Made any good new year's resolutions? Broken any yet?
Mine is to complete the RAW Africa event in South Africa in April - a 278 km, 5 day event where you have to carry your own kit - maybe a stone and a half at the start. Just to add that extra element of fun, we will take the same rhino suit (as pictured) which crossed the Atacama Desert in Chile (probably still has some of my sweat on it - nice!). This time we've put together a crack team - we want to scare some of the other competitors by putting in a really good time. There will be 6 of us, so hopefully that only means about one marathon distance for me in the suit, which weighs about a stone itself. Of course, you still have to carry your own kit under the suit, so in total you might get two and half stone heavier.
South Africa is a good place for this challenge since The Big Conservation Success Story comes from here. White rhinos were poached down to the last 50 or so by 1920. One single man found and brought these remnants to his farm. Now there are around 14,500 white rhinos in the world.
All money donated goes to Save the Rhino, and they use it to fund projects around the world - see the STR website for more detail.
There may well be some TV coverage of this event, so you can watch along as the rhino pegs it through some beautiful countryside.
Here's the detail:
Donating through this site is simple, fast and totally secure. It is also the most efficient way to sponsor me: Save the Rhino International will receive your money faster and, if you are a UK taxpayer, an extra 28% in tax will be added to your gift at no cost to you.
