Well, that’s that then, is it? We had a great time; we challenged ourselves and each other and rose (rode?) to the occasion; we raised quite a lot of money for the
Chain of Hope in The Gambia, and therefore specifically for Gambian children and their families; and we feel we did a little bit to help raise awareness of heart disease in the country as a whole.
Our nearly 200 generous donors deserve huge credit for helping us raise (at the time of writing) well over half a million Gambian Dalasi, and none of this could have happened without the less obvious support and encouragement of many, many friends, colleagues and family members. Thank you, each and every one. The
JustGiving page is a record of named and anonymous donations, and a growing number of off-line contributors, sponsors and helpers — in cash and in kind — are acknowledged on another page on this site.
There’s a bit more to come too, including I hope some personal accounts from those who took part — which may well be of interest if you want to join us next time in a repeat, or something different but similar. And we now have a page on
Facebook as well as the photos on
Flickr.
It’s also been a really great ride.
Mark Twain had one of the best
bicycling quotes, back in 1884. He said: ‘Get a bicycle. You will certainly not regret it —
if you live.’ Although some of us may have regretted being on one at at some points, we did all live, and I don’t think a single one of us regrets the experience.
And finally of course — that’s
not really ‘it’ at all, and perhaps in the end the riding itself may turn out to be the least important part. Cycling is a rich source of metaphor for life (it was Einstein who said ‘Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving’) and we’ve already begun to make plans for next year.
After all, if we stopped now, we’d only fall off.
Ride safely!
Remember, £16 pays for a monthly blood clotting test for a child on anticoagulant medicine after surgery. Just £25 covers the cost of an echocardiogram in Dakar (hospital bill alone). Then £80 is enough to get one child and a relative from The Gambia to Dakar for an echocardiogram (including hospital bill, transport, subsistence, and accommodation). And £180 will obtain two visas (child and carer) for travel from The Gambia to the UK for surgery.
