13th Shrewsbury Toy Run

Two days before the 13th annual Shrewsbury toy run: it was Friday the 13th. Bad omen or what! Judging by the weather early on Sunday, It was p***ing down I fell of the fence and landed in Bad omen's garden. I thought numbers will be down and as the bike is off the road I went in the Volvo. (O.K I've made the sign of the cross three times and will sand the ends of my fingers for typing the V word. But it was cheep to buy & run as it runs on LPG. So there!)

By the time I got to the square in Shrewsbury The rain had stopped, apart from the little cloud over Mr. pessimist here, and the square was already about half full of bikes and bikers.

The Roadhouse Blues Band brought music to our ears. Other entertainment was to be had watching a fella in a bear suite, from the local radio station, threading his way around the square trying not to knock over any bikes while handing out plastic flags.

A photographer from the star was also there snapping away.

Apart from the organizing club, other clubs present were the Oddballs and the Bug Splatz from Telford, The Off Your Butts from Cannock and the Shropshire Gold wing owners club.

This year the diversity of bikes was greater than ever

The run left the square to wind its way through the streets of Shrewsbury out to Monkmoor and the back through the town again and up to the hospital.

A few of the people on the run voiced the opinion that maybe it might be best for the organizers to revise the route and not go through the town twice. As holding up the traffic and shoppers twice could cause tempers to become inflammed. Once through the town would hopefully satisfy all and cause the minimum of disruption.

I counted 144 bikes and trikes as they entered the hospital car park.

After having a mince pie and a drink at the hospital I went back down the Copthorn road to the Beacon for a drink and the raffle. It surprised me that so few came to the pub, most must have opted to get home before the rain started again. My luck in raffles held true to form and I won Zip. The old lady, who lived opposite the pub and had stopped the run as it came past to donate her gifts to the kids: Won twice as did a couple of others.