The Q’Appelle Valley is a place of exquisite beauty – especially at this time of year. It’s wide and fertile, and trees wearing their fall best tuck into the folds of the valley sides. The Q’Appelle River winds lazily around all over the valley floor for more than 100km.
It gifted us what have probably been our favourite 70km of this entire journey but it’s difficult to share how lovely it is because 1) cloud cover and flat light for the first couple of hours, 2) cameras just cannot do justice to the scale and and colours, and 3) we have a slight reluctance to riding one-handed taking photos while wading through thick, loose gravel.
We passed no towns except the historic hamlet of Ellisboro, which is made up of two churches, an 1884 hall and a friendly cat with her kittens. So, food today was packed sandwiches and fruit on the side of the trail.
We loved the healthy, lazy cows in their meadows, the plentiful deer, the horses, hawks, and even foxes and snakes. Once the cloud lifted to reveal a gorgeous Saskatchewan sky, the colours popped and the wind settled at our backs to make the up-down workout of a ride extremely pleasant.
That all came to an abrupt end at 75km when we turned north for the steep climb out of the valley up to Melville. Up on the plateau the 35km/h wind hit us from the front and we crawled the last 30km with heads down, teeth gritted and butts complaining.
Then we met Liam Haime. We had seen a cyclist ahead and caught up to him on one of his breaks. Liam told us he is riding to raise awareness and funding for residential school survivors, and had come from Cowessess today, where 751 unmarked graves were recently found in the grounds of the former Marieval residential school.
His story is here at @rideforreconciliation on Instagram, or here: https://gofund.me/66d5e2c7. We might have battled in the headwind; Liam has it for days on end as he heads west to BC and back again to Ottawa, carrying enough gear for 70 days. You’re an inspiration, kid.
Today’s distance: 106km on Treaty 4 land
Today’s climb: 700m
Total distance: 3,501km
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