We walked over to the staging area of the Tour Down Under today. It's across the street from the Hilton where Lance and his family and team are staying. We missed Lance by 45 min! Lots of Lance followers are here. I'm proudly wearing my yellow Livestrong bracelet and so are many others. It's very noticeable when walking around the city that heaps of folks love Lance and are proud to support his efforts to fund cancer studies by buying and wearing a yellow bracelet.
Yesterday Lance twittered to his fans to come and ride with him this morning at 9a.m. He egged them on by twittering that he wanted to beat the record of his Twitter ride in Dublin where several thousand showed up last year. Thousands turned up today for the opportunity. The total # will be in the papers tomorrow, but people here were saying between 5,000 to 10,000! We would have rented bikes and joined in if we had known ahead of time, but we're not Twitterers. The race festivities start tomorrow afternoon with a Cancer Hospital Charity ride. On Tues., the real race begins! If you have the Versus channel on TV, you should be able to watch the race and see Adelaide and the surrounding region.
These car pictures topped with a kangaroo and cyclists follow the riders and represent various stages of the races. The Kangaroo car always is at the beginning of the race.
We have mixed feelings about missing the Tour Down Under, but we are very excited to be going on the Ghan train to Darwin tomorrow morning. We leave at noon, spend 3 days and 2 nights on the train with stops at Alice Springs for 6 hrs. and a stop at Katherine for about 4 hrs. We'll spend 2 nights in Darwin before flying back to Melbourne. Don't know what the internet situation will be like anywhere, so it may be awhile before the blog gets going again.
Cheers,
Mary and Bob
How funny, Mar - at first I thought one of these behinds was Lance's. Bob will be watching the race on TV, and I'll be viewing the scenery!
ReplyDeleteHi Guys - Love it all - wish I was with you !
ReplyDeleteEspecially the Kangaroo on the Tour Down Under. Less appreciated the McDo in Adelaide but they are already on so many corners, how could the Aussies hope to resist. Adelaide looks as though it would be a city I would truly love with all the stone architecture and charm. Darwin, however, sounds even more exciting ! Wish that Bev had a computer so that she could follow your blog... Attended an Extraordinary concert of Mongolian musicians and dancers last nite - made me want to accelerate plans for a visit. The concert was opened by the new Mongolian Ambassador to Paris (he had just 1 hour earlier presented his credentials to the President of France). He (the Mongolian Ambassador) was ever so charasmatic ! Have to schedule trip this year or next !
Me
Me
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ReplyDeleteHi Mary,
ReplyDeleteHad sushi last night and thought of you! Looks like all is better than well! Hugs and love to you and Bob.
Ariane
P.S. Read a book that was equal to 1,000 White Woman it's called The Help it's posted on my blog, excellent, read it if you have the time :)
Go Lance...catch the "roo"! We love reading about all your adventures. I leave for Vietnam in 2 weeks. Starting to get organized!
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