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Day’?s Verse:
He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Isaiah 40:29-31
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Ian here. After months of anticipation, Katie has finally embarked on her two day, 150 mile journey from Quincy to Provincetown. In the end she raised $2,500.01 for the national MS society. I think that’s quite an achievement. (Full disclosure: I donated an extra $45 to push her over the $2,500 mark).

This morning we got up at 4:30 AM, which is ridiculously early, especially for a Saturday. But we had to drive to get Katie to Quincy so she could check in and get ready to leave at 7:30. I vaguely remember throwing some clothes on and doing some last minute stuff like securing the apartment while Katie made herself some oatmeal and got geared up for the ride. We packed the car last night, so after throwing the bike on the back we took off for Boston at 5:00 AM. Apparently 5:00 AM on a Saturday is a good time to head east. There was no one on the road. Which is good because we drove through a part of Boston that I’ve never been through, so it was helpful to be able to drive really slow or do extremely illegal maneuvers without anyone seeing.

We arrived at the start point around 6:00 AM. There were quite a few people there already, but nowhere near the 1,700 who would be doing it, so its probably good we arrived so early (more on that later). Katie checked in, got all of her numbers in place (a number on her helmet, one on her bike, and one pinned to her back so they can identify her), went to the bathroom, and generally got ready to begin.

We do have some pictures of her at the start but sadly I can’t post them yet. We brought Katie’s camera but it’s broken. It turns on fine, but it doesn’t display any picture in the view finder. Katie tried it last night and it worked, so I don’t know what happened. I’ll be Googling this problem to try and figure it out. So we snapped a couple of shots with my cellphone camera, but Katie’s got the cellphone with her so I won’t be able to post those until I meet up with Katie, download the pics off my camera and then find a wifi hotspot (probably tomorrow).

The first 75 leg of the journey ends at the Massachusetts Maratime Academy on the Cape Cod Canal. I’ll be meeting Katie hopefully around 1:30 this afternoon. Between now and then I’ll be chilling at the Panera Bread in Plymouth if anyone wants to hang out. Ah, the joys of laptops and free wireless internet access.

I’ll try and get Katie to write a description of her ride so I can post it tomorrow. In the meantime, here’s the route Katie will be riding today:

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Please help me raise money for the MS Bike Tour Cape Cod Getaway. Donate today on my MS Participant page.
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