Arthritis Walk 2013

For 30 years I stubbornly resisted the Arthritis Walk. With the sore feet that commonly accompany Rheumatoid Arthritis it seemed to be counter intuitive.

This year, since I'm a member of  Patient Partners In Arthritis I joined their team and embarked on fundraising. Even with a very slow start I got some contributions that were encouraging and raised over $1400, for which I thank all of my friends and relatives.

The day was beautiful - sunny and warm.  We gathered at the Evergreen Brick Works in the Don Valley on Sunday morning. It was a place in Toronto I had not seen before but always meant to.

Here's our team, ready to go. We made it to the Top Five in team fundraising in Toronto.

Before we started to walk there was a warm up led by enthusiastic dancers.

The walk went very smoothly. I did the one kilometer walk instead of 5K as most of my team mates did. Near the end there was a live brass band to give us a fun break and to cheer us on!

These are some of the walkers near the beginning of the route. At the tent on the right there was a Keep Moving dance contest.

All in all it was a very nice way to spend a morning - with friends and for a good cause. Here are some more of the sights along the way.

And a well-deserved reward at the end of the walk.

Thanks to Donald for many of the pictures.