Perspective

Tuesday night we were the guests of Dordt College and we basked in luxury. Before going to bed that night I did stop by the computer room yet and read some of the blogs posted by fellow cyclists. I chose to read Bill W's blog from Monday and he brought back to reality what this trip is all about. I have written about how tough some of the rides have been, the wind from the wrong directions, etc. etc. He stopped me in my tracks and made me realize how blessed I really am. We still have choices and lots of them. Those we are hoping to help in dire circumstances do not have choices as to where to sleep, what to eat, what to wear, etc. etc. This sure helped me to focus on Wednesday when we had a tough day ahead of us. We were all up already and getting our gear back onto the gear truck when all of a sudden we had a down pour - just what we needed on a super long day. By the time we had been treated to a buffet breakfast the rain had stopped and it was just drizzling - now, do we take our rain gear or opt to just get wet - we still have choices. We had a mid week celebration service at Dordt College as well which was well attended. Representatives from CRWRC and the Micah Challenge addressed us as to what they are doing to help alleviate the cycle of poverty.

What was supposed to be a tough day turned out to be a good day - the rain brought cloud cover which kept the temperature down and it also provided us with a tail wind which made our ride even more enjoyable. Rita and I pulled into camp just after 5:30 with 186 km on our bikes and we were on the saddle for 8 1/4 hours - not bad at all. We had stressed over this first of the 3 long days and it turned out better than everyone had thought it would. Our peleton meeting started with a prayer thanking God for the added blessings of the day.

Today is Wednesday - I have supper duties tonight and breakfast duties tomorrow morning so another person who is also on the same sweep team and myself decided to take a ride with the SAG vehicle and just do the last section of the ride today - we did 66 km - this way we will be in camp in time to do whatever we need to do to help out. Today's ride was tough - the wind was not favourable at all so the other cyclists will not be getting in early - the temperature was wonderful around 75 degrees. We took four hours to do the 66 km. We also have to unload the gear truck and reload it tomorrow morning so we just needed a break before we do another long day tomorrow.

I'm heading off to camp now to start my duties......did find the local library to post this blog first though - there will be a mad rush here after supper so I did get ahead of the rest....