Barbara "BaaBaaRa" rides again: 2023 Cycling for Sight!

Hello!  It's CFS time again, and I am doing my best to train for this year's ride.  This is my 11th year riding with the club, and it's hard to explain what this club means to me, because it's such a big part of my identity, but let me try. . .

I was introduced to the Blind Stokers Club at a fundraiser in the fall of 2011.  My neighbor's son David, aka "Kutter" had lost his vision and his mom had converted her garage into a separate apartment for him.  He was a speaker at this fundraiser, and talked passionately about what it meant to him to just be able to get on a bicycle and get a great workout, and by the end of his talk I had realized that this was a club I very much wanted to join.  

The BSC is wonderful at getting blind and visually-impaired athletes out on tandem bicycles, where all of us, sighted or not, get on our bicycles and share the great outdoors and the friendships that spring up when people share fun but challenging activities.  Our club keeps expanding its range; this year we camped and cycled in Borrego Springs.  Last winter we explored Death Valley.  Our club now includes training in hiking with trekking poles, with the sighted hikers carrying bells to help the blind athletes to stay oriented. 

The money that we raise goes primarily to the San Diego Center for the Blind, which provides training for people who lose their vision as adults.  It's such a great organization that my visually-impaired friend Joni volunteers there twice a week. She was there as a student, when her vision started to fail, and she feels that it made such a difference in her quality of life that she wants to help the current group of students.  The SDBC is small, and our CFS ride is their biggest annual fundraiser.  Your donations really make a difference.  A portion of the money also goes to the BSC.