Saturday, May 19, 2012

26 Riders will battle to ride 535km from Armidale to Newcastle over 5 days to raise money to support Ronald McDonald Houses Newcastle & Tamworth, assist with the Establishment of a family room at Gosford Hospital and help to improve the Holiday Retreat at Foster. All this so that Sick Kids and their families can stay together!

To many Ronald McDonald House ‘is family’ and simply by reading this shows that you care. This attitude is what helps Ronald McDonald House continue to be a shoulder of support, a person to talk to, a glimmer of hope.

We hope that the 2011 Ride for Sick Kids again exceeds all expectations and we can help families with their sick kids. After all, it is all about the Kids!

Thank you for your support!

RFSK 2011 – Final Leg

by RFSK on September 3, 2011

After all these months of organising, and a great week we have come to the last 25km… tears in my eyes as it is all about to finish. We left McDonalds Swansea with Ross Baines from Metroll Newcastle leading the pack. (Ross is also one of our major sponsors of the Ride for Sick Kids and has been for a number of years, Ross thanks for you continued support and everything you bring to the ride.) The pack stomped through Belmont to hit the Charlestown inner city bypass, with only two steep pinches left to climb.

RMH was ready with families and supporters to welcome the riders and support crew back to John Hunter Hospital. Balloons high in the sky, Ronald McDonald himself making an appearance and sick children waiting egerly to see the riders. It was a gorgeous sight and making it all so real what this week has been for.

The riders calmly road down the hill into RMH with NBN present to film their arrival and cheers from the families as they hit the driveway. Hugs from everyone and high fives for the kids. We have done it! A safe trip, no accidents, happy riders and lots of money raised to support Ronald McDonald Houses and Family Rooms Northern NSW. CONGRATULATIONS EVERYONE!!!! You have done a brilliant job and I am so privileged to work with you all!

We quickly unpacked the truck, ute and BMW’s and then enjoyed a generous lunch that Rohan and the volunteers had put on for us!

From myself and Nathan, thankyou to everyone for allowing us the opportunity to organise and participate in this ride! We fill very honoured and have had a brilliant week.

Take Care and again congratulations to everyone! A Beautiful week.

Gretel x

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RFSK 2001 – Day 5, Cessnock to Terrigal

by RFSK on September 3, 2011

Great news, last nights function run by Ron Mussali from the Central Coast raised $60K for RMH! AMAZING! Thanks Ron and McDonalds Central Coast. You put on an amazing show and the money you raised shows it! It was a very late night for some riders, but well worth the lost sleep. Thankyou to ’The Reef’ Restaurant who held the function and ‘The Cove’ that feed all the riders. The food was superb.

Saturday morning, the riders rose to yet another beautiful day with the sun rise over Terrigal beach. Fresh coffee and great breakfast and we set off for our destination, RMH Newcastle. In yellow today, John Lynch, aka ‘the muffin man’ and the CEO himself, Mr Ross Bingham. Congratulations boys you look smashing in your yellow and well deserved!

Our ride headed north back through the entrance, all the lights and round-a-bouts to come to our first drink stop at Budgewoi, where again a generous donation from a local gentleman. Trevor Burns our McCafe Manager from Taree, who came along as support crew, collect $50 from this very kind man  to put towards our total fundraising this year. It is truly amazing the generosity you come across throughout the whole community!

The ride only had 50km to go and we hit the Pacific Highway. The riders loved the road, dual lanes, smooth surface and the pace picked up! Nathan Chiswell and Lincoln Amidy on the front setting a cracking pace. Lincoln is our safety officer for the ride and also one of our major sponsors for the ride, ’Pinnacle Team Events’. A fantastic job done by Lincoln. Not one accident this year, the first aid box stayed closed and that is the way we like it. Well done Linc on an amazing job and ensuring everyone’s safety!

We hit Swansea McDonalds for our final drink stop of the ride, it was a breif stop to ensure all riders arrived at RMH Newcastle on time! Coffees were drunk quickly and we were back on the bike to finish what we had come out to achieve!

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RFSK 2011 – Day 4 Cessnock to Terrigal

by RFSK on September 2, 2011

Friday morning we woke to a glorious day, and the RFSK crew enjoyed a delicious breakfast, bacon and eggs, pancakes, croissant’s … We departed Crowne Plaza to ride through Cessnock and stop at our last school for 2011, Kearsley Public School were again we were greeted with open arms and the children were so excited to see us it was beautiful. The prizes for the colouring competition were again the highlight for the kids! The two bikes that were donated by ‘Hadleys Cycles’ we were told by Mr Ian Lampth the Principal of Kearsley Public School, that we could not have given to two more deserving children. Imogen, 6 and Liam, 7. So much so that he had tears in his eyes and thanked us! This is what the ride is all about! We hope that little Imogen, who didn’t even know how to hop on the bike enjoys her beautiful ‘bella’ and Liam can enjoy working on his fitness with his bright Blue Giant.

The riders enjoyed a tour of the school and sat with the students in their class room for 10mins before we departed on route to Terrigal. Another emotional school visit that hits home to all on RFSK 2011 why we are doing this. Keeping families together in tough times and giving sick children every chance of getting better, growing up and enjoying their own children.

The riders departed Kearsley Public School with our lead escort, a BMW X5, kindly donated to us for our ride by ‘Klosters BMW Newcastle’. The car looks fantastic all sticker-ed up with Ride for Sick Kids so all traffic can see it coming with flashing lights in tow. Brendan Drury, our Klosters representative rider for the week sat comfortably on the front of the pack leading them to the KOM (King of the Mountain) for today. A 1.3 climb out of ‘The Gap’ just prior to Freeman’s Waterhole. No outright winner today, the pack all rolled up together in a great time.

We took a drink break at Coorangbong, where our lovely driver Graham Smart from McKey stricked up a conversation with a very generous man who asked Graham what we were doing and then offered him a$100 donation. THANKYOU! Every dollar counts and we are so excited with our fundraising so far this year. We are going to be well and truly over our target and I can not wait to hear of the final figure that we have raised for this fantastic charity! Graham is driving our Truck (which sits right behind the riders to ensure their safety from all other Traffic) which is donated for the week, all petrol and Grahams services from McKey. The distributors of McDonald’s. McKey we couldn’t do it without you! Thankyou to Graham and Derrick for their continued support and help, collecting fruit, and muffins, delivering the ‘RFSK Travel Mugs’ to all the McDonalds Stores and ensuring all the luggage is courier from destination to destination. 

The boys set off from Coorangbong for lunch 30km down the road, where we stopped at a beautiful beach side park, just North of Magenta Shores. The boys made great time today, putting the pace on to get into Terrigal as earlier as they could to have a well deserved sleep or spa. The road into Terrigal was long, with plenty of round-a-bouts, traffic lights and pedestrian crossings, all riders safely navigated their way through, only to take the same route back out tomorrow morning. Everyone arrived at the ‘Haven’ park at the South end of Terrigal Beach to have photos with the local newspaper and enjoy Tim Tams and Wagon Wheels donated by Arnotts, not to mention one of our very large sponsors that have provided every drink for us known to man kind… Coca Cola! The riders have had so much to choose from, water, juice, coke, mother, powerade and the list goes on. So thankyou to Coca Cola for keeping our riders and support crew well hydrated for the entire ride.

We all returned to the Crown Plaza Terrigal to get ready for our last function of 2011. At present the function is still going, and I think it is going to raise alot of money for our RMH! I can not wait to hear the final results. A little inside to the function, it was very glamorous, the ladies were all dressed beautifully, the men in suits and the restaurant, ‘The Reef’ at the haven in Terrigal were pumping out some amazing food. The auction items looked fantastic, the mystery balloon purchase was a brilliant idea and everyone was having a great time when i had to depart! So final figures and photos will come tomorrow morning! One day left, 77km to RMH Newcastle and our ride for 2011 is officially at an end, but fundraising is not…

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