On the 17th September we kicked off the third annual bike ride for the Yolanda Moore Foundation, tackling 80km of Dorset’s finest countryside.
We met at Jazz Cafe early doors, with a mixture of bike ride veterans and new joiners. We assured the newbies at this point that it was an easy ride, they would later find out the truth! After our warm-up up and down the Bournemouth seafront, we hopped on the Sandbanks Ferry and started the real cycling.
After our first hill through Studland we made our first stop in Swanage where we fuelled ourselves for the journey ahead. We then set off for Corfe Castle which was our half-way point. Here, we realised that we had to do it all over again! We started off again with Rhonda at the back of the pack making sure nobody was left behind. Until, Rhonda and I took a wrong turning, with the others ahead of us going the right way. After it dawned on us that we were not going the right way, instead of cycling back to join the others, we decided to hike up at valley in our cleats with our bikes; this included hurling them over a coupe of stiles, easy! After the help of some lovely locals, we managed to get ourselves back on track. Alexa was waiting for us with open arms and some delicious cupcake.
After a much needed pep talk, we hopped back on the bikes in hope to catch up with the gang. We were all reunited at the bottom of the last climb (which I was hoping we had avoided with our detour). We started our ascend up what we were now calling Ice Cream Hill, as the reward is a Mr Whippy at the top! ‘Just keep peddling, just keep peddling’ was the anthem of the climb. After we all devoured our ice creams, we started to the last leg of the journey. At this point, an alcoholic beverage was on everyone’s wish-list. With that in mind, we zoomed to the finish line. 80km completed! Everyone freshened up and met back at Wayne and Rhonda’s for some much needed food and drink.
A lovely evening was had, chatting about the ride and exchanging stories about our times spent with Yolanda. Many committed to riding again next year, and some were not so sure. We raised over £2,000 this year and would like to thank everyone for their support and contributions!
From Jo, our super cyclist supporter
