Well we did it! At 8am on Saturday 6th May, 8 lovely ladies and 2 gorgeous male supporters hit the mountain trail.For 100metres, all seemed easy! We were being lulled into a false sense of security! One of our party sadly had to drop out early as she had twisted her ankle the day before and it became apparent that it would not hold out. Our boys took her down and back to the hotel. Onwards and upwards! Va of the way up, another one of our party, became quite unwell, but fortunately our lovely support team had re-joined us, so back to the hotel they went, taking our very poorly colleague with them! We carried on! The weather was unbelievable but the going was tough - A rocky, steep path all the way. The path climbed steeply at a gradient of 1 in 5! The scenery was stunning - we felt so privileged to be experiencing such beauty! Up, up, up we went - we assumed there would be flat bits where we could catch our breaths, how wrong we were! 5 1 /2 miles of uphill walking! Not for the faint hearted! We thought we were nearly there and went round a corner to see 2 further hills, which were covered in deep snow! We trudged on up - but we had made it! What a sense of achievement and the most amazing views!
It was worth carrying the champagne so far - my goodness, it tasted good!! We had mastered our challenge! Then we had to come down! My poor knees! We had all enjoyed the experience immensely! Even the boys managed to get to the top, despite their 2 journeys back to the hotel! Hopefully, we will have raised over £ 3000.00 for prostate cancer - if you want to sponsor us, its not too late, just pop into the surgery or go on line.
You can donate through www.Justgiving.com. to local charity events here. For example, click Julia's Ben Nevis a 2017event in support of funds to treat Prostate Cancer. This comes after the 2016 event for Breast Cancer which raised some £4000 locally.
Matthew Weeks .... Rowing the Channel in aid of Ethan Maull's 'Up yours to Cancer' charity.
They did it! On Saturday 3rd June, our 10 wonderful boys from Market Rasen Round Table (5 of whom are from Middle Rasen - George Coopland, Dan Quint, Mike Rogers, Matt Weeks and James Young), succeeded in their mission to row the Channel in aid of Ethan Maull's 'Up yours to Cancer' charity.
They rowed 68 miles from Ramsgate in Kent to Belgium and it took them 12 hours and 20 minutes. The boys said afterwards that they had managed to avoid 2 supertankers, had 5 cases of suncream malfunction, 3 bouts of seasickness and had 5 wees in plastic bottles! At the end they felt like they had consumed 7.5 tonnes of flapjack and 3 cows worth of beef jerky! They drank more lucozade than they ever imagined and despite taking with them 80 beers, they nbelievably drank just 4!!
They returned home with 40 aching limbs, wonderfully intact senses of humour and as 10 accomplished rowers. The rowers want to pass on their thanks to all their families and friends for the support they have been given and to all those who have sponsored them, businesses such as - Monarch Enterprises, Duckworths, Cooplands and Equip (to name just a few) and to everyone else who has donated! To date £ 10,000 has been raised, with hopefully more to come in! As James Beeden said "it was an amazing achievement, with an amazing team of lads who gave everything for a great cause. It was incredibly hard work in rough seas, which gave us a true sense of excitement and kept us focused! But we got there, we did it!" (If you would like to see some videos of the crossing, go to facebook and type in 'RasenRowsTheChannel')
Julia Weeks