PLEASE WATCH BOTH VIDEOS-THEY ARE BOTH TRULY INSPIRATIONAL!
The Spirit of the Sport
First off, I would like to acknowledge three local Comox Valley athletes who have all qualified for the Olympics coming up in a few weeks time in London, England. Geoff Kabush will be making his third Olympic appearance for mountain biking and will be a heavy medal favourite. Young Cam Levins, who has shattered the dreams of myself, Ry and Scotty year after year in the Comox 4 mile race, will be running in both the 5,000 and 10,000 metre races. I actually think he comes from Kenyan descent! Finally, a personal friend of the Mackinnon family Martin Reader claimed one of the last remaining Olympic spots last week in Beach Volleyball. Marty graduated with Sean and also coached Ryan’s Senior Volleyball team to a 4th place finish at Provincials. The guy is a freak of nature and I wouldn’t be surprised if he came back with a Gold medal around his neck. All three athletes should be saluted for their perseverance and dedication to their sports and we Mackinnons and the rest of the Comox Valley are behind them all the way!
This Olympic shout out leads us perfectly into our day, which was full of excitement. To refresh your memories let’s remind everyone of the Provincial winners thus far. Scotty has won 3 Provinces (Alberta, Ontario, Manitoba), Sean has won 1 (Quebec), I have won 1 (Saskatchewan) and the youngest, fittest Mackinnon has won 0. Ry “the Ox” Mackinnon has claimed the yellow jersey town after town, but us brothers have realized that it doesn’t matter who wins these meaningless places. The Provinces are the only ones that matter! And I know it has eaten Ryan up that he hasn’t won one yet.
So we started our day biking from Rivierre Ouelle, a small, but beautiful little campground placed right on the St Lawrence. I actually can’t remember the last time we have had rain. It seems so long along now. Scotty has actually thrown his yellow, ripped up rain gear out. He has challenged the biking gods and I hope they don’t respond with a Maritime Hurricane. Other then the continuous rolling hills that the end of Quebec had to offer the ride went relatively smoothly. Scotty and myself had come up with a perfect plan on how to win New Brunswick, which of course ended with us completing screwing over Ryan. I actually am starting to feel badly, we have not given him an honest chance to win any Province as of yet.
Our plan to win was simple. We stop 15 km from the border to get groceries and as Ryan goes in, we take the air out of both Scotty’s tires, hide the pump and Scotty rides Ryan’s bike to an easy victory. We figured Scotty would have a big enough lead after Ryan pumped up both the tires to win the Province. Our plan to say the least didn’t pan out. Ryan has learnt a ton over this trip and one main thing is to never trust anyone. The minute we stopped for groceries he knew something was up. So he decided to stay outside to watch the bikes, which didn’t give me the opportunity to take the air out of Scott’s tires. However, Scott grocery shopping inside didn’t know this. He thought the plan was still on. So he snuck out of the store, and seeing that Ryan’s bike was balancing perfectly upright on the sidewalk he decided to go for it. I was sitting there with Ryan when all of a sudden Scotty did a full on superman jump onto Ry’s bike and was in perfect tuck position, pedaling away in a millisecond. Needless to say, Ryan and I were stunned by this bold, but extremely athletic move by Scotty. If you have ever seen a classic cop move where he has to run, jump and slide his rear end against the hood of the car, this was impressively similar to that. Not to be anti-climatic at all, but Ryan jumped onto Scotty’s bike (who’s tires were supposed to be deflated by me) and caught him in the first 100 metres. Scotty quickly gave up and they were back to the store a few seconds later waiting for us.
So finally the battle for a Province would have to be won honest and fairly. All four of us went stroke for stroke for about 12km when Ry finally felt it was time to take off. When this happened I officially bowed out and stayed close enough behind the three to watch this suspenseful finish. Neville was pedaling faster then I had ever seen him pedal, looking like a young Elvis Stojko with his hair gusting in the wind. With about 100 metres to the “New Brunswick” sign the guys were still side by side by side, taking up the full shoulder, pumping their legs at warp speed. Then all of a sudden IT HAPPENED. Without any warning at all Ry aggressively swerved right into Scotty, sending him flying into a bed of bark maulch and flowers. Scott’s bike went flying 10 feet into the air and his old, frail body went head over heals as he landed awkwardly on his right leg. I couldn’t believe what I had just seen. I immediately pulled over to see if he was ok. Neville, who was still going neck and neck with Ryan looked back and saw what had occurred instantly jammed his brakes turning around for his eldest brother.
What happened next is what sport is all about. Scotty who was in excruciating pain, held his knee shouting and screaming. Neville and I tried to help and console him, but Scotty wasn’t having any of it. He still wanted to finish. I can honestly say I have never seen so much determination on another mans’ face. Scotty hobbled on one leg trying to get to the New Brunswick sign. Neville and I couldn’t let him do this on his own, so we grabbed both his arms and walked him towards the sign. People must have thought we were crazy, but we continued walking arm and arm. As we arrived to the sign all three of us embraced each other in hugs and felt a feeling like no other before. This was truly what sport is about!! Ry Mack had won the Province, but at what expense. His three brothers could never look at him the same again!
Rusty out
A special moment in sportsmanship and sporting history Maritimes, Here the Mackinnon Boys come. Where are our Lobsters at? | The Four Mackinnons 5000 Kilometres and 6 provinces later. Scotty the modern day Cowboy! Sean Neville racing back to Quebec and the 10-Day Festival. We had to tackle him and pin him down. | Nouveau Brunswick BABY! Sean Neville can climb anything. Sean Neville confused about whether or not he really wants to be moving on. |
Cotty Mac here.
FIRSTLY WE JUST WANTED TO THANK EVERYONE FOR THE SUPPORT AND THEIR GENEROUS DONATIONS. WE ARE AT 32,OOO DOLLARS RAISED AND COUNTING AND COULD NOT THANK EVERYONE ENOUGH!
Leaving Quebec City was bittersweet for our guy Sean Neville, I thought we might wake up to find him sitting in our hotel room, covered in “Biking for Baha” Stickers, unpacked and spending the rest of the 10 day festival on the hill in Quebec City. Sean has embraced the French culture more than any of us. In the past few days I have seen him with a glass of red wine, making small talk with student protesters, rubbing shoulders with Party Quebecois leaders and since we have arrived in the land of Les Fluers, all of our sandwiches have been made on baguettes. Sean was made for this province, and I think he is started to realize that.
Our Sunday morning started off similar to every other Sunday morning we have had on this trip. We wake up, dust off the 150KM we rode the night before, listen to Russ banter on about “Snackies”, watch him try and squeeze his voluptuous behind into his leotard spandex and jump back on our bikes and decide to pedal again.
However for some reason this morning felt different. For the first time in a while, I was beginning to believe we were going to make it to Halifax. After our surprisingly smooth trip north along the St. Lawrence from Montreal to Quebec City, we were all feeling quite positive about our possibilities of actually seeing the Atlantic. Within minutes, as it does on this journey, everything was about to change.
Quebec City borders the west side of the St. Lawrence River, to get across to the other side you have two options, Option A: Bike Friendly Alexandria Bridge or Option B: Suicidal, bike prohibited highway 20 Bridge. Through a dreadful navigational mishap by yours truly, we naturally chose Option B.
And our story begins …
As soon as Sean Neville took the left turn onto the SUICIDAL BRIDGE I knew we were in trouble. Sean was about 100 Metres ahead of Ryan and myself, and was met with a bombardment of Jacque Villaneuve like drivers jetting, swerving and forcefully directing themselves across the bridge. Ryan, Russ and myself watched as Sean stuck on the middle of the ludicrously busy death trap of a highway jutted out into oncoming traffic and busted to the other side of the road, clinging against the median he successfully got to the middle of the bridge. Sean waited about 5 minutes but was literally a sitting duck on the bridge and he had to leave, as it was way to intense. We saw him vanish across into the distance, leaving a trail of golden hair and his rainbow of serendipitous festivity behind him. Without our fearless leader we were very nervous.
Now it was Russ, Ryan and myselfs turn. Sitting on the imaginary island of yellow lines smack dab in the middle of the highway, we were positioned in a seriously dangerous spot. The island was connected to the highway by a blind curve that had three lanes of agitated, aspiring Formula 1 drivers tearing around it. When they noticed us they either started honking their horns or waving their hands in repulsion. For about ten minutes (It seemed like 2 hours) we were stuck on this island, poking our front tire out a little bit about to push off, just to have another set of cars swing around the corner at mock speed. That is when panic began to set in. We realized even if we crossed to the correct side of the road we were going to have to then traverse across the narrow, condensed bridge. Russ was in full “Rusty” panic mode. His eyes as big as saucers, you could literally see his life passing before them, you could see images full of black leather couches, ice cream raindrops falling from the sky, pana-go pizza parties and his new inclination Poutine cheese curds floating through his head. Russ eventually decided we should try and back up into oncoming traffic and the lane that we entered onto the bridge. This lasted about 5 seconds as Russ waddled his unmaneuverable bike back up the hill and had a wave of 25 cars honk balistically at him. Sheepishly Russ crawled back to our 5-foot island out of ideas and broken, dreaming of one episode of Saved by the Bell on our couch. For another 10 minutes we sat there, getting verbally abused and having passers by throw their hands up in disgust. All we could do was watch in agony. There was no way we could get across without causing a 42 car pile up and there was no way we could go back without risking our lives even more.
Finally Ryan who genuinely seemed worried for Russ’s sanity and who had not spoken in a long time, said “ We just have to go”. Looking up at the oncoming traffic was probably one of the most nervous moments of my life, I knew if we did not hit the gap at the exactly correct instant we were in big time trouble. Sitting there, waiting, was excruciatingly painful as there was just no opening. Finally we got the chance we were looking for, Ryan and I bolted across the road narrowly missing the traffic and safely caressing the other side of the road. The comforting relief of knowing we were off of the island lasted about 10 seconds as we turned our heads to realize Russ had not moved. Russ was still frozen in the middle of the imaginary island, his peanut butter covered whiskers twitching in fear. We tried to help Russ by being lookouts for him on the other side of the road but it was to no use. If you have ever seen a first time rock climber freeze on the wall, too afraid to go up, too afraid to go down and petrified of letting go of the wall, this was our guy Russ. He was on another planet. Finally he fired across the lanes successfully, pretty much leaping off of his bike into Ryan’s waiting arms. We decided we were going to clasp the railing of the bridge and slowly move our way across. With cars hastily passing us, we finally heard a sound that I will never forget for the rest of my life. Sirens, Red and White flashing lights following directly behind the three of us, I looked back and saw a policeman waving frantically at us to get off of the bridge. What transpired next was one of the funniest things I have ever seen in my life. The cop was so flustered by us; he was screaming French which is complete gibberish to all of us and waving his hands frantically. Russ, the last in the line of us three meatheads, turned his head rattled by the screeching sirens and started screaming through the front passenger side window at the cop, “PARLEZ VOUS ANGLAIS, PARLEZ VOUS ANGLAIS, PARLEZ VOUS ANGLAISSSSSSSSSSSSS!” the cop rattled kept rambling in French and then finally squealed as loud as he could “GET OVER THERE!!!!!!” Over there was a fifteen-foot by fifteen foot square piece of land that stood right before the bridge. After hammering our bikes over the curve and escaping the madness, the policeman drove up over the curve and scrambled out of the car like we were runaway fugitives. I am not sure if anyone knows about this, but a cyclist riding across Canada for charity was arrested a month ago for riding on one of the highways in Quebec. The French Canadians had an up roar about this. So we think the policeman was nice to us because of this. The policeman proceeded to Hughie Mac lecture us in broken English about responsibilities, the dangers of riding on this bridge and asking us, “What were you people thinking”. The policeman shaking his head, brilliantly decided to reverse back against the traffic, his car angled down half on the meridian and half on the concrete and privately escort us back across to the correct exit and eventually the bridge we were suppose to take. Walking our bikes across the beautiful bike lane on the Alexandria Bridge…
It is not hard to realize why people are so amazed we have actually made it this far.
From our campsite in Riviere Ouelle. | Scotty did not want to leave this spot. He just kept staring and not responding to anything we said. Ry Mac hanging out along the river which tricks you into thinking it is an ocean. The sunset was extraordinary today. I think the biking gods were repaying us. Nice way to ride into Saint Anne. Les Fleurs. Scotty needed one more. Said he never gets any pictures on the blog. | Sunset over the farm fields. Scotty Mac again... He made us take about 250 shots. Said we were not getting his best side. Stunning church More spectacular churches along the ride. | Scotty grimacing in pain. Look at those calves!
Sean Neville here, we woke up this morning with LMFAO still playing in my head, a smile on my face thinking about how great of a day and night I had in Quebec city. I don't think the guys know yet or have noticed through my actions but I might not leave this amazing province. Festival d'ete de Quebec is the biggest music festival in Quebec all year. Artists you might know would be:
-Bon Jovi
-Aerosmith
-lMFAO
-Sara Mclaughlan
-Offspring
-Metric
-City and Colour
-K-Os
-Lionel Richie
We just so happened to land in Quebec at this time so we decided to splurge on tickets. Last night we saw a few good shows, one known as LMFAO. Said to have been 50,000 people there with us in the main stage area. We got up early to see old Quebec, the citadel and Chateau Frontenac. I didn't realize that Quebec City was sitting on the provinces equivalent of Mount Everest, the hill claim to our hotel wasn't much fun but it sure made this city beautiful. Small Street winding down through the historic buildings to the Saint Lawrence River as Street performers showed off. We sat on the citadel wall looking over a park for an hour or so. It was nice to relax! We saw some of the students on strike marching down the roads nearly nude representing that the tuition they are is taking the shirts off their back.
Our friend Alex Pouliot an ex Glacier King in the Comox Valley who's originally from Quebec took us to Le Grante alley Full of pubs, people, music and where it seemed like every Quebec girls staggette was going on. I'm the midst of all this was a park which had one of the stages that filled with up to 10,000 people quick to see city and color. The show was unreal and we were surrounded by good company. We had a bunch of Biking for Baha stickers on our shirt and everyone seemed interested. By the end of the show people everywhere were either supporting us with stickers, donating and even some of the Westjet girls promoting flights took our picture and sent it to the head office to get them to support. An awesome guy who was behind us named Sebastie Duhaime who play's in the band called " Low Level flight also did the same. It was awesome to be surrounded by the friendliest people that wanted to get involved and help promote our cause. I think it will be hard to cross into New Brunswick in two days after such an amazing time! Big Thanks to Alex Pouliot for hooking us up with a hotel, tickets and touring us around this magnificent city.
Sean Neville
The most photographed hotel in the world: Chateau Frontenac | Sean Neville scaling the wall and proving he would be the best soldier of the four of us. Ryan manning the cannons. View of the St.Lawrence from the wall. Walking Quebec City Wall. Quebec City is only one of two walled cities in North American, can anyone name the other? Russ got a standing ovation for his 4 block long, Artistic Gymnastic performance. Old Town again... Tons of Action. | Entering Old Town. Scotty manning the cannons Sean Neville manning the cannons Sean Neville from the top of the Citadelle. The Wall again.Pink Floyd is playing on the Plains of Abraham in less than a week. Chateau Frontenac A top of the Citadelle again. | Sean Neville handing out stickers and talking to people about the cause. Ry Mac found his DOPPLEGANGER!
Quebec has been extremely nice to us so far on our journey. Spoiling us with unbelievable hosts, beautiful scenery, cool cities and countless free music festivals to boot. However, today was at a whole other level. Quebec city was on the horizon around 130 km from our cozy resting point behind the motel. We set out pretty early in the morning as everything went without a hitch on our pack up before take off. Ross was making “Snackies” with his eyes closed, Scotty sat on the lawn similar to his first two years playing ball for the U of L pronghorns and Sean Neville packed the tents in no time. We were pretty happy with life as the sun was shining and we were flying down the coastline of the St. Lawrence.
The heat was by far our only problem throughout the day. It was sweltering; it literally sucks the life out of you. Our water breaks have turned to “Russ breaks” the past week. I will try and make it very visual and as PG as possible. Here is what happens. We all pull over to the side of the road for about five minutes. Russ, slowly veers off to the side of the road and immediately lets his body go limp. Sean, Scott and I then quickly run to Rosco’s aid and cover him with the shade of our bodies like an umbrella. Russ winces and breathes heavy as he lays there hopelessly. The next few minutes all three of us focus on lowering his core temperature, feed him and improve his morale. Sean focuses on spiritual techniques. Sean barrages Ross with noise that could be found in a spa. Scotty takes a towel and waves it back and forth trying to get some cool air around his body. While I got the younger brother job, which consists of dabbing Rosco’s forehead with a “wet towellette”. I can’t wait for it to get to a tolerable temperature.
To be honest, my knowledge of Quebec city was pretty limited until my best bud Cam McDonald tried out for an event last year. He just missed out on the chance to compete in the “Red Bull Crashed Ice” which is basically a downhill ski course on hockey skates. When trying out for the event in Vancouver, Cam had an amazing course time. Unfortunately, he hit a cone in the final seconds of his time trial disqualifying him from any chance of making it. Basically, this got me interested in Quebec City. For the past 7 weeks I have been constantly thinking about how cool the city is going to be. Quebec city’s “Old Town” is a walled city from when the French settled it back in the day. With massive stonewalls encircling some of the coolest buildings you will ever see.
To get to my reason for interest, Cam and I played hockey together everyday when we were growing up. Outside of his house road hockey was like a fourth meal in a day. It was mandatory. In house hockey we were unstoppable. Batman and Robin, Sonny and Cher, Jordan and Pippen. This is until Cam’s skills skyrocketed and mine quickly declined. He eventually ditched me for the prestigious Comox Valley Glacier Kings for an illustrious and coveted career. ( I have always stayed away from his career until he mentioned to me he was trying out for the Red Bull Crashed Ice) I immediately offered to be his trainer/nutritionist/coach/mentor in hopes of seeing him succeed. Basically, after seeing the streets and the entire course inside and out. I have studied every curve and every line that you need to be successful, Cam, this is your last and final chance for me to finally help you get to Quebec City! I can help you improve your only skill you are lacking. Attached above is a video from Mighty Ducks, Cam could never master the ability to stop in hockey. Now I can teach him how!
After strolling around the city, we moved on to the Festivel D’ete du Quebec. A massive music fest that lies just to the south of the walled city. The group LMFAO played with over 50,000 people within the concert venue. For someone who has never been to a massive music festival it was quite the sight to see! We were in the crowd jumping around and telling people our story. We immediately made friends and had some pretty good music to rock out too. Overall a pretty cool time, I have never experienced anything like it. Anyways, we are taking a rest day tomorrow to take in all of the historic sights. I am way tooo excited! Love you bye! Ryan
Russ and Ryan taking in the thousands of Red Foo Fans
Scotty was a little out of place with the 25,000 screaming teenage kids at the concert. 50,000 people shaking and dancing their hearts out. | Russ getting in with the Quebec locals Ry and the LMFAO fans Party Rock Crew-Such a cool atmosphere. We handed out a ton of Biking for Baha Stickers. Ryan was pretty much carrying people all night long.They wanted his view of the stage. Yes thats Russ on Sean Neville's shoulder on the back. More festival shots. No one realizes we have not changed in five days. | Russ meeting more people Everyday were shufflin Festival Neville showed us a great time! The wigs and neon colors on the Plains of Abraham were awesome! Burnaby Joe Sakic in the crowd! |
To say the least we were very sad to leave Montreal. Scotty had found his love for Jazz music, Ry had found his love of early 18th Century architecture and Neville had found his love of the EVERYTHING that Montreal has to offer. As we biked away from the City I looked back and saw Neville all teary eyed. This was honestly the first time I have seen him upset since Scott kicked his tooth out when he was in Grade 7.
Over our trip many people have asked us how good of shape we’re in now from biking this whole way…. I will be the first to answer this question and say that we aren’t in good shape at all. We have all developed what Neville calls “peanut butter bellies” and our aerobic capacity is very minimal. See, the thing about long distance biking like we are doing is that we pedal all day long, but I swear we never raise our heart rate to over 120BPM. We are in good biking shape, in terms of we can sit and pedal all day, but other then that we aren’t in good shape. Our main foods of Peanut Butter and Banana sandwiches, Subway, granola bars and trail mix have not been the calorie friendly to us haha. I honestly don’t know how Jared from Subway lost all that weight from his Subway diet haha. Scotty has claimed that he is in the worst shape in his life, claiming that his 6 months of crossfit training prior has gone for nothing.
So leaving Montreal it was no surprise we were VERY sluggish. We grinded and battled for every kilometre today, hoping to blow past Trois Riviere, and end up a measly 80km from Quebec City the following day. It is crazy to see the size of the Churches in every small community along the way. The first couple Churches we seen, we would all be pumped up about them and pull over for some photos. But by about the fifth Church the novelty wore off and we realized that they aren’t as rare as we thought and there was no need for Paparrazzi Scotty to snap 200 different shots of us in front of them. As we pulled into Trois Riviere at about 6pm, we stopped off at a Mcdonalds in town, killing some time before it got dark, as we planned on throwing up our tents at some random field.
One of the things over the trip I have noticed that Ryan takes pride in is what he calls a “mainsy”. A mainsy, as Ryan defines it, is energetically snapping your fingers in unison while going down the main street of any village, town or City. He has done this in large Cities like Regina and has done this in small towns like Indian Head. No matter what the place is Ryan will get this excited look on his face and start doing a Mainsy. We were all very hesitant at first to follow in this odd entrance Ryan would do, but it slowly grew on us. We have had mainsys that have had people look at us very oddly and mainsys where we received honks from cars and cheers from passing pedestrians. Ryan never let’s any reaction arouse him. He will do it the following day no matter what.
So this leads us to today. It was about 8:30 entering the City of Trois Riviere when we turned onto Boulvarde Des Forge the main street of the City. Without any hesitation a huge smile arose on Ryan’s face, snapping his fingers and waving his arms in unison. However, it took Ryan about 3 seconds to realize that a massive music-fest was taking place right center of the street. This did not deter Ryan as he continued pedaling around the thousands of festival lovers mainsing the whole way. Scotty and I were laughing hysterically behind him, while Neville, who had been so upset about leaving Montreal, was all of a sudden in his element again! Ryan had claimed afterwards that “in his 2 years of mainsys that was the best mainsy of all time”!
We are stunned about how much is going on in Quebec in the summer. There is always live music, street vendors, shows, you name it and they have it. I am fearful that we are going to lose Neville to Quebec and there may only be 3 of us dipping our bikes in the Atlantic! It was a shame that we could only hang around the festival for an hour, as it was getting late and we still hadn’t a clue of where we were staying. Leaving Trois Riviere it was quickly getting dark and you could see captain Scotty getting nervous. As the sunset we continued biking into the night, looking frantically for a place to set our tents up. That’s when we saw a motel and Scotty made the decision to go talk to the manager. Scotty has always claimed to be the most cultured Mackinnon, so he figured he had the ability to use his 6 words of French he knows to try and swindle a deal. He talked to the lady for a good 5 minutes or so, before he walked out with this big grin on his face. He then told us that we could camp for free in front of the motel. What we didn’t know was the Lady was rounding up shovels, rakes and gloves, as she had told Scotty that we could stay for free if we removed all of the sawd, grass and weeds that had been removed from the entrance way of the Motel. So here we were at 10:30pm for an hour clearing out weeds for this French lady for a free nights stay. I, being an experienced landscaper, delegated jobs for the boys and pretty much made sure everything was in order. Halfway through the job the lady had Neville, the only capable handyman, changing showerheads in 3 different motel rooms. After we finished we all laughed about Scotty cutting a deal with a lady without even knowing what it was!
Anyways, Quebec City tomorrow! Bon Voyage.
Enjoying the ride along the stunning St.Lawrence River. | The long days are taking a toll on Scotty | AND Sean Neville! Festivoix, Trois Rivieres | The stretch along the St.Lawrence could possibly be our favorite stretch of road during this entire trip. | Canola Fields | Beautiful! Just beautiful! | Town of Comox employee of the month Jared Hendry would have been proud of Russ. Here we are working for our lodging. | A well needed break for the boys. |
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