The 2015 Grand Tour to Benefit Leader Dogs

[codeblack]

The 2015 Grand Tour to Benefit Leader Dogs for the Blind is coming up August 6-8! This 350-miles-in-3-days endurance ride raises money for the privately-funded organizaion. Join us! Ride, become part of our Land Support Crew or make a donation to Leader Dogs. Karen Kinsella (Wavegirlie), Mark Luxnat (Lugnut), Jim Lueck and Michael LaBelle all have GoFundMe pages--so with just a few clicks, you can support these riders! Go to www.gofundme.com, and type the person's name in the search bar. Or, you can donate to the Grand Tour itself or any other rider, at www.grandtour.org. See us on Facebook in the Grand Tour group.

Read all about it in the Watercraft Journal:
http://watercraftjournal.com/now-is-...for-the-blind/

and watch the movie!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qzm1pJfaQPo

[wavegirlie]

THANK YOU Sea-Doo.net!!!!!

[wavegirlie]

Hi, this is the link to my GoFundMe page, THANKS everyone for your support!
http://www.gofundme.com/y23kb9s4

[GP@PPG]

There are fewer things more satisfying than helping this cause out!! Seems like everyone is fighting for Cancer, and rightly so!! But please don't forget we have many other maladies befalling we humans all the time! Please help if you can!!

How did it go? I know you had some good weather for it. Let us know!

[wavegirlie]

Grand Tour was fantastic again this year. We started Thursday in Mackinaw City with a beautiful sunrise and some flat water, heading under the Mighty Mac and starting the year off with our traditional wet handprints on the bridge pier. The morning flew by, again with traditional donut stop in Cross Village. Lunch in Charlevoix included 6 Leader Dog puppy raisers, complete with adorable puppies, learning about the world and taking cues from their 'moms and dads'. The afternoon ride was more challenging, with some decent chop just to bounce us around a little. Sunrise on day 2, heading out of Traverse City was again, awesome, but red.... the lake was much bigger. Grand Traverse bay was biting back. As we found out at Northport. After a brief check in with land support there, we headed out in to the bay again, and into some very challenging chop. One rider got bounced too hard, fell off his ski, and in the process, caught his ankle in the footwell. This all before 9am. (final diagnosis after ER: dislocated/broken ankle). We got going again, about an hour off schedule. Re-fuel at Leland, then off to Frankfort for more fuel and lunch. Skies looking very gray at this point, check of the weather showed rain/storms coming in. So we headed out into water that got bigger in the hour we took for lunch. Pushing hard in the rain, we rounded a point and got into some smooth water, only to round another point and head into more choppy water--2-4 foot waves. Launching off those every 2-3 seconds, and then landing(lots of torpedoes...)...for about 70 miles. Everyone tired and sore at the end of day 2. Saturday leaving Ludington started exactly as day 2 finished, rainy and big water, even bigger than Friday. Wind had picked up, and the Lake was tough. I was riding as best I could, trying to keep up with the front-line riders, and I kept falling back about 30 seconds to 1 minute(those minutes add up and can really screw up our timing), just didn't have enough tough in me to keep up, and was afraid I would continue to fall farther behind. At our final fuel stop, in White Lake, I made an incredibly difficult decision. Unwilling to risk holding another rider back in those conditions, (we never do anything alone, so I knew at least 2 people would stay behind with me, no matter how far back I fell from the main group), I elected to pull out of the ride with about 50 miles left. The good news, I got some great pics of everyone beaching at Holland! and the most important part--$12,500 raised for Leader Dogs, putting our group total over 18 years to $310,000!

WOW! Thanks for being the event reporter!
Congrats to a group who has made a huge contribution to this effort. You have all made a difference in the lives of so many.

[wavegirlie]

sorry I was so long winded. Basically copied from a facebook post... I'll edit next time before I post.