Remembrance Randonnee (G, new route)

125km/5000ft RUSA Populaire

In the Commonwealth nations, November 11 is also called Remembrance Day. On this Tuesday, we will organize a variant of Veterans Velo that will have dirt sections to navigate through.

Because Stowe Trail cuts through MCAS Miramar, you will need to obtain a DBIDS pass unless you have a common access card (CAC). Here’s the link to download the application. After completing it, you will need to visit the MCAS Miramar Visitor and Registration Center (VRC) located by the east entrance off of Miramar Way. Be advised that your application will be processed but at a very slow pace. I won’t be checking your valid base pass. If during the ride you are stopped by a patrol and do not have a pass, I will deny ever knowing you as the Marines decide how to adjudicate your trespass. FYI, the base does have a brig on site.

Please read our accepted proof of passage.

For an alternate view on the Great War, below is the poem written by Wilfred Owen.

Dulce et Decorum Est
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.