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Odyssey is a wonderful little charity set up to support people with cancer to live the life they have now, to celebrate and to challenge themselves.  

This idea is very dear to my heart, and not just for people with cancer, I believe we could all do a bit more celebrating and a bit more challenging ourselves to live for the moment.

Cancer is an awful curse on our society and we need to fight it with everything we can throw at it.  For individuals on a very personal level it is obviously devastating to hear you have it, and I believe the approach that Odyssey takes not only helps people to enjoy and celebrate the life they have, but it also offers very practical support in hugely difficult times for individuals and families.

How it works is that oncologists around the UK refer patients to Odyssey and they in turn offer the patient an opportunity to attend their course free of charge.  When I met with around 14 people undertaking a cycling challenge through Wales this summer, including my sister Ali, the inspirational stories they told me moved me very deeply.

The whole thing about dealing with cancer, doing something that challenges you and celebrating what you have instead of what you don't have is very personal to me as my sister has been affected twice by this crummy, devious disease.  My Mum had it too, at least one of my grandmothers, possibly the other one, too... as well as one of my aunts...  

My 'Weekend(s) Walk Around Wales' began a few months ago, as a personal challenge for me. 870 miles around the Welsh Coast and another 176 or so miles along the length of Offa's Dyke which for a lot of the way forms the border between England and Wales - so 1046 miles all together.

Why did I want to do it?  Well because I absolutely love walking.  I am happiest when I'm walking and I hope by doing it I'll encourage other people to walk, too.  On top of that, my homeland challenged me to see if I could do it by opening up the Wales Coast Path in May 2012 - they may not have realised it at the time, but that's how I saw it, so there you are!  

This new joined-up footpath around the whole Welsh coast happened just a few months before I had completed walking the Cornwall Coast Path (all 296 miles, and quite a few more besides...) something I had wanted to do for 40 years.  So before I had finished my Cornish adventure I decided that my next one would be to Walk Around Wales, just for the fun of it.

So far I have walked from Chepstow in South East Wales to Llanelli, just into Carmarthenshire, a distance of approximately 171 miles - all of it beautiful - yes even the bit through Newport!  It's taken me since last November - although in my defence I was in France and Spain for 3 months earlier this year - but the pace is picking up now.

I plan to complete the walk by the end of 2014.

It has been bothering me all this time that I wasn't getting sponsored to do the walk.  I suppose I reasoned it will take quite a while and until I met with the wonderful people at Odyssey I just wasn't sure which charity to support.

Now I do know and I passionately want to support these fantastic people who are doing so much to help people enjoy life and prove to themselves they can do something they would never have thought they could. 

If you sponsor me, it'll help Odyssey offer more courses to more people dealing with cancer.  They will then challenge themselves to do something amazing - like the 225 mile bike ride from Cardiff Castle to Caernarvon Castle my sister Ali did in the summer.  Her group of 11 raised over £14,000.00 between them and Ali raised over £800.00 despite being a very late entrant. 

You can read more about Ali's trip here, by copying and pasting this link: http://www.justgiving.com/AliWhillance

I hope you will help support some amazing people to deal with this life changing challenge in a way that will inspire them and help others at the same time.

Thank you again.

Love,

Jane x