22 June 2009 I walked the walk! I have very sore thighs and have lost a couple of toenails but other than that I feel good!

There were 10,000 people walking including an amazingly brave woman, Margot Hunter, who had entered the moonwalk and later found out she had breast cancer. She since has had a mastectomy and 3 days before the walk started her chemotherapy! There was a minute silence before left, which left me teary thinking of my lovely Aunty Ingrid but also thankful for the research that has helped my Aunty Pauline, Oma and all my friends who have had breast cancer but are healthy now.

We started just before midnight in Inverleith Park, walking up to the Castle, lit up in pink for the event, and into the Royal Mile, with people hanging out of windows and coming out of the pubs to cheer us on, then out to Holyrood Park and around Arthur’s Seat. Luckily at that point there were no streetlights to show how steep the climb was! We then returned to the town and out along Queensferry Road to Silverknowles and the coast, out to Leith docks, before heading back to the start/finishline via the stunning new Parliament building. A fantastic way to see Edinburgh, with the beaming volunteers buoying us up and cheering us on; there were even people standing at the end of their gardens with bowls of treats!

The weather was perfect; slightly cloudy with a little breeze. I walked with my friend Emma in our tartan bras (the theme was Highland Swing) and we only had to cover up for 15-20 minutes when we first hit the coast before the sun rose. Thankfully the heavy rain didn’t appear; in fact the dawn was calm with beautiful herringbone clouds. The first tinge of a blue sky appeared around 3am and an hour later we were walking in sunny daylight. Poor Emma suffered from blisters for the last half of the walk but fortunately my knee held out. My physio rang me on the drive up to Edinburgh with the MRI scan results; I’ve ruptured a cruciate ligament and will have to have keyhole surgery. Eek! Despite our injuries, we did it in good time: my stopwatch said 6.41, so with a loo stop and waiting to cross traffic I reckon that’s 6.35 but I’d rather believe the finish clock which read 6.26 - and it took us 6 minutes to cross the start line!

Huge thanks again to all those who have helped bring the total up above my target and to the others it’s still not too late to contribute to this fantastic charity :) Have a look at the work they do: http://www.walkthewalk.org/Fundraising/OurCharities Their scalp coolers, which keeps hair loss minimal for those undergoing chemotherapy, are just one way they help women & men dealing with breast cancer http://www.walkthewalk.org/Fundraising/OurCharities/ScalpCoolers