had no lunch stop due to the rain. It's the longest day we have been in the saddle so far on this trip. We're pooped!