Meals on PALM

All the meals on PALM are optional: you get to pick and choose the meals you want. PALM makes no money on the meals: what ever we collect, we pay to the people providing the meals. At times we've subsidized the meals. When I realized that the ride was filling up fast, I encouraged people, if money was tight, to at least register for PALM, that they have up to June 1 to add the meals (and bus rides for that matter). It looks like a lot of people took me up on that. The meal counts are down 40 to 50 from the meal counts last year for a similar number of people.

The meals are communal events. It's a time that all riders get together and that you get a chance to talk to other riders that you do not know in an informal setting, not as strangers. Some towns that we are staying at are small, eg Dowagiac, Sturgis, Hudson. There maybe only a couple of restaurants and few other food sources in town. If 200 or 300 additional people show up, they are going to be stressed. We warn restaurants at our site towns (and all along the route) that 700 people will be staying in their town (or will be riding past their place). I used to do this job. I would tell restaurants and groceries: think locusts. But sometimes the warnings are not enough. Consider buying the meals, at least some of them.

And if you are going to get the meals, please try to do it as early as you can. Don't wait until June 1. As part of registration, I'm in charge of the meal lists and counts. Things are always hectic at the beginning of June. Adding meals for 40 people , relaying the new meal counts to the site people, and mailing out new conformation letters would kill me.