Kindness across the border

After biking across America, I’m taking on a new challenge: riding through eastern Canada and New England. I began two weeks ago in the Québec province, continued into New Brunswick, and am now in Nova Scotia. A couple of encounters with kind strangers along the way have reminded me of people’s inherent goodness.

During a particularly challenging stretch through northern New Brunswick, I needed to cover 65 miles through mostly rural areas. As I struggled up a dirt farm road, I looked behind me to see a black pickup truck rolling along slowly in the distance. As it got closer, I pulled over and waited for it to pass. To my surprise, the driver pulled up alongside me.

“Are you okay, sir?” the woman in the passenger’s seat asked.

“Yes,” I replied. I explained that I was riding to the city of Campbellton and would soon be stopping at a snack bar in a tiny town up the road.

“We saw you from back there and wanted to make sure you were okay,” she added.

I smiled. I told her and the driver, a man, about my big trip — from Québec City, Québec, over to Campbellton, New Brunswick, then a train down to Halifax, Nova Scotia, then across the Nova Scotia peninsula to Yarmouth, from which I’d catch a ferry to Maine.

They smiled, too. After wishing me a good trip, instead of driving off into the distance, they pulled up to the next side street and turned the truck around. Coming past me the other way, they headed back to where they had come from.

What? They had gone out of their way just to make sure I was okay!

After a few days of some of the most challenging hills I’ve ever come upon, during which I felt worn out and scared, I was touched by this couple’s gesture. Knowing that they cared about me, a stranger, bolstered my spirits.

A couple days ago here in Nova Scotia, I veered off a bike trail through the woods into a tiny town in search of the post office. I was sure from the map that the town would have SOME place where I could fill up my water bottles — a gas station, a cafe, a bed and breakfast?

Absolutely nothing that I could find.

Reaching the little post office just after it had closed, I despaired at finding water for the next 10-mile segment. Seeing an older woman with curly, gray hair and glasses pull her car into the lot, I asked if she knew of a place where I could fill up my bottles. To my disappointment, she said there was no place in town ... but she lived only a couple houses down. If I were willing to wait a moment (she had a key to the post office and was going to duck inside), she’d give me some water.

I gratefully agreed.

Following her a short ways down the road, I stopped before a white, clapboard house. I waited by my bike as she went inside to get a few bottles of store-bought water for me. It was a particularly hot day, and to my surprise, she asked if I’d like some ice cream, too.

With warmth in my heart, I accepted.

She invited her partner outside to join us, and after she gave me a double-waffle cone of rum raisin ice cream (the inside cone had broken, she told me, so she added on the second), we all sat down on Adirondack chairs at the edge of their lush, green lawn. She introduced herself and her partner, and I told them my name. We wound up having a lovely conversation — about the area, about my riding, about the weather, about the town, about politics. They gave me some information about the ferry service between Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, and Bar Harbor, Maine, that I hadn’t known. The explained to me why their town didn’t have any real commerce. They taught me that, contrary to my assumption that it was cold here on the southern coast of Nova Scotia most of the year, it wasn’t. In fact, their lawn stayed green all year long.

This couple also helped me in a very tangible way for the future. Google Maps wouldn’t route me onto the country highway that skirted the southern coast of the peninsula, putting me instead on rocky, winding trails that really are meant for all-terrain vehicles. When I mentioned this to them, they said that you are, in fact, allowed to ride on the shoulder of that highway. They see cyclists do it all the time.

Wow! This would shave 10 miles off the next day’s journey AND save me from having to bounce uncomfortably over little stones for hours on end.

“Bet you didn't think you’d be having rum raisin ice cream this afternoon,” the woman said with a warm smile, as we sat chatting on the relaxing lawn late in the afternoon.

No, I smiled back. I hadn’t.

When it was time to go, she offered me some more water, but I said I had enough. The woman told me she’d be thinking of me on my journey toward Yarmouth.

The unexpected human connection, kindness, and real-world help they offered me has been one of the best parts of this journey.