Cape Town – Motorcycling means different things to different people. For some, it’s all about track days – zooming round a race circuit for the sheer joy of rider and machine in perfect sync.
For others, it’s the road less travelled, finding those isolated corners of our country (and there are plenty of them) left behind by the march of time. But for most it’s about being part of an extended family, wearing the badge and riding together (usually no further than the next pub) to satisfy what author Robert Heinlein so aptly described as the need to belong.
But there is one thing they all have in common. Once a year they gather in enormous numbers, decorate their machines with colourful symbols of childhood and ride in slow, noisy processions through towns and cities across the land to remind us that the children are indeed our future and in too many cases we are not treating that future very well.
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The annual Toy Run is held on the last Sunday of November each year in dozens of locations throughout South Africa and Namibia. Attracting an estimated 65 000 riders, it is by far the largest motorcycling event in Africa and is thought to be the largest one-day biker gathering in the world.
In its essentials it is an outreach from the country’s loudest minority to its most silent, collecting toys of all types (except toy guns and knives – that decision was made a long time ago) for distribution to children in homes, shelters and grassroots child-care centres who would never otherwise know the meaning of Christmas.
This is not to decry the efforts of the NGO’s and welfare organisations who look after the thousands of South African children whose parent can’t or won’t give them the homes they need. These entities do heroic work under often heart-rending circumstances – but there is simply no budget for ‘non-essentials’ such as Christmas gifts.
MULTIPLE PROCESSIONS
Which is where the Toy Run, now in its 33rd year, comes in. Even though the hundreds of thousands of toys donated each year are never enough, each represents a smile on the face of a child who would other wise have nothing to smile about on the day that we celebrate the birth of the man who said: “Suffer little children to come unto me.”
The 2015 Toy Run will be held on Sunday 29 November in at least 24 venues around South Africa – from the mammoth multiple processions in Gauteng and Cape Town to gatherings of no more than a few hundred in small towns from Polokwane to Plettenberg Bay.
The Gauteng Toy Run – long since too big for a single start point – will start from four different locations – Irene Village Mall in the north, The Blockhouse 1-Stop in the south, Carnival City Casino on the East Rand, and Silverstar Casino in the west – all leaving at 9am sharp. The last-named, says convenor Pete Beart, is a fairly long ride, so don’t forget to fill up.
The end venue for all four will be at Benoni Northerns Sports Grounds, on the corner of O’Reilly Merry and Brodigan streets. There will be a gift shop for last minute Toy Runners at the entrance; this year the organisers have issued a special plea for educational toys and sports equipment, as well as toiletry items for older kids, particularly girls.
There will be more than 100 stalls selling food, accessories, bikewear, regalia and jewellery, a beer garden and a sound stage with non-stop entertainment - MC’ed by the inimitable Paul Rotheram - including two live bands.
For more information contact convenor Pete Beart on 083 229 6621 or chairman Graeme Cartwright on 083 463 2761.
CAPE TOWN
The Cape Town Toy Run has two start points again for 2015, a new southern venue in the Pick n Pay car park at Tokai on Main and the familiar northern start at Grand West Casino on Vanguard Drive. In each case the mass ride will start at 10.30am, to the end venue at the William Herbert Sports Ground in Rosmead Avenue, Wynberg.
Entrance fee to the venue is, of course, at least one toy. There will be a special entrance where riders and public who arrive without toys can buy a toy or make a cash donation in lieu.
At the venue there will be plenty of shade, food and drink on sale, stalls by the dozen selling everything biker-related from motorcycles to metal badges, accessories to bling up your bike, bikewear and jewellery to bling up your pillion, three live bands, stand-up laughs with Kurt Schoonraad and friends from the Cape Town Comedy Club, and a Concours d’Elegance competion featuring some of the Cape’s most superb customised and classic machines.
As at every Toy Run, you don’t have to be a biker to be there – just bring toys. For more information, contact convenor Rodney Ford on 021 703 8121 or PR officer Mike Clark on 083 227 2676.
To find out more about a Toy Run in your area visit the national Toy Run website or just ask the nearest biker.
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