08/04/2011: For all you lovely people that sponsored us, here is an update on how our Jailbreak challenge went.
It started on Monday 4 April at 9am. When the klaxon sounded, our team Are We There Yet? – which consisted of Ellie, Dan and I – headed in the complete opposite direction to all the other teams. We had the brilliant idea to evade the barriers at Leeds station by heading to an unmanned station in Headingley. From there, we caught the train to Leeds station so that we were on the right side of the barriers and wouldn’t have to argue our way through. We thought this was pretty clever, but it actually proved to be a pointless move as the guard of the Cross Country train refused to let us on. This was our first experience with the incredibly strict health and safety rules that all UK transport companies seem to live by!
We eventually managed to get out of Leeds on a National Express coach, after being unsympathetically told by a Megabus driver that ‘you have legs, use them’. Once in London Victoria, we got on another National Express coach to Gatwick in the hope that an airline might offer us a flight. We knew it was a bit of a long shot but thought it was worth the risk. Unfortunately, this only resulted in us hearing the phrase ‘red tape’ more times that we thought possible. A talk with the lovely men at Airport Information confirmed our suspicions – anyone who manages to blag a free flight conveniently has a family member working at the airport (cheaters!) On the up side, we did manage to blag free cocktails at a posh bar at the Sofitel hotel, where we felt severely underdressed and saw an apparently famous cricketer (although none of us knew who he was!) We then tried to get a bit of sleep in the departures lounge before heading back to central London on an Easybus in the morning.
What followed was ‘Plan B’: a trip down to Portsmouth via National Express; the sad realisation that nobody was going to give us a lift over the channel after a time spent hitchhiking; a couple of hours spent wondering if we would even make it out of the country; and finally a talk with ferry company LD Lines that resulted in them offering us cheap ferry tickets to France. As we weren’t allowed to spend any money, we headed to the pub next to the ferry port where some generous drunken Irishmen and general pissed pub goers funded our tickets to our final destination: 300 odd miles away in Le Harve in France!
In Portsmouth, we had been told that Le Harve was both a ‘shithole’ and ‘picturesque’. In reality, it was neither. It was a perfectly nice city, with the redeeming features of pretty parks, amazing weather, and a lovely beach. It may have not been the most exotic location, but it was a great way for our trip to end.
We then got a return ferry back home at 5pm, spent the night in Portsmouth in a Travelodge, got another National Express coach (we owe them a lot of money!) to London, and then used the train tickets that Chiltern Railways generously donated to get home to Leamington. At Leamington station, we encountered the first danger of the entire trip when a crazy woman attempted to set Ellie and I on fire using her lighter. Apart from that, it was an exciting and fun trip – despite being much more difficult that we expected – and our team collectively managed to raise around £900! The winners from Leeds got to Genoa in Italy – pretty impressive!
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03/04/2011: Jailbreak challenge starts TOMORROW at 9am! To follow our adventures, check out www.twitter.com/arewethereyettt
28/03/2011: Leamington Observer article - http://www.leamingtonobserver.co.uk/story-Students-looking-to-sweet-talk-way-across-globe-37280.html
Hello everyone!
We (Ellie Hitchcox and Kate Noonan) are participating in an event called Jailbreak with Leeds University on the 4th April, which basically involves us getting as far away from the university as possible in 48 hours - without spending any money! People have got as far as San Francisco, New Zealand and Tokyo, so you never know where we might end up!
This is all in aid of a great charity, the Kinamba Community Project, which provides educational opportunities for people in the Kinamba area of Kigali, Rwanda. The project offers hope to those affected by the genocide of 1994, by sending the poorest children to school, providing skills training and support for adults, offering basic numeracy and literacy classes as well as training for HIV/AIDS awareness.
To find out where your money is going and how it can help, visit http://www.kinambaproject.org.uk/
So donate as much as you can, so that we can attempt to get to the other side of the world without spending a penny and raise money for a worthwhile cause in the process! If you're lucky, we might even send you a postcard from wherever we end up ;)
THANK YOU!
