Day 109: Peaceful Purgatory - 0km

Rest day at Rocking Horse Stable in Blind River

If you can believe it, it was our first day off where we were in our tents. We always tried to take days off when we were at someones house, with toilets, a kitchen, tables and chairs and if we were lucky, wifi. But this time our comforts consisted of two picnic tables, a fire pit, a hose, and an outhouse. It could definitely have been worse.

After sleeping in till 8am, I wondered how on earth the day would ever pass with essentially nothing to do. But sure enough, it did, and it even passed quickly. Cooking each meal took extra time, starting the fire, cleaning the pots. We washed our laundry with the hose by hand, and I even showered in the freezing hose water. We hung around the horses, and hung all our things out to dry and get some fresh air (things get really smelly unwashed in packs all day). Jewel, Joseph and I played a lot of Wizard. A fun card game Bill and Linda taught us. There was a beautiful sunset and we were back in bed by 8pm.

We did it, a whole day living outside, and we still had the comforts of running water and electricity. Though it was weird. It felt like we were just waiting for the time to pass, waiting for tomorrow to come so we could pick up and do it all again. Move slowly, another 20 or 30 kilometres. The days had become somewhat mundane at this point, the views never really seeming to change, just subtle differences you notice because your looking at the flowers in the ditch all day. Or the ways the trees reach for sunlight, how their types change based on altitude and area. So it felt a bit like purgatory. A nice one. But still just an in-between. Suspended. Only there to be gone shortly.