2nd Chance Trail Ride through the Summer

Help 2nd Chance Trail Ride & Fuel Up on September 19th at Lakeland Co-op, 6020 54th Avenue, Bonnyville.

The 2nd Chance Trail Ride has been taking the summer to increase awareness on organ and tissue transplants. The non-profit organization, which assists in the cost associated with living post-transplant surgery for patients and families, is also a major contributor in raising awareness of the transplant registry.

Faye Irvine, founding member of the 2nd Chance Trail Ride, says the group was busy in parades this summer, “we have done five parades, one of them in St. Albert.” Irvine says the group participated in the Rain Maker parade, which was a great opportunity for them to spread their message outside of the Lakeland, where they are very well-known. In the parades there are four to five members in a horse drawn wagon, along with four members riding horseback with the wagon. Other parades they participated in were the Elk Point Canada Day parade, St. Paul Rodeo parade, Dewberry and Clandonald.

“We took our wagon, with our big signs on it, down to a trail ride in Saskatchewan,” Irvine says although they advocate for transplant registry in Alberta, they are starting to spread the message to neighbouring provinces. “We did some networking and putting out the word.”

The Canada Transplant Association has a trout in Edmonton, which 2nd Chance participated in, “we went to that one and had some people sign up for my birthday card.” Irvine is working on completing a birthday with 150 signatures of successful transplant patients for Canada’s 150th birthday. She hopes to have the card completed by the end of the year. “We have about 300 years of life after transplant on the card. Some are pretty long times, like 20 years.” Irvine was able to go through the hospital and visit recent patients and add signatures to her card.

The group will be in Edmonton this week doing a conference with the Alberta Registry Offices, highlighting the importance of registry workers asking people to say yes to organ and tissue donation when renewing or receiving their licences. The group will also speak at the Elk Point Auxiliary’s annual general meeting and at the Knights of Columbus meeting in St. Lina.

People have been very supportive of the 2nd Chance Trail Ride, says Irvine, “we had a kidney transplant patient who had a birthday coming up and instead of presents, she asked people to donate money to us.” The money raised goes partly to spreading the message and partly towards maintain the Good Hearts Foundation apartments in Edmonton. The organization has two apartments for transplant patients and families to stay when going through the process.

Another upcoming fundraiser is the Fuel Good Day at the Co-op. The Lakeland Co-op Gas Bar, 6020 54th Avenue Bonnyville. “People do not have to donate money, it’s coming from the Co-op themselves. They are donating ten cents per litre of fuel sold that day.” The event is September 19th, says Irvine, “I would like to encourage everybody to fuel up their tanks, their jerry cans and anything else they have to fuel up!”

For more information on the 2nd Chance Trail Ride visit and follow them on Facebook @2ndchancetrailride.