Bloomsday Vulture strikes North Idaho

The signs at the bottom of Beauty Bay Hill read, "Evil lurks ahead" and, "Soon, we will pick your bones dry."

Coeur d'Fondo cyclists had no idea what lurked at the top of the hill until they began to hear the music.

It was the Bloomsday Vulture, making a special appearance in North Idaho and patiently waiting to "pick off" tired riders as they made their way up the steep grade.

"Don't let the Vulture get you," "Vulturette" Tom Aylward crowed to passersby from beneath a beak and feathered wig.

The athletes' seriousness and uphill focus was broken with laughter as they rounded the bend and saw crazy bird people dancing and shaking their tail feathers alongside the 10-foot-tall "Vulture."

"I love him. He makes me feel like I'm really working hard because when the vultures start circling, you know you're almost gone," cyclist Cindy Gordon of Ojai, Calif., said with a huge smile. "It makes you keep moving."

Surprise, encouragement and entertainment were goals well met for the Bloomsday Vulture and his "Vulturettes" Saturday morning during the fifth annual Coeur d'Fondo, an event put on by the North Idaho Centennial Trail Foundation in which cyclists choose one of five distances to ride around Lake Coeur d’Alene.

It was the Vulture's first North Idaho event in the 30 years Bill Robinson has climbed inside the costume and given hard-working athletes something to smile about when they're struggling up Bloomsday's Doomsday Hill.

"I'm always stoked, no doubt about it," Robinson said while putting on the different layers of the Vulture costume. "I have a lot of requests for the Vulture. I have to be careful or I’d never have a weekend with my family."

Aylward and his good friend, Connie Price, always like to do something fun, enthusiastic and inspiring for cyclists working up Beauty Bay's difficult and serpentine hill. Aylward said last year they dressed as Dr. Seuss' "Thing 1" and "Thing 2."

"Volunteering is just as rewarding as doing a race. You're cheering your friends on and making them feel good," Aylward said. "We like to surprise them and make their day fun."

Aylward said he and Robinson talked about bringing the Vulture to the Fondo about eight months ago, then finally solidified plans last month.

"I just wanted to do something special this year, and I thought, 'What can we do that's different?' So I looked the Vulture up online," Aylward said. "Bill responded right away and he said, 'If I'm in town, I'll do it.'"

The Vulture costume is made mostly of Styrofoam and foam rubber with ripstop Nylon and paper maché. Its wings span 16 feet, and many Bloomsday runners will smack one of the wings for good luck when they see Robinson lurching along Doomsday Hill.

Aylward said he thought it would be special to bring the Vulture to North Idaho, and it paid off — just about every cyclist laughed as they rounded the corner, many waved and hollered and some even jumped off their bikes to dance with the "Vulturettes" and take photos. Despite the uphill challenge, their spirits were raised and they now had a fun story to share with their friends and families.

"I thought the Vulture would be perfect for keeping people on," Aylward said.

Results: cdagranfondo.com