USNA 1973 Ride-2-Remember

Day 0, 3 August: Astoria, OR

Greetings, everyone. We wanted to document the R-2-R in as many ways as possible.  This blog will hopefully provide a nice complement to the Facebook page in a somewhat more linear format.  I hope all of our team and crew will chime in with their thoughts and impressions over the next two months, so I’ll kick it off for today.

We’ve all assembled in Astoria to make this commemorative ride to honor our departed classmates.  The vision was Doug Leland’s and has been three years in the making, finally coming together as the five of us launch at 0600 tomorrow (well, Doug does, and the rest of us follow as soon as we can grab some breakfast).

I’ve been inspired by this concept as we have lost 6 classmates from First Company and have held two memorial services of our own to remember them. This ride symbolically gathers us all back to the academy after 50 years, and I’m honored to be a part of it.

We’ve bonded a bit the last few days, briefed every contingency we can think of and tried to set the tone for the ride. Doug set four priorities for the group that we all endorsed:

1.  Every day, make sure we do the tributes to our classmates.

2.  Safety!  We don’t need to take chances out there.

3.  Have fun, or it’s not worth it.

Last.  Number of miles pedaled – it is what it is, not likely anyone’s going to do every mile.

We had our final tune-up ride and ceremonial start today with a quick jaunt up to Navy Heights for pics at the intersections of Nimitz, Halsey, Spruance and McCain Roads.  Then down to the Columbia to dip our rear wheels in the Pacific (close enough). The front wheels will touch Santee Basin 2 months and a day from now.

We had our final brief for tomorrow. Weather looks good, we have police escort for the most challenging stretch, and we’re as ready as we’re going to be.  Farewell to the Pacific Coast sunsets of the last few days. Join us!

Bill Montgomery