Day three started off at 3:30am with a less
than 12 hours recovery from day two. Because we got in so late yesterday I
think it was fair to say everyone didn’t feel quite as rested. The vibe was
good though as we knew that it the last early morning!
Dan provided some entertainment early on by
colliding with the railing on the bridge… Thank goodness there was railing
otherwise we might have had a very wet and injured Dan to pull together!
The Americans made the peanut and jelly
sandwiches this time and we all enjoyed one at first break!
As we kept in doubles the whole way today
we all took turns being up front. The
second largest mobile DJ in the world- Andy had us singing for only a few hours
today. He forgot to charge the battery over night. School boy error!
There were lots of ‘debris’, ‘BUMPS’ and ‘Jombie’
shout outs from the front. This was important as we rode 3 hours in the dark
today all with various lighting ability. Jombie was the word we used for locals
in our path (or local vehicles). I can’t exactly remember the story behind the
word… something from the gang who taught in Korea. I will never think about
obstacle the same way, they will always be Jomies from now on!
 |
| Flying V |
Just as the sun was coming up today (and
the traffic was not so bad) it was decided that we should try a Flying V (from
Mighty Ducks). It was great to be occupied for half an hour by continuous
‘quack, quack, quacks’ to motivate the formation. All just to grab the perfect
picture!
Our last big stop came just outside the
20km to go mark. There were many more smiles here than earlier today as we all
knew that 20 was going to be easy! Text messages were sent to school to tell
them we were about 1.5 hours away. We were averaging a little less today per
hour as we had another head wind!
The last 20 we played games, sang as many
songs as we knew words for (Ironic by Alanis Morrisette was the biggest
success, 100% of the words!) and talked about what foods we couldn’t wait to
eat. Really, you would have thought we hadn’t been fed in weeks!!
There was one quick stop at 7km out as a
few needed a sneaky wee! Then we were on the home stretch and flying!! As we
started seeing landmarks we knew the pace picked up.
Arriving… this was AMAZING. Words cannot
describe the feeling here. The whole school was out on the road with banners,
balloons and massive smiles. A few kids greeted us at the turn and ran along
side the bikes giving massive high fives. We all threw our bikes down and the
hugging and crying started!!! Regardless of how sweaty and smelly we were the
kids didn’t care, hugs all round.
‘I know I can…’ was chanted several times
by a choked up Tammy and no one could keep the smile or relief off their face!
Then to our surprise Monica and the gang back at school had organised an esky
(cooler) full of drinks and a stack of food for us. Vanessa cracked the bottle
of champagne and we all had an emotional toast to everyone involved.
A HUGE thank you to our support crew. They
haven’t received much of a mention here but they worked hard. Chris was amazing
as moto support, always having those waters ready for a ‘on the move’ grab.
Herm was our bike mechanic who was always there checking on everyone. He also
went out of his way to clean all our bikes after the first day of mud. Larenz was amazing as our photographer, I am sure you will agree if you have liked any
of the shots I have posted today (check out Oyen Rodriguez on FB for more). Last but not least there is Matt who drove
the truck and was fantastic support every step of the way. He crawled along the
highway with the water, beer and food for three days at about 20km… that must
have been frustrating!!
Need to go for now as we have celebratory
dinner at Square 24 tonight. I will update again when we have the final donation
figure.
Finally… If I have made you smile or laugh
even once whilst you read this blog please donate! At the core of it all if
ABCs didn’t exist then 180 kids wouldn’t have an education, amongst other
things. It relies only on donations to survive and we need all the money we can
get as it grows and grows!
it's "peanut BUTTER and jelly sandwiches" darling. They are an absolute staple!
ReplyDeleteJombie comes from Zombie. Koreans can't say z's very well and instead replace them with j's. Hence, they all say "Jombie" instead of "Zombie." I guess when it was still dark and there were people walking slowly in the night (in our way) we thought they were zombies. So we would yell out to one another to warn about the zombies and not hit them. And now, after living in Korea, Dan refuses to say Z's and replaces them all with J's. That's the long-winded version of how we got to yelling "jombie" everytime we saw a pedestrian.
ReplyDeleteP.S. I love this blog.
Great job on the blog Bianca and I dare say most of it written when absolutely knackered! Between this blog, all the photos and comments I have never felt I wanted to be somewhere so much. You have helped immensely to convey the spirit of the ABC family which again I miss every day - just as well I am about to sort that permanently :)
ReplyDelete