We rolled in to a John Deere store after a short 50 mile ride where my friend Nathan McCrary and I pulled (in front to break the wind) our small team of 4 at paces of 23 to 25 mph on flats. It was a tough pace but we both wanted to push ourselves hard on this short day. We finished as one of the fastest groups although the entire team was quickly at the store since we were all eager to get off the bikes. While we waited, one of the team members put down a few coins on some train tracks to see what would happen. To our great surprise, the train did not derail! See the pictures below for the results. After a half hour waiting, a police escort arrived to clear the path for our arrival into town.
Most of the day’s events had been kept a secret from us, so when we rolled into the nicest hotel in town, the Holiday Inn, everyone in our team almost screamed of joy. The mayor was at the arrival to congratulate us and proclaim the day, July 12th, as “Push America Day” in the city of Grand Island (which is actually not an Island, mind you). Then, after unpacking our bags from the vans, the ladies of Grand Island popped open the trunk of one of their cars where they had Sonic Slushees prepared for us! It was such a serendipitous moment as many of us had just been talking about getting slushees later on in the day.
After dropping our bags and bikes in the beautiful rooms of the hotel, we headed out for a lunch at Tammy’s house. We spent the afternoon there talking over some great steaks, playing Wii, playing pool, and just simply relaxing. That night we had a dance in the local Elks Lodge. Since we have become pretty comfortable as a team making a fool of ourselves on the dance floor, it was crazy fun! We were dancing and screaming at the top of our lungs, we had circle dances where we included people in wheelchairs, we played air guitar, did the Macarena, the cotton-eyed-Joe dance--it was great time! I meet some great people there, especially Nia and Jessica. These two girls were fantastic and some of the friendliest and welcoming people I have ever met. We all crashed into bed early on the first night in Grand Island. Many of us went to the hot tub and pool at the hotel.
The next day was a busy one. We went to the local park where we visited a playground Push America built a few years ago. It is a ‘barriers free’ playground specially designed for people with disabilities. There was even a swing built for people in wheelchairs! We preformed Kids on the Block again, where I played the role of Renaldo. After a game of pickup baseball and some sprint races, we left for a visit to the local hospital where Milly, Sue’s adoptive daughter, was in for some surgery. We brought balloons and a nice card and came to support Sue in these hard times.
That night, Tammy brought us to her Kindergarten classroom where she had prepared a PowerPoint presentation of the past JOH teams. We all left that room with tears in our eyes and the realization of how monumental this trip really is. Not only did I come to appreciate first hand the impact we have on the lives of people, but also the impact this trip is going to have on the rest of my life.
PS. We get a lot of media attention along the way. Cyclists rotate doing interviews in cities we visit. We actually saw ourselves on the local news channel as we were sitting in the hotel the first night in Grand Island! My friend just pointed me to this website:
http://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/article_ba186448-d3f0-5ce5-a20f-a7130ffd25a7.html
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