A Nelson woman is sending a heartfelt thanks to two good Samaritans who came to her aid after she took a nasty fall from her bike on the Okanagan Rail Trail.
Willa Horsfall was out for a bike ride on the Rail Trail from Wood Lake to Vernon on Aug. 22. When she was four kilometres from Vernon, she fell from her bike into the ditch of the trail and severely lacerated both her legs on sharp rocks.
Horsfall was without a first aid kit, but a few minutes after her fall, the first good Samaritan came along the trail who just so happened to be a former paramedic.
“He asked if we needed help and we asked if he had a first aid kit,” Horsfall said. “He came over and bandaged my legs … He was with a couple friends as well and they just stopped their whole ride and took care of me.”
While her legs were now bandaged up, Horsfall still had the problem of getting into town. That’s when the second good Samaritan came to the rescue. She described a hydro truck watering plants along the trail near the site of her crash, and the driver graciously turned around and offered her a ride into Vernon, where she received “amazing” care at Vernon Jubilee Hospital.
Horsfall said the ex-paramedic went by the name of Eli Silver, and while she didn’t get the name of the hydro truck driver, she knows he works for Lake Country’s McFarlane Contracting Ltd.
Now back home in Nelson with her legs stitched up, Horsfall wants to thank the people who went out of their way to help her in her time of need.
“Just a big thank you to both of them … to know that the Rail Trail has people like that on it is just amazing,” she said. “I couldn’t have made it without you.”
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