The Ricky Craven Ride for Charity has now come and gone. The temperature was considerably warmer than the week before when we had the B-52 Ride. About 500+ people showed up for the event and close to that many sleds. They raised over $253,000.00 for the charities, bringing the seven year total to $820,110. They gave $48,500.00 to each of their 5 major charities, The Marrow Foundation, Make-A-Wish Foundation of Maine and New Hampshire, Childrens Miracle Network, The Travis Roy Foundation and Give Kids The World. They also gave $10,000.00 to the Greenville Schools and $1,000.00 to The Moosehead Riders Snowmobile Club. Then, after all that, Ricky comes up $5:00 short on his club dues. He asks Wayne Shaw to cover him 'till he sees him again.... But seriously, that's an overwhelming figure and something for all the participants and donors to be very proud of.
Our involvement as a club was stricktly as volunteers to set up the trail. Members of the club put their heads together to map out a trail that could handle 500 sleds under, to say the least, not prime snow conditions. This year the trail was laid out basically to the southwest of Greenville. The snow in that area was a little better than on the east side of the lake where the ride has been in the past. I personally rode back in after all the sleds had gone by, and it was remarkable how well the trails held up with all that traffic.
The ride, which would cover 55 miles, started out with a run accross the lake over to the west cove, then up Wiggins Stream and under the bridge. The clearence was low so signs were placed to tell all the riders to "DUCK"
(the yellow sign),
and the white sign said
"LOW CLEARENCE". These were placed on both sides as the beginning and the end of the ride went under this low bridge.
No, this is not The Greenville Chain Saw Massacure, it's just Wayne Shaw with his chain saw getting ready to cut some slots in the ice to put in a sign. When you think about it, quite an ingenious way to set sign poles in the ice. A trail of arrows on posts were set accross the ice to guide anyone whom might have got separated and would have to come in on their own. To help keep this from happening each group, consisting of about 60 sleds, had three guides from The Moosehead Riders. We placed one in front, one in the middle and one to bring up the rear. This worked very well and no one got separated from their group. Some riders did fall back within their group, but the guide riders stayed with them. Congratulations to all the Moosehead Riders for a job well done.