Tuesday 17th June saw the sun shining brightly as Pink Row launched The Paul Satow from Richmond.  There was clearly an element of the Tardis about the boat, given the vast amount of equipment that was put on board!

We progressed to plan up the Thames, stopping at Laleham, Hurley, Caversham and Clifton Hampden before arriving some 100 miles later in Oxford on Saturday lunchtime to a wonderful reception at Folly Bridge.

We had our fair share of moments, disappearing up dead end creeks, losing the odd rowlock, racing Leander at Henley, sighting Kingfishers and otters and meeting some wonderful people along the way.

We set out with three goals: to raise a decent sum for Breakthrough; to row all the way from Richmond to Oxford upstream as J K Jerome and chums did over 100 years ago; and to have an excellent time doing it.  We did all three!

There are so many people to thank: Chris, Liz and Kate from Breakthrough for all their encouragement and advice and help; our support team who arranged banners, flags, medals, T shirts, champagne and logistics; to Paul Satow, Mark and Bill for providing and collecting the boat; to Tom Turner for creating our superb logo; to Adam and all at Reading Rowing Club for their hospitality and to Peter for his organisation and peanut butter sandwiches! Thanks to the crew who rowed over two tons of boat, kit and people - the practising oarsmen, Paul and Ben, those who hadn't rowed for over 30 years, Peter and Sam and a very special thanks to the two "novices" Mario and Donal who did a brilliant job.

However the final word of thanks must go to the hundreds of people and companies who donated to our cause and helped us beat our target of £20,000 for Breakthrough.  The website is open until 14th August, so please feel free to add donations.

There are plenty of photos on the Flickr site,so please browse a selection of the best.

From Pink Row 2008, Jim, Peter, Sam, Paul, Ben, Mario and Donal a huge thank you for your fantastic support.

PS from Peter: And a very big Thank You! too to Jim, who wrote the above and so can't thank himself - Jim had the idea in the first place, drove it forward, and did more organising than the rest of us.  We await, nervously, his next idea.