Podunk Below the Masthead (Wednesday, May 26, 2010)

A successful end to a fund-raising cyclist's adventures, the Port puts some money towards community groups and
the SPCA seeks assistance from the public on abandoned pets, some of the items of interest in the Wednesday news cycle.

Daily News, front page, headline story
EMERGENCY NURSE CYCLIST COMPLETES HER JOURNEY FROM RED DEER-- An emergency room nurse at Prince Rupert Regional Hospital has completed her fundraising ride from Red Deer back to Prince Rupert. By the time the journey had come to an end  on May 18th Nurse Rae had raised 8,000 dollars towards the purchase of new HD cameras for the hospital.

The Provincial government has put in motion funding to a toal of 5.3 million dollars in upgrades to the Nisga'a Highway improving access to the Nass Valley from Terrace. Work begins this month and will wrap up by August of this year.

North Coast MLA Gary Coons has weighed in on the debate over classroom cameras, suggesting that there would be few benefits to having the close circuit cameras in place in School District classrooms. Coons outlined his main concern on the issue of that of overuse and potential abuse.

The sports section featured a photo of yet another award  for former Rupertite Lisa Walters, the former professional golfer was back in town for Homecoming 2010 and received the City of Prince Rupert Achievement Award on Tuesday. The section also features an update on the plans for the Seafest Men's soccer tournament , set for the Port Edward Soccer fields on Seafest weekend in June.

(Daily News Archive Items for May 26, 2010)

Emergency Nurse cyclist completes her journey
Upgrades to Nisga'a Highway
Naikun recalculating but hopeful
MLA says no cameras in the classroom
Friendship House going for a greenhouse  

The Northern View
Prince Rupert Port Authority provides more than $55,000 to community groups-- The Port Authority spread some goodwill around town recently as they distributed more than 55,000 dollars of donations to a number of local groups and organizations (see article here)

CFTK TV 7 News 
SPCA asking for public's participation -- The SPCA in town strives to reduce the number of abandoned pets in the city with a plea to the public. (see article here) Sahar Nassimdoost provided this report for TV 7)

CFTK TV 7 News 
Deadline to comment on NTL looming -- The opportunity to comment on the planned Northern Transmission Line is fast approaching, as local residents with concerns or questions have until June 10th to make their views known (see article here)

CFTK TV 7 News 
NH puts cancellation of program on hold -- Northern Health reverses itself on the issue of the Medical Stay program, keeping the program intact on a month to month basis pending further discussion (see article here) (Sahar Nassimdoost provided this report on TV 7)

CFTK TV 7 News
Poll Released Showing Opposition to West Coast Oil Tankers -- Details of a recent poll that suggest that 80 percent of British Columbians surveyed want a ban on oil tankers on the west coast (see article here)

CBC News Norther BC, Daybreak North
Daybreak North is only posting selected items on their website now.

The most recently posted items can be found on the archive page for Daybreak North click here

Daily News, front page, headline story
Emergency nurse cyclist completes her journey from Red Deer 
By Monica Lamb-Yorski 
Staff Writer 
Prince Rupert Daily News
Wednesday, May 26, 2010

 A long ride and an impressive $8000 later, Nurse Rae is back home.

After pedalling 1,964 km on her bicycle from Red Deer to Prince Rupert, and raising almost $8,000 toward the purchase of new HD cameras for Prince Rupert Regional Hospital, Emergency Nurse Rae is back at work.

On May 21 hospital staff celebrated her return with a 
barbecue.

Nurse Rae arrived home May 18, earlier than expected. That’s a surprise in itself, because originally she thought it was a 1,500 km journey and it turned out to be 464 km longer.

Her expediency was due to being able to ride on average over 100 km a day.

“It worked out better than I expected. My longest day was a hundred and thirty five kilometres,” she recalled.

Her steady progress even allowed for a couple of relax days.In Prince George she dined at Denny’s and slept in a hotel.

The weather was terrible at the beginning of her trip. There was snow, sleet, hail and thunderstorms to contend with between Red Deer and Jasper. Photographs of her trip show her bike parked in the snow at several locations. 

“They had a hot tub at a hostel, but when I looked at it and the snow, I decided to go to bed instead,” she explained.

Between McBride and Prince George she saw a bear up close and personal. It was skinny and small and nosing around.

“I got in after one of my longest days and set up my tent in this little lay-bar and we frightened each other quite badly. Then a trucker came in and parked his rig and he didn’t even see me.

“After that the bear was gone and, because the trucker left his rig running all night, I got a good night sleep,” Nurse Rae said.

It is a peculiar thing that the bear appeared at that particular juncture of the ride. A long poster, created ahead of time by one of her co-workers to plot her progress, included a bear painted on it near to the spot where she actually saw the bear.

 “It couldn’t have been any closer,” she said, shaking her head.

 After Prince George the weather made the trip a “walk in the park”, she commented. “I met so many interesting people. Some that have already cycled between Istanbul and Beijing, Iceland and New Zealand.”

Congratulating her at the barbecue, Orthopaedic Surgeon Alf Smith asked if it was a difficult journey. “You had a lot of big hills to climb,” he said.

“Sometimes I didn’t know what to do,” she told him. “When I was going through the Ice Fields in Jasper I got off the bike and walked because I was going so slow. And at that point I needed to stretch and sometimes my feet were so cold I had to walk to warm them up.” Overall, Rae summed it up as a great experience and, besides accomplishing the fundraising and the personal challenge, she also spent time thinking her own life.

“I spent a lot of time pouring over things,” she said. Still impressed with the generosity of people in Prince Rupert that contributed to the fundraising, Nurse Rae is overwhelmed by what she described as the ‘grass roots nature’ of the project.

“Even people that didn’t have [much] money contributed. It was amazing,” she added.