Eric Lindenberg

The ride went on Saturday as planned, the 4 of us damaged riders tagged along to IWK (Izaack Walton Killam Children’s Hospital ) in Halifax for a moving presentation. Our next stop was Pleasant Park, where we dipped our wheels in the Atlantic and received our finisher medals. The wrap up dinner was great, Graham belted out Barratt’s Privateers and the Last Saskatchewan Pirate. We managed to drag ourselves to The Ale House in Halifax till the wee hours. It is now Thursday so I have had a few days to decompress and reflect. My year of prep, fundraising and training was totally worth this experience. My only regret is our crash has shifted the focus from the ride. This ride was an emotional roller coaster, I have never cried so much in my life. You hear the tragic stories of young children taken by cancer and the triumphs of those who survive. The outpouring of appreciation and support from strangers is moving. The bond between my team mates is like no other, we will be brothers for life. The crew and volunteers catered to our every need, we being the Team 2 'Primadonnas', they deserve the medals. The sacrifices my family and work mates made to support me were huge,all of you that donated hard cash, wow, $25k +, thank you. In closing, I feel privileged to have accomplished this ride for such a worthy cause, and hope my friend Thomas would agree. Love you all, Eric

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnTmUazH9k4)

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oddlp7hQbA)

Fun Day for Team 2

Wear your helmet! Huge gouge near my temple.

It’s late, so I will pick this one up tomorrow.

A little early for Halloween!

Ride an average of 200km every day and it looks good on your Strava!

The day our luck ran out. Day 17, 236 km, hilly, cold and raining, yuk. Amherst to Lower Sackville, NS. We started off with a 60km shuttle, saddled up and set off. Grinding in the rain, feeling your shoes fill with cold water, face splattered from the rider in front of you, not my favourite kind of day. We were about an hour into the ride when we descended  a hill rounded a corner and were meet with a steel bridge, the kind that look like a hatch pattern,  and like black ice when wet. . A warning sign 10 feet from the bridge, no time to slow down. Mike Kelly made it across, but Graham went down right in front of me, I swerved to avoid him but my bike slipped out from me, Wham! Carnage everywhere, Peter and Martin went down hard, Mario just fell off, and Damon was able to bunny hop his bike over Graham’s wheel and landed upright. All told there were 4 out of 7 of us bleeding and laying prone on the bridge in the cold rain. Just like hitting a human cheese grater. Dang did it hurt. We were cared for by Linda and Darryl. Many others stopped to offer blankets or help till the ambulances arrived. We were transported to Amherst Hospital, Graham and I were shipped to Halifax. All told we were lucky, an on coming vehicle would have done us in. We owe a lot to our support team and the kindness of strangers .

Fredricton to Moncton, just under 200km. Yet another beautiful day. We stopped at Havelock Public School and met a great bunch of kids, especially one fighting cancer.The weather has been good this week. The Moncton Police gave us an escort to the Sears store, very cool. The store really had a lot going on, entertainment, food and a gymnastics demo. We heard from 3 families who had dealt or were dealing with childhood cancer. The food was great, and the store setup a living room for us to relax in after the store closed, nice.

Levis Quebec to Riviere du Loup. We dedicated today’s ride to Micheal, the son of our Photographer, Mike Leitere. Micheal passed away in his teens from liver cancer. Mike has embraced the SNKCR, by riding or volunteering for years. We met a local teenager this morning who lost his leg to cancer and is still being treated. This ride is a roller coaster of emotion. Our ride was beautiful and aided by a tailwind. So much so we arrived early enough for ice cream courtesy of Neil Babbage. We showered and had an amazing meal at Auberge de la Pointe. We shuttled to the Fredricton Sears store and were met with a rock star like reception  at 11:00pm, cool. Gotta love that East Coast hospitality.

Happy Team!

It was a beautiful day to fly down the road on the west side of the Ottawa River, nice. We rolled into our lunch rest stop minutes after a 3 car accident. Fortunately there were no serious injuries, but one of the vehicles caught fire and burnt up. Quite a show.  We were able to vacant about 1.5 hrs later and shuttled to Hawksbury, then road into Montreal where we picked up some relay riders. Our procession wound up in Seas in Pt Claire PQ, good food and showers, then off to Levis PQ.

Pickering to Belleville. Having been in my SNKCR bubble for 2 weeks I was super keen to get home, even for a hour or two. Today I dedicated team 1’s ride to Thomas. The pace is more relaxed in team 1  but fine riders none the less. We picked up some ride alongs in Brighton, including Shirley and Lynn Forbes. It was fun to lead the team through my stomping grounds.  The reception at Sears was overwhelming. So many of my friends, family and supporters were there, I was  humbled. It was so fitting that today was dedicated to Thomas.  We loaded the bikes on the truck and Shirley and Helen drove Damon and I to Ottawa, where we would rejoin team 2.