Antigonish to Antigonish, NS
Traditional territory of the Mi’kmaq
<5 km
Cloudy, glimpses of the sun, perfect breeze, 16 ºC
The days are packed. Even the ones in which we don’t bicycle more than a few kilometers or any kilometers at all. We were up early-ish, to start the morning. I dropped off my bike at the incredible local shop, Highland Bike Shop, for the spokes to get retensioned. The more time I spend with disc brakes, the more I miss my mechanical brake pads. But this is not a technical blog so we won’t get into that, not in this entry.
Keaton, a dear friend from another timezone, is hosting us and took me to the All-of-us Society for Arts Presentation where he is currently doing a residency.
When we were in the Margaree area (see Day 021 and Day 022) we ran into someone while munching on lunch who told us to visit the Tall and Small Cafe which was owned by her sister. Excellent establishment which reminded me of the cultural treasure which was The Sleepless Goat Cafe in Kingston. We ordered lunch but I had to dash before it arrived to meet Will, Sue, Juniper, Beecher, and Sammy. Such a treat to spend a tiny amount of time planting potatoes and having them field a whole host of questions from me.
Half a year ago I had some chocolate at a Remembrance Day event which had travelled all the way from here. The company was called Peace by Chocolate, started by a Syrian family, based out of Antigonish. So today, wonders shall never cease, they were gracious enough to open their home (and factory) to us, one of them even going so far as to cancel their daily English lesson for us.
It was all very humbling (and delicious). The chocolate makes for an excellent present and can be ordered online! More on this soon. An excellent opportunity for me to practice my very limited and basic Arabic.
Jonathon wrote about us falling behind on content. It is a very real and serious concern. There is a lot to stop and smell but then the work to try and describe the smell which we’ve stopped to breathe in begins. A gargantuan task for an already difficult odyssey. So it feels.
But increasibly perfect too in a lentil-soup-and-tofu-and-fifty-percent-off-on-these-cherry-tomatoes-blue-cheese-and-pasta-this-delicious-chocolate-and-tinker-with-this-loop-pedal. Singularly unique moments of time and space. Till tomorrow.
