The next challenge for Around The World is to tick Truro off the bucket list of places to visit then make the final hop, skip and a jump over the hill to Halifax. Stage 735 is the first of the remaining three stages and its task is to take the route along the northern shore of Cobequid Bay approaching Truro where the Salmon River flows out into the open sea. The stage is a big climber but an even bigger descender. With a five hundred foot climb waiting to burn your legs from the off, you’ll never have been happier to reach the highest elevation on the stage than on this one at three miles. It’s a tortuous start to the stage.
The rollout climbs up through Westchester Valley straight from the off, crossing an offshoot of Otter Brook after a mile before carrying on up the hill to Westchester Mountain at three miles. Off the top, Highway 104 descends to cross a tributary of Gleason Brook after four miles before a lumpy couple of miles on flatter terrain takes the road over the Portapique River at six miles ahead of a gentler climb to the second highest peak west of Sutherland Lake.
After passing the lake, the road straightens off a left hander at eight miles then crosses Matheson Brook just after at the start of a five mile descent that passes by Lornevale at eleven miles and Londonderry Station three miles later. Between the two, the highway crosses over the Great Village River just north of where it flows into Moose Brook. The road snakes right/left/right/left after the crossing as the road approaches the coastline, but it hangs a left at Masstown after twenty one miles and that sets up the run in to the finish, parallel with the shore, with Debert airport a mile away to the north (left). The road remains relatively flat after fourteen miles, and that’s a remarkable statistic in itself given that both the total elevation and total descending exceed a thousand feet over the whole stage.
Distance: 24 miles / 38 kilometres
Ascent: 1106 feet / 337 metres
RGT Magic Road: Ea535OYSqY08
Max elevation: 821 ft
Min elevation: -46 ft
Total climbing: 1106 ft
Total descent: -1437 ft
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