Thank you for visiting my fundraising page. I am really excited to undergo this trip in the summer, and know that although it will be fun it will have some really challenging moments to it. The girls who are joining us from South Africa come from an informal settlement on the hills above Knysna in the Cape. They are all scholars at the Percy Mdala High School and Harriet and I visited the school in October last year. Our trip forms part of a leadership programme called Wild Swans that will help all of us young women to understand our strengths and to learn how to make changes happen in our lives with confidence and understanding of what is truly important to us. We want to learn ways to make a meaningful difference to the world. We will be meeting regularly to raise funds, have training in leadership and advocacy and to prepare for the trip. We have chosen not to go with an adult leader but to work together and be independent as a group. This will have its challenges but we will also learn a lot from this element. In addition to the wilderness element of the experience we will all be spending five days as part of our Duke of Edinburgh Award Residential in a remote Zulu community. We will be living in pairs during this time with a local family and will not see the rest of the group until the end of the programme. Culturally this will be a big learning curve for us all, but I am sure that the experience will give me new thoughts on poverty, needs and how people cope in these very deprived areas. If you are a UK tax payer, and not a direct family member I am able to gift aid your donation which will further your contribution. This will give an extra 25p in every pound that you give which will go directly to the Foundation's work. Your help would mean a lot to me and The Wilderness Foundation UK that I am supporting. Thanks Livi Roberts