Hopkins 4K for Cancer

June 8, 2007

by Katherine Sommers
After a relaxing day off, we hit the road again, this time to Kankakee, IL. Today a bag of Jolly Ranchers decided our groups and it was really fun to ride with some new people. Leaving the city was pretty crazy, it was windy and there was traffic. Shortly after we got out of the city we had a water stop in a local park. Apparently, this is the year for cicadas because we saw and heard them EVERYWHERE. Some of us were freaked out by all of them, but one of us enjoyed them…as a snack! Eric ate a live peanut butter dipped cicada for $12! I guess the going rate for cicada eating has gone down because during spring of my sophomore year a man in the stands at my lacrosse state championship game was offering kids $100 to eat a cicada. Thankfully, we had clear skies and flat land for most of the day. My group had a little flat trouble, but our misfortune turned into a nice delay. We met some locals and Jann Morlan at the Health Nutz store generously donated energy bars and
water to us and Arry Marinakos from Fresh Point Market donated two cases of Powerade. The day ended on a great note thanks to the donation of ice cream cones from a local Dairy Queen! We had a delicious potluck dinner at the First Presbyterian and got to talk with several members of the community. We were really inspired by some of our dinner guests who had been able to beat cancer. A few of them beat cancer twice and one special lady shared with us that she was 92 years old and a 14 year survivor of cancer. Then we got a tour of the sanctuary and its gorgeous stained glass windows as well as a private concert from professor of music who ate dinner with us. Tonight we stayed at the local YMCA and got to take hot showers and sleep in an air conditioned room in preparation for our first of three centuries in a row!