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Hi, I'm Tom and I'm Heather and Lillianne's dad. My daughters have 'Retts syndrome' a genetic disorder resulting in Severe learning Disability and Physical Disabilities.  Heather and lillianne love the outdoors, they love making new friends and maintaining old ones,and they both love animals. It's important that they enjoy a good quality of life, not be restricted by their disability and just as important they have fun!

That's where Camsley Grange Riding for the disabled Association Group come in. Horse riding for people with disabilities not only benefits mobility, posture and co-ordination, but also encourages the development of personal confidence and self esteem all the time whilst having fun.  Heather and Lilliannes physical disabilities can be prevented from worsening by maintaining good posture, good physical therapy and co-ordination, in short horse riding is just what the doctor ordered!

Camsley Grange RDA Group is a small volunteer-run charity offering horse riding and pony care sessions to people with disabilities in and around Warrington, Cheshire. We strive to enable both children and adults to improve their health and wellbeing thru. a real and lasting therapy.

Heather and Lillianne ride on Wednesday evenings along with other people with disabilities. There are also rides on Monday evenings and pony care sessions how is all this made possible?  It all costs money, persons dedication and time but Camsley Grange Group make this all possible, but it can only continue with regular funding...

Camsley GrangeRDA Group relies on the generosity of its supporters for around 80% of its income and is lucky to have support from regular doners i.e. parents/carers. however each year is always a funding challenge for us. we need regular donations to help keep our horses in sound working order for the benefit of the disabled riders.

An example of some of the costs required to look after one pony...

£180-00 ...cost of one months livery....£20-00 ...costs of one months farriery and shoeing....£15-00 ... two weeks worth of feed...£10-00...two weeks worth of straw...£5-00....horse care items brushes, combs etc.  Additionally, periodically equipment needs replacing or upgrading such as saddles, bridles, stirrups etc often such equipment may have to be specially made or adapted for people with disabilities. Mounting blocks, bibs, helmets..the list goes on.

Where do I come into all this? Well, as I've already mentioned i'm dad to Heather and Lillianne whom are active members of the group, but I'm also one of a dedicated number of volunteers whom quite frankly without such the group would cease to function. 'Vols' as we are aimicaby known act as'leaders' for the horses, act as 'side walkers' during the sessions to make sure the riders are safe, they 'tac up' the horses prior to the session and brush them down after. They are invaluable and contribute greatly to a safe, successful and fun packed ride twice a week look at the photo's!!

What else can I do, that you can help with in contrubuting to our group? Well, as a life long climber and hillwalker I thought an ascent of kilimanjaro would be quite a challenge and at the same time a fantastic opportunity to raise some funds for such a worthwhile charity.

As such on 14th September 2011, three friends and I fly out to Tanzania to begin our challenge and what a challenge it will be! A three mile high mountain,the ascent starting off in a jungle environment and finishing off on a glaciated summit with temperatures at minus 25 degrees centigrade. We will spend ten day's on the mountain taking eight days for our ascent!

My target apart from reaching the summit of course! Is to raise one pound for each metre of height of the mountain. With the summit being 5895 metres that would be an incredible £5895-00 raised for our charity such a figure will contribute greatly to the continued sustainability of the group, and indeed enable further expansion i.e. more horses equals more rides for more people with disabilitiies!

I would like to thank you in anticipation of your donations, on behalf of myself, our riders, volunteers and trustees and if you wish to go one step further as well as donating and you are interested in volunteering with our group please contact us via our web site at www.camsleygrangerda.org.uk

I shall update my page periodically with any new information. i.e. how the group is doing, new photo's, how my training for the trip is going, and last but not least an account of my successful summit bid after the event-Complete with Photo's!!

Kind regards, Tom Shaw

UPDATE!! 27th Sept 2011: Summitted at 0710 hours on Thursday 22nd Sept 2011, after leaving for the summit at 5 mins past midnight on Thursday 22nd from 'Barafu camp' at 4600m we ascended in pitch darkness reaching Stella point on the crater rim at 5735m to a glorious sunrise...we then had a 'short' but tiring walk to 'Uhuru' summit (Kilimanjaro summit) at 5895m (Uhuru means 'Freedom') The views were sensational, the curvature of the earth was evident as well as the numerous glaciers around the giant crater of Kilimanjaro. A truly memorable mountain, all four of us made the summit followed after about 20 mins on top a long tiring scree descent back to Barafu camp where a much needed brew was called for then we broke camp and walked out to Millenium camp at 3800m where we spent a further night before walking off the mountain thru Deep Jungle the following day! Temps on the summit climb I recorded as minus 20 degrees centigrade plus wind chill on top of that!!

Thank you to  everyone for your support and donations, I will be posting some pictures shortly but please continue to donate for such a worthy cause.

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So please dig deep and Donate to Camsley Grange Riding for the Disabled Association Group (Reg. charity Number 1073670) Make a lot of people with disabilities happy! :-))