Hills? Those were Mountains my Friend

**Now updated with pictures.

My family is currently on a road trip, and with the MS bike tour looming up at the end of August my husband and I brought our bikes. We didn't have much of a chance to ride them on the way out to Ottawa, although there was this one time we decided to bike down a hiking trail. Ken would have been fine, but I had to walk my bike most of the way down. That was okay, after three days stuck on top of the van it was nice for her to get out. However, in order for us to get back to the van we had to go back up. Ken thought it would be better to take the road back because, although it was longer was made of actual asphalt. My friends, a prairie girl is not made to ride in the gargantuan hills of Ontario. I thought I would be okay, but my ability to recover after a hill is not great, and the breaks between hills were not long enough for me to recover and pick up speed so I ended up having to walk up most of the hills. Faced with this reality and the fact that I had already walked up three hills and we were not any where near the van, I did what any self respecting female would....I totally and completely fell apart at the seems. I cried, I hyperventilated and I had to be talked down several times by my husband. Finally, I resigned myself to my fate and walked uphill, humbled and a lot embarrassed.

Fast forward three days. The morning had come for my first ride in Ottawa. I felt some trepidation because I was afraid I would spend most of the time walking again, but my fears were unfounded. I picked a nice bike route that went along the river and my average speed was 26km/hr before I hit the construction and had to turn around. We are planning a family ride with the girls and a 50km round trip in Niagara, so I have some fun rides to look forward to on this trip.

My view at the beginning of the path

Going down beautiful paths makes the ride seem effortless. I hope the riders in Ottawa appreciate what they have here.

Booo! According to the local paper, this construction has been taking so long cyclists have been ripping down the fencing in order to use the paths. I can understand why, the detour went uphill through a bumpy open field.