Charleston: Piggly Wiggly and Beyond

We started off the day at Piggly Wiggly. The Charleston County Police Department was nice enough to escort us from there to the Outback for our fundraiser. Their help was awesome - kinda made me wish we had some officers along with us for the other 4,997 miles :)

We were worried when it started pouring rain during the lunch hour, but at 11:30 people started arriving. Folks joined us from all over Charleston - local banks, Happy Days (a local childhood cancer support group), MUSC, 95 SX Radio Station, Prudential, Allstate, and people from other companies. Everyone came out to support Cooper and his family. We raised just over $2,000 at the lunch alone. The staff at Outback even donated their tips.



After Outback, we visited the children's hospital where we were able to give out goodie bags in the play room and talk to several families. Our last stop was a Dumas were Vineyard Vines is going to hold a raffle for us. The guys there fed us some awesome barbecue, and David Dumas, the owner chipped in another $1,000 in honor of Cooper.

Thanks goes to Lizzabee and Chuck Ciesar for hosting us for the past three nights. They fed us and let us use their house as a staging ground for all of our Charleston efforts, and they have armed us with confidence to attack the next city. Lizzabee's sister, Jeni, also helped out by getting us the police escort and hooking us up with Chris Willis at Black Dog Bike Shop.

Chris repaired my bike after the big spill - had to get a wheel shipped in from Miami, and he didn't even charge for shipping. So my bike's back in business, our bruises are healed, and we are headed to Greenville!! Thanks again, Charleston.

~ Austin