Here I go again!

Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page. Creating it brought back distant memories of aching limbs, blisters, mosquitos and a near-total roadside breakdown through heatstroke/exhaustion during Cycle India 2010.

So why, I hear you cry, am I ready to put my body on the line once again to cycle 340kms across India in five days?

Well, because, like Arnie Schwarzenegger, I promised someone 'I'll be back...'

A few years ago I began sponsoring a young girl, Anusha, through the UK-based charity HEAL (Health and Education for All). Like many of her schoolfriends at the HEAL Children's Village in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh, Anusha comes from a disadvantaged background in a poor rural region of southern India. Two years ago, I was lucky enough to meet her.

Having survived, and successfully completed, Cycle India 2010 (much to my surprise) I was taken, along with the other cyclists, to visit the Children's Village where HEAL does so much work to give underprivileged kids - many of them orphans - shelter, healthcare and a proper education.

There, waiting to greet me, was Anusha in what proved to be one of the most emotional days of my life. After visiting her school and meeting her friends and the staff who look after them, Anusha asked if I would come back to visit again and I had no hesitation in saying I would.

The photos  posted on this page will explain why. HEAL does incredible work to remove children from the poverty trap and give them the tools to make a better life for both themselves and their own communities.

The two previous Cycle India events in 2008 and 2010 have raised Heal over £170,000. The hope is that the 2012 charity bike ride can raise over £100,000 in the UK, and a further $100,000 in the US, money which is urgently needed for HEAL's most ambitious project yet, the new Paradise Village which aims to take another 1,000 severely disadvantaged children under its wing. My daughter, Sam, hopes to be one of the pioneers of the project, helping to set up and run the nursery school planned for the village from next summer.

In 2010, I not only saw the great hope provided by projects such as the Children's Village in Guntur, but many instances of abject poverty, including entire families living under plastic sheets in makeshift roadside camp sites and tiny children begging in the city of Hyderabad.

ALL of the money we raise will go towards HEAL's good work in Andhra Pradesh - all of the 30 or 40 cyclists from the UK, India and the US are paying their own way, so that donations will go directly towards funding the charity's numerous projects.

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. So it’s the most efficient way to donate - I raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity.

So please dig deep and donate now. Thank you.

Footnote (January 19): I would like to express my thanks for several  'celebrity donations' from the likes of Hugh Grant, Richard Griffiths, Graham Norton and Ross Noble, who have all contributed signed items which I shall be auctioning for Heal in February, on my return from India.