Theatre Bay Area Walks to Eradicate AIDS

This past Sunday, many of the Theatre Bay Area staff participated in the 2009 San Francisco AIDS Walk through Golden Gate Park. As a team (there we are, at left!), we raised over $1,000 for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. It was a great experience for all of us, and we got a tremendous amount of support from friends, family and colleagues.

The walk itself is about 6 miles through Golden Gate Park with 25,000 other walkers from far and wide. The day was gorgeous in a way that San Francisco summer days rarely are--there was almost no fog, and the sun warmed everything to just the right temperature that we could walk in short sleeves. Monday morning (the morning after), commuting from sunny Petaluma, my bus plummeted into a big old layer of fog--much more traditional summer weather for the city. I’m glad we got the sun instead.

The organizers led a pre-walk stretching session and made sure we all were hydrated throughout the run. They had an inordinate number of high school-aged volunteers shouting encouragement through bullhorns all along the route, and they had set up bands to play at regular intervals along the route to encourage us along, and provided water, ice cream (my favorite part) and other snacks to keep us energized.

The walk attracted an extraordinarily diverse group of people. There were church groups and scientists, tons of little tiny dogs, ladies in their 70s and little kids on Razors all taking the route. It was a great feeling to be giving to such an important cause, and we’ve already got plans to take part again next year.

More photos:

Brad Erickson, Theatre Bay Area's executive director.

The walkers stretched for as far as we could see - 25,000 total!

Deputy director Cara Chrisman with a little friend.

The team on the move.