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Rick Hansen's Anniversary Relay arrives in Abbotsford

The event retraces the Canadian portion of the original Man in Motion tour.
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Medal bearer Corrie Devries (left) chats with an event volunteer as she completes the second leg of the Rick Hansen 25th Anniversary Relay on Old Yale Road in Abbotsford on Monday afternoon.

The Rick Hansen 25th Anniversary Relay arrives in Abbotsford today (Monday), bringing some celebrities with it, and will continue through the city on Wednesday.

The tour has retraced the Canadian segment of Hansen's original Man in Motion tour, but this time the phrase is "many in motion," as 7,000 participants from across Canada have become medal bearers. They are walking, wheeling and biking their segments of the tour, and passing along the Rick Hansen Medal. Hansen is appearing at a number of stops along the way.

The anniversary relay is a 12,000 km, nine-month, 600-community tour. It began Aug. 24, 2011 at Cape Spear – the easternmost point in Canada.

The medal arrives from Chilliwack and winds through Abbotsford on Monday. It will leave from the Whatcom Road McDonald's Restaurant at 2:17 p.m., and travel through the city on Whatcom Road, Old Yale Road, down South Fraser Way, and ultimately on to Rick Hansen secondary.

BC Lions general manager Wally Buono is one of Monday's medal bearers, running along Blueridge Drive, up to Thornhill Drive, scheduled for 5:07 pm. The day's touring ends with a celebration at Rick Hansen secondary at about 5:30 p.m.

Tuesday the tour will stand down, but members of the relay team will do a presentation at the University of the Fraser Valley campus from 1 to 2:30 p.m.

Hansen was not scheduled to be in Abbotsford on Monday or Tuesday, but he is on Wednesday, when the relay resumes from his namesake school and then travels to Mission. The medal will drop onto the school field around the neck of a skydiver, and Hansen will wheel the medal out of the school for the first leg of its journey from there.

He will be accompanied by Shyna Kanda, a Grade 12 student who is known for her leadership and high academic achievements.

One of the medal bearers along Downes Road will be Vancouver Canucks icon Trevor Linden, at 11 a.m.

The tour winds up on Wednesday in Maple Ridge.



Neil Corbett

About the Author: Neil Corbett

I have been a journalist for more than 30 years, the past decade with the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows News.
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