10/04/25

What an amazing event! There were pains and blisters a-plenty, but - more importantly - there were lots of laughs. It was a wonderful time spent with wonderful people. Walking 40 miles is HARD. It requires you to ignore your body screaming at you to stop, and requires you to keep doing something which eventually becomes painful. But for the 15 hours we were on the trail, the option was there to stop, and we laughed in its face every time.

That isn't an option for the people we help here at CRCB. People can't just stop losing their sight, they can't just checkout at the next way stop. With the kind and generous donations made by both the people on this page, and in cash at CRCB itself, we can continue to support people in Coventry who are on their own difficult journeys. We can get them to the next way stop. We can sit them down and give them a cup of tea. We can show them how to access information, to use devices which will make their lives easier, and we can help them boss their own challenges.

Thank you all so much for your kindness, your generosity, and your support. It all means more than words can express.

20/03/25

A non-trivial walk with trivia questions was had on Monday! We did our longest training walk yet. The 56 km or 35 mile route took a lot less time than expected, but was never the less a challenge. For a welcome change, we stuck to the roads and avoided much of the mud which had plagued our previous training walks.

Thanks to our good friends Matt and Estelle, we learnt that orchids produce the popular desert ingredient vanilla, and that Japanese and Spanish are the two languages which linguists have discovered are the fastest spoken languages measured in syllables per second.

Now we're entering the taper period of the training plan, so next week we will walk a mere 48 km or 30 miles. The following week, there will be a final stroll of 40 km or 25 miles.

Thank you to everyone who has donated so far, and please keep sharing this page with your friends!

01/02/25

Most people don't see 8am on a Saturday morning, but for the walkers getting in as many daylight hours is vital. Meeting at Canley Ford the adventurers set off to walk the 20 mile route that Jenny (guide walker and friend) has planned out... well, we would if she could find it! Using her geographical knowledge, Jenny quickly worked out a circular route which would take us to Burton Green, along the Greenway. At about the 10 mile point we reached Hickory's Smokehouse and stopped off for some well earned food and drinks (massive thank you to them for the £20 gift voucher) and friend, Rahul originally from India joined to walk the home stretch.... through mud, giving him an education into the British countryside in winter! Returning back to Earlsdon the gang said their goodbyes and looked forward to a rest...until next week where the distance creeps up to 34km

10/01/2025

While Claire stayed at home to see off the remains of a cold, Jenny, Chris, and Jenny's friend Craig braved the threat of snow to tackle the 24 km set out in the training plan.

We left from CRCB just after 9, and headed up through the woods to the Greenway where we headed towards Berkswell. After 13 km, we decided that the collective need for a toilet overrode our wish to continue, so we retraced our footsteps.

Unfortunately, although Jenny's friend had offered the use of a toilet, they had also gone out shopping, so it was with crossed legs and grumbling stomachs that we returned to CRCB at about 14:30.

Distance covered: 24 km.

Popular topics of conversation: food, toilets, animals.

For anyone, the 40m Coventry Way is a daunting challenge. There can be deep mud, rough pathways, stiles to clamber over and stinging nettles to avoid, and of course, the mental effort of covering 40m in one day.

Now imagine doing all that, in just one day, and without your sight!

Chris and Claire, together with Sophie and Jenny as guide walkers, will be doing just that, and Lean Body Vision in Earlsdon are providing background training support.

The four are raising money for Coventry Resource Centre for the Blind, where Chris and Claire work, and which does a staggering amount of work for people in Coventry who are living with sight loss.

Claire can't see at all in low light conditions and even in good light she cannot judge depth, so the difference between a small step down and a long drop are really hard to see. She will have to make the most of the April daylight, feeling her way using her walking poles and trusting in the verbal cues given by her friends. Chris, who is totally blind, said: "Inspired by an ultra marathon that Sophie ran for charity a couple of years ago, I am fascinated by the idea of long distances. It is incredible that I get to walk my first ultra marathon with not only the person who inspired much of my exercise journey, but my wife who has shared and supported me with much of that exercise journey, not to mention the amazing Jenny, who never fails to bring a smile to my face, with her unfailing positivity and fascinating insights into life in general. I really couldn’t have chosen a group of finer human beings to take on this challenge with."

Jenny initially signed up without realising what the distance was! Being a positive person who enjoys a challenge, she shrugged and got right down to training. She is determined to do this whilst balancing a fulltime job, multiple volunteering commitments, and managing to spend time with her family. Sophie met Chris and Claire at the Earlsdon Running Club and did the Guide Runner’s course offered by British Blind Sport to satisfy the insurers. She spent many of her Thursday evenings thereafter attached to Chris with an old lanyard fashioned into a guide rope and a lasting friendship was formed.

CEO Hugh Sorrill says: “Without the generous donations offered by members of the public in response to fundraisers like this one, Coventry Resource Centre for the Blind could not continue doing the fine work it is known for. We wish the four walkers fine weather and all the best in their challenge!”