The Ride for Alzheimer's is On!



July 3, 2000. My trip begins....

Start at home in Ledyard, CT. Alarm goes off at 4:30 AM, breakfast & finish packing. Left for airport at 7:00. Arrived at 8:15 AM, checked in, set for boarding at 9 AM.

I am experiencing great anxiety.

Plane on time, departed at 9:35, will change planes in Cleveland and then on to Kansas City. Scheduled to arrive at 1:22PM. Everything running on time so far!

Flying at 35,000 ft. Small plane, 65 seats. Continental Express Jet, appears to be quite new.

Continental Express Jet at airport

Flight is very smooth so far, and includes a coke/cookie. Raining in Cleveland so the landing is bumpy, but we arrived on time.

We exited and then reboarded (same plane???) and departed at 12:10.

On time but it is still raining. Flying at 31,000 ft, above the clouds. Beautiful view out the window, like another world up here!

View of clouds out plane window

Roast beef sandwich and coke on this flight. 4 guys next to me are a barbershop quartet, "Turning Point". They recently came in 18th in an international competition. They are flying to Kansas City for another competition at Kemper Arena and expect to come in 12th. We exchanged URL's, they told me that they would let me know how they did. After our chat it didn't seem to be quite so lonely.

I am anxious to get to St. Joseph, MO, check in, assemble my bike, and meet the other cyclists and send my first e-mail back with all this information!

I wish Donna could be with me, what a thrilling adventure this is going to be. I'm so proud to be able to do this 1,023 mile bike ride for the Alzheimer's Association. Thank you all so much for your donations and encouragement!

Landed in Kansas City at 2:10 PM, picked up luggage, and called Drury Inn for a ride (they are one hour away). Nobody came, so I called again. ABB came and I finally got to the hotel at 6 PM.

There was a hotel reception for us. I met Horast Ollmann (retired aircraft machinist), Jay Kauh (retired chemical engineer from West Virginia), George Pierce (retired from Portsmouth, NH fire dept.), Tom and Julie Lever (Wethersfield, VT. Retired MacDermid Coop. CEO - equipment Div., and Julie is a retired hospital health specialist and classical violinist), Dave Robinson (college math teacher at Trinity), Grant Birch and Tom Turan (both retired chemists at Proctor and Gamble).

This has been an interesting first day!

Here is Mike Monk, ABB head mechanic, putting my bike together at the Drury Inn, St. Joseph, MO.

Mike Monk from ABB assembling my bike.

Ride For Alzheimer's Home On to the next day



This page written and maintained by Ed Bareiss