Uppsala - Stockholm 95km

This was it, the culmination of a year of planning, phonecalls, emails, meetings, endless miles in the car to meet contacts.
The day before Joachim Englesson had been out and marked the whole route with green signs marked with arrows and 'Ride of Hope'. Talk about commitment!
We leaders went out with him the day before and checked the route for ourselves. A very, very good move.

Thanks to Joachims initiativ the day went smoothly. The light groups set off at 10am, the medium groups at 10.30 and the fast groups at 11.
This kept a good distance between all of the groups on what is traditionally a tight run in into Stockholm. We didn't want too many riders bunched up heading into the capital. This solved such an eventuality perfectly.
All the groups came to Gröna Lund in Stockholm within 30 minutes of eachother and made for a nice closing ceremony where all the riders that completed the full 9 days got medals and an applause.

Before this though we were to have a ceremony in Uppsala at the start.
The money from this years ride will be going to the fund that is helping to build Swedens 5th Ronald McDonald childrens house in Uppsala.
 These houses are a home from home for families with children being treated.

The way out of Uppsala was uneventful. We cycled and we chatted. It was going to be a wonderful day.
To my great delight Sören, Göran och Poppe turned up from CK Falcon. I first met these three guys in Italy in 2007 on a Chase the Sun trip. Görans daughter Malin will be one of the leaders when I travel to Misano again in October.

I went with the medium group today. This year the route will be different after Märsta where we won't be having a depot. That is moved to Skånela kyrka. I rang the Church pastor 2 months earlier and was given the ok to be there that day. When we arrived though we couldn't see our tent. Apparently today was "Skånela Fair" and the place was packed with cars and people. A quick confused look around and we saw our tent 100 yards further down the road on the front lawn of a house. Brilliant improvisation.

Now how do I describe what happened next?
well let's give it a shot. After we left the depot we continued on to Skålhamravägen, and this is where the fun began. You'd have to have ridden with us that day to fully understand it. To hear fully grown men wooping with delight over this undulating landscape, the rolling hills and the road snaking in and out of the trees was incredible. I described it as the worlds longest rollercoaster ride. Absolutely fantastic road. I was almost tempted to turn back and ride again ... but soon we were in Stockholm, navigating the north side of town through the port at Varta where the ferries to Finland depart and arrive.
Before we knew it we were circumnavigating Gärdet and arriving at the finish. 2 rows of cyclists, neat and tidy gliding through the finish.
I was asked how I felt and muttered something I can't quite remember ... I was naturally ecstatic to have completed this again, raised all this money for the cause and once again met so many people and made many new friends. Soon the emptiness would set in, the realisation that this was it and soon it would be work.
For now I was going to enjoy the coming hour. The laughter, the reminiscing, getting our medals and then we'd disappear to our own lives again ...