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"Deer ahead," I shouted.
Sure enough, just south of Kinmount on the Haliburton-Lindsay rail trail stood a good-looking buck and doe 100 metres ahead, squarely in our path. As we saw them, they also say us and bounded into the woods. Drawing abreast of them, we noticed they had stopped about 50 metres into the woods, staring back at us. With a snort, the buck led his doe, not deeper into the woods and away from us, but running a parallel path to ours, keeping pace with four very surprised randonneurs. Easily visible through the bare woods, we kept pace with the deer for about 200 metres before they angled off into the woods behind a granite outcropping. Wow! On November 12th, Larry Strung, Allan Thwaits, Ken Dobb and yours truly were riding the first official off-road brevet of Randonneurs Ontario (yes, that's our new incorporated club name!). The previous afternoon, Catherine Strung had kindly shuttled the four of us to Haliburton. After dinner, a restful sleep at the Silver Maple Motel, and a hearty breakfast at the Kosy Corner café we executed a perfect 8:00am start under cloudy skies and 3 degrees. We started with a north wind behind us, and enjoyed the trail surface, which is mostly a packed gravel and earth surface with occasional sandy sections. Heavy rain two days before left a half dozen good-sized puddles on the trail, but our various cyclocross style bikes handled them easily enough. |
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