Alyssa Jo: Death by Moonlight!

Last year my good friend Hollie M rode in a bike ride on antelope island called the Moonlight Ride. BreeAnn and I went to see her come in and she seemed to be in pretty good spirits when it was over. She even came over and hung out for awhile after even though it was really late at night! So, this little idea popped into my head that maybe I could handle this bike ride. I mean, it seemed like it would be a pretty fun experience. So, I started mentally preparing myself to join Hollie in the Moonlight Ride 2010 right there and then! Let me repeat, I began MENTALLY preparing myself. I didn't actually start practicing on a bike until a few weeks before the ride. Hollie is my friend so therefore I trust her but I am not sure why anymore because she flat out LIED to me about this ride! I swear she told me multiple times that there was ONE hill I needed to be worried about. I stressed and stressed about this ONE hill! This ONE hill pretty much consumed my thoughts for months. I finally just told myself I would do the best I could and if I had to walk my bike up part of this ONE hill, then so be it. So, when my mom and I started the ride and my legs instantly had a hard time pushing against the force that was what seemed to be a hill, I thought to myself, "Perfect! We can get the hill out of our way right at the beginning and the rest of the ride will be a breeze." I asked my mom (who had done the ride a few weeks earlier and had also lied to me about the ONE hill thing) if this was the hill her and Hollie had referred to. She laughed! She had the nerve to laugh! She informed that this was indeed not the hill that had haunted me for months. I knew I was in trouble. I pretty much thought at that point that there was no way I was going to finish the ride. But I am proud to say that I did finish it! Yea! And I didn't even have to walk my bike at all. Say what? But that doesn't mean that I didn't have to stop about every five seconds but still! My mom said she had never coasted so much on a ride. Ha! Sorry mom! But seriously, I really appreciate her doing the ride with slow poke me. My goal for next year (I am actually shocked I am thinking about doing this ride of death again.) is to not have to stop at all!

The ride was on June 25th at 10:00 at night so the plan was to leave my dad's birthday party around 9:00 and meet Hollie and company there right before the ride started. Things didn't quite go according to plan! Maybe I wasn't supposed to do the ride because pretty much everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong. My mom couldn't find our tickets, my headlight wouldn't work, both bikes needed air in the tires, and by the time we got to antelope island, there was a HUGE line of late comers like us. So, unfortunately Hollie and her dad had to start the ride without us. I was pretty sad about that because I though maybe Hollie and I would be closer to the same riding skill. My mom is way better than me so I feel bad that she had to go so slow with me! We didn't start the ride until after 11:00 so there were people already on their way back (show offs), so I made it my goal to make sure Hollie was not a part of any of those groups so we could ride the way back together. They didn't find me yelling, "Hollie Joy Marshall, are you there? Are you a part of this group?" in a loud horrible english accent as funny as I found it...When my mom and I got to the ranch where they serve snacks and water, I thought there was no way I was going to be able to find Hollie. There were like a billion bikers! But right as I started walking down the hill, a Glee shirt caught my eye...it was her! I had found Hollie! I pretty much consider this a miracel considering the swarms of bikers. So her dad, aunt, and cousin headed back and Hollie waited at the ranch with my mom and me to ride back with us! The ride back was pure HELL. The wind was blowing like crazy and I am pretty sure I ate lots of bugs. But it made it a lot easier to have Hollie next to me! We tried to laugh at our misery. My mom would ride ahead of us and wait for us slow pokes so it was also good for her that she could go at her own pace. All in all, it was a really fun night and I am glad I did it! I just definitely want to be in better shape next year. Apparently it is not as hard of a ride as I am making it out to be because there were little children doing it! I consider that child abuse but whatev.