Lost Touch

18th June.
Lafleche -Assiniboia
I left Lafleche and began to worry. I had been unable to make contact with Base Camp (John Ruth) for several days. I had no signal from my tracker or mobile It is impossble to realise just how difficult it is out here. By the time I reach a town at night everything is shut and as I am off early in the morning,everthing is still shut!! I had to find a phone. I saw a sign that said Limerick of all places, and took a sharp right. I noticed an office with Ranch Ins. above it and it was open. I sort of fell in the door with all my baggage and asked if there was a phone I could use as it was urgent. Wendy was the lovely girl who had to listen to this distraught granny. She was so kind despite everything. She took John's number made the call and John rang back - what a relief. After 4 days missing John had contacted the British Embassy who were about to organise a search party.... What a lot of trouble I was causing. Anyway we started catching up on what had been going on when by an amazing coincidence daughter Katy rang John and Ruth on the other line. She is an Eventer and the good news was that she and her horse, Barney, had just won their class at Burgie, a big event near Elgin in Scotland. Ruth put her on the speaker phone so we could hear her ans she could hear me and there was chaos for the next ten minutes. I burst out crying and felt sorry for Wendy who was looking worriedly across her desk at me. When I explained they were really tears of happiness she said she understood as she had travelled a lot too and got really home sick. She lived on a ranch in Wood Mountain with husband and two children. I thanked her so much and off I pedalled. I arrived in Assiniboia and needed to find a library to blog and reply to e-mails. It is quite a big town and it felt strange having people around me for a change. Help; was I becoming some kind of lonesome nomad shuffling from place to place and forgetting what it was like to communicate with people. If I have many more prairie days I may become withdrawn and unable to talk!! Suddely a figure was waving at me. It was Wendy with her children who had come into town to do some shopping. We had a chat and I felt so much better.