For Darci Dougherty, it doesn’t matter if you’re a turtle, snake, or frog – if she sees you trying to cross the road, she’ll jump off her bike and give you a helping hand. And that’s exactly what happened at the 2019 Ride for Roswell.
Darci was riding the 65 mile route when she spotted something up ahead of her group of riders, right in their path. Once she realized it was a turtle and her group was quickly approaching it, she signaled her fellow riders that she was stopping to help the animal cross the road. As quickly and safely as she could, she unclipped from her bike, grabbed the turtle and moved him across the road in the direction he was heading.
“I’m sure he had very important turtle things to do,” Darci said. “I really didn’t want him to get crushed, but I also didn’t want any of the riders to go over their handlebars hitting him because they didn’t have time to go around or cause an accident with other riders swerving.”
Her teammates from Team Hollyloft are used to Darci stopping when there is wildlife in need of a bit of help and so they stopped with her. And when some Ride marshals saw what was happening, they jumped in to help, too, making it a real team effort.
“Once they realized what was going on, they made sure that all of the riders coming through stayed away from us,” she said. “Luckily, there wasn’t much vehicle traffic on the road at that time so we didn’t have to worry about that.”
In the spirit of the Ride, Darci, like all of our riders, is always ready to lend a helping hand.
“Anytime you can help someone or something that needs assistance is a good thing.”
2020 will be the fifth year Darci is riding, and she’s encouraging all her fellow riders to keep an eye out for turtles on the road, whether you’re walking, running, or driving consider giving them a hand across the road if you can do it safely. And don’t forget to wash your hands!
