Blog post 2 – June 16, 8:20 a.m.
One more day until the riders depart! You can track their progress here. In the meantime, check out our latest news release:
The End2End ride doesn’t start until June 17, but Susan Kerr is already grateful for its impact.
“I’ve never seen a group of people come together and ignite the community in the way they have,” said Kerr, who leads the Island Kids Cancer Association, the beneficiary of the 1,000-kilometre, round-the-clock End2End fundraising relay, in which eight cyclists will pedal from Victoria to Port Hardy and back.
IKCA is a small, frontline charity that works directly with Vancouver Island and Gulf Islands families blindsided by childhood cancer. Founded in 2017 by Kerr — who lost her own son, Jacob, to the disease — it is made up of people with an intimate knowledge of the struggles such families face.
The End2End effort will help IKCA provide support and connection through every phase of a family’s cancer journey, Kerr says. It will help break down their feeling of isolation. It will mean more access to the essentials – things like fuel, food and mental-health care for people who often have to give up their jobs to care for their children. “Those three should never be out of reach for families supporting a child with cancer.”
And, vitally, End2End will broaden the community of people who see the gaps in the system and want to provide real help to real neighbours. “The group has taken on our mission as its own,” Kerr says.
The End2End ride was dreamed up by Andy Dunstan, a retired police officer who now works part-time at the Trek Bicycle Store Victoria. What he envisioned was this: a fundraising relay that will see four pairs of cyclists take turns riding a succession of 50-kilometre segments. Each pair will pedal for roughly two hours, rest for six, then climb back in the saddle for another leg of the round-the-clock journey. Each rider will complete 250 kilometres by the time the trip is done.
Dunstan took his idea to bike shop owner Bill Fry, who made the store the event’s organizing sponsor.
The first leg of the ride will see Dunstan and Fry set out from Vic West at 6 p.m. on June 17, climbing the Malahat to Cobble Hill before giving way to Saanich police officer Rob McDonald and Duncan’s Chris Day, a CFB Esquimalt firefighter. That pair will be followed by CHEK News’ Mary Griffin and retired Mountie Steve Foster, who will then hand off to commercial realtor Erin Glazier and Victoria police detective Kevin Nystedt. The riders will continue the journey in that order until arriving en masse at the Trek store two days after they left. Their expected arrival is around suppertime on Thursday, June 19.
On the way, the riders and other supporters will gather at Port Hardy’s Hardy Bay Seniors Centre, where a hot dog sale, bake sale and loonie auction will begin at 1 p.m. on June 18.
That’s one of a string of events up and down the Island – spinathons in Victoria, a barn dance in the Comox Valley and cookie sales in Port McNeill among them — that have helped End2End chase its goal of raising $100,000 for IKCA. In addition, the contributions of sponsors and volunteers have kept the cost of staging the event to almost nothing.
“It seems the premise of ‘Islanders helping Islanders’ is actually very popular,” Dunstan said. “All our sponsors and supporters are local and the fact we are doing this to help families on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands is proving to be very appealing.”
People can learn more about – or donate to – the cause at End2Endcancer.com