I just got back from Calgary where I participated in the Rona MS Bike Tour with my boyfriend and his family. It’s a cause that’s very close to both of us – members of both our families have MS.

I hadn’t done a lot of biking prior to the ride and was a little worried about how I’d manage the 160km. Though I was more concerned with how bruised my bum was going to be after the first day than how sore and tired my muscles would be. And as it turned out, despite padded bike shorts and a padded bike seat cover, I’m still nursing what appears to be a bruised tailbone. Getting back on the bike on the second and final day of the ride was excruciating. However, I rode the entire thing. I even made it up all the hills. If one thinks ‘prairie’ means there is no hills, one would be wrong. The gently rolling landscape is all but gentle and rolling when on a bike.

We rode through small towns and by-passed the highway on potholed back-country roads beside undulating fields, cradling ponds full of singing frogs, red-winged blackbirds and busy ducks. Unbordered by mountains, the sky spun countless different shaped clouds above our heads.

Between the two of us, my boyfriend and I raised just over $1700 and our team as a whole raised $7202.06 thanks to generous support from friends, family, workmates, acquaintances and strangers between here and Calgary. Thank you to all who supported us on the ride!

BC has its own MS bike tours as well – two day winery tours in either the Fraser Valley or the Cowichan Valley, or one day rides by the Kamloops Thompson River or through Vancouver.

The Finish Line (photo by Llynn Carcary)

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