Fourteen hardy souls joined me to brave the elements. A big thank you to all who came out and got soaked with me. We rode our slow, silent 11 plus miles in a steady downpour and as we skirted Saint Joseph Sound near the end of the route we were treated to an anomaly of nature - the orange ball of the sun hovering above the horizon, trying desperately to shine through the clouds and rain. The effect was an eerie glow of pale yet brilliant orange in a misty gray sky. A fitting tribute to our fallen comrades.
Special thanks to Harold Mitnick for doing much of the leg work for this year's event, especially procuring and painting our ghost bike; and to Chuck Holley for spending an enormous amount of his limited free time rigging up a trailer so that the ghost bike could be towed along the route at rider level.
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In Tampa, there was also a Ride of Silence and the local FOX news station was there for the story:
http://www.myfoxtampabay.com/story/18475114/2012/05/17/on-memorial-ride-just-the-sound-of-silence
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And in Clermont northwest of Orlando, Lacey Nickell, whose dad was bicycling when killed by a motorist, helped organized a Ride of Silence (with Sara McLarty whose dad was also killed while bicycling) and wrote this poem:
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