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As most of you will know, we lost Shaun's mum, Alex and Lauren's nan, on 9th May 2015 to a type of blood cancer called Myeloma.  Her final days were spent in the Ellenor hospice.   The care and understanding for Jean was second to none.   They treated her like a member of their own family and for this we can never thank them enough!

However what we can do is help the Ellenor by raising funds so that families in the future can continue to receive this amazing end of life care and support.  So when Alex and I saw information about a Fire and Ice Volcano Challenge in Iceland - April 2016 being organised by and in support of the Ellenor we decided to sign up!! 

This is a taster of what we have signed up for:

We will be trekking across Iceland for 5 days through spectacular volcanic landscapes.  We will hike through mountain gorges, over vast glaciers, across frozen lava fields and climb to the top of Eyjafjallajὃkull (don't ask me how to pronounce it!!) which famously erupted in 2010 leaving air traffic in meltdown for weeks across most of Europe.  Eyjafjallajὃkull is 1666m high, taller than Ben Nevis!!

The itinerary involves trekking an average of 8 hours a day, but up to 14 hours per day on two of the days over rough mountainous terrain, possibly using crampons, snow shoes and ice axes.  There will be extremes of temperatures and climate. 

This has been a huge challenge to us not only raising the funds but also physically.  From the very start we have been committed to the time and energy needed.  When we reached our target of £5500 at the beginning of January 2016 we were over the moon.  Not only did this mean we had raised an amazing amount for the ellenor hospice it also meant we could concentrate on our training for the trek itself.  We couldn't have done it without you so thank you from the bottom of our hearts for anything you have done to support us over the last few months.  We knew we could do it but we just needed to prove it to all of you! 

Our fundraising events have included a Run or Dye 5km race, an amazing afternoon tea where we raised over £1000.  We have also done Chalk fete, plenty of Boot Fairs and Christmas/crafts fairs.  Other events were our quiz night, and our 'All wrapped up' body shop and 'pampered chef' party.  Our final event was our Race Night on 30th January which raised a whopping £463.16 taking us well over our target and raising even more for the ellenor Hospice.

Since Christmas our time has been taken up with serious training, gym, aerobics, yoga and lots of walking! We had a weekend in North Wales where we climbed two mountains on simultaneous days - we made it to the top of Snowdon! On our final training weekend we walked nearly 30 miles with fellow trekkers on a glorious summer's day.  We are now on the cusp of our challenge and all the hard work is culminating in to our Iceland adventure.  Nervous and excited but we're ready and we have such a great group of people to share it with.  The ellenor has been part of our lives for the last year and we are thrilled to have helped them to continue to help others.  Next challenge the 26 mile walkathon in September - Tower Bridge back to the ellenor hospice!!!!

Please keep checking our page for photos and updates of our trek itself.  Finally...

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU - Alex and Rachel