Email

Print

It is a ride for charity and the proceeds this year will be donated to the Belize Hospice Palliative Care Foundation and the Belize Red Cross Social Assistance Program. We found out about the reason behind the ride:

Richard Flowers - Chief Executive Officer, SSB
"Today is the 10th Anniversary of the Ride Accross Belize program, basically it's an SSB initiative. Our goal is to try to raise funds and fight different causes, a worthy cause that can benefit from the funds and this year we have two - The Belize Hospice Palliative Care Foundation and the Red Cross Assistance program. What we do is we have a staff/committee that meets and bring up various proposals but we found this year that the need was really there for them especially the soup kitchen for the Red Cross Association and their Assistance Program - they are actually running out of funds so we think this is a critical time and they provide a needed service. The Ride started in Corozal then to Belize City then San Ignacio and then to Dangriga and this year we went all the way to Punta Gorda. Last year we stopped in Placencia but this year we're going the entire way so it's a lot of effort."

Denys Barrow - Rider
"Well it was a pleasant experience and congratulations to Chandra Nisbet in particular and the Social Security people for organizing again a lovely ride. It was excellent, well conducted and we had one mishap and I hope the lady does quite well shortly, we had a mishap just before coming out of Corozal before reaching the turn off from Libertad, a dog came out and caused Karen to fall but we're told she's not in a bad way - so that's good. Again it was a lovely ride and good company. This is my 5th year - every year I've been doing the four staged, I think last year I missed one because of Court. The important this is to prepare, getting your training ride, long hard rides - four, five and up to 6 hours on the weekend and once you have your base then you're set."

Chris Berry - Rider
"The first stage was not bad. God has been great with us because we've had wonderful weather this morning, we started out at 6am from Corozal and we made a 15 minutes stop in Orange Walk at the SSB Branch and the other stop we did was at Crooked Tree cutoff and after that it was all the way to Belize City. It was a wonderful ride so far and we're looking forward to the other three stages."

Daniel Ortiz
"Why do you participate in it?"

Chris Berry
"Why? First of all, I'm a cyclist and I have been riding for 25 years and secondly I am a volunteer with the Belize Red Cross and a part of the proceeds will be going to the Red Cross so it's definitely a privilege again to be a part of it as well."

The ride sets off for Cayo from in front of Social Security's Office in Belize City tomorrow at 6 am.