This year has passed like 1 month and believe me I would never have thought that I would go this route again one day. And yet there are places where if you go once you go back all your life. A bit of training and a good pilgrimage bike made me decide to ride from New York. 122 miles or 200 km, 3 days, and we are there. Wake up at 3-4 am, breakfast together, cleaning, prayer, checking the bikes and we're on our way. A pilgrimage is not only about driving, checking your physical abilities, endurance related to the weather or the terrain. They are people who can make the effort and give their best in this comfortable world. In a world where consumption and satisfying one's own needs dominate, there are people who renounce comfort and go to do something for someone or for someone else. Because you are a pilgrim with intentions.


These are conversations with them about problems that, it turns out, we have the same, and they are not talked about at all. This is laughter, dancing, singing, guitar and drums, this is music that is waiting all year round. This is a group of volunteers who took time from their jobs to bring us water, our luggage, wait to pick us up from the road, repair broken gears or tires and bring us to our destination. These are people who do not look at whether the sky is pouring heat or rain, but do their job here and now, so that I can achieve my goal of reaching Our Lady of Częstochowa. Beloved, it was great to see you again and meet many of you. Brother Stanisław, one of the oldest pilgrims who kept my spirits up a year ago, this year pedaled so hard that it was hard to catch up with him, a group of young people from Stamford, 52 women and 66 men, single people and with families. There were 118 pilgrims in total !!! In addition, we add 5 priests, 1 nun, 5 male volunteers and 4 volunteers who looked after our safety.

Boguslaw Gaweda, thank you for creating the Bicycle Pilgrimage to the American Częstochowa: FAITHFUL IN FAITH ON A BIKE, for your initiative, for pushing you to your goal, for the fact that 6 years ago you went alone (because no one wanted to) to clear the trails and take, a year later, 40 pilgrims on this journey. Today, 5 years later, during a pandemic, the ban on meetings, communing in groups, basically closed churches and limited sacraments, you managed to organize it all, gather people for work, sponsors, volunteers, cars ... we even had a dog on the route that was guarding us .... and us willing to ride. Can you imagine what it will be like in 15 years? And finally, let all our intentions be heard, God bless us and take care of us until the next year, and now I am finishing, because I am going on a bicycle .... after all, after the pilgrimage, my hands ache instead of my legs. See you in a year!!!

Iwona Jaroszuk