Story
You might be reading this and thinking you have a good handle on your wallet.. No chugger is getting past you with their mind games and their stories of great physical feats!
Well.. Strap in, and good luck:
On 19th July (TBC), Myself, Tash Richmond, Courtney Kelly, Luke Garrad, Anil Sojitra and Tim Brading will be embarking on a dangerous incursion into Wales, in an attempt to drag our aging, feeble carcasses up three of the welsh's finest peaks in just 24 hours.
We are climbing, in order, Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon), Cadair Idris, and Pen y Fan (for the welsh colleagues shaking their heads at my spelling, I can only apologise.. but also be thankful you didn't have to hear me pronounce any of it).
Who is Charlie, and why do I care, you still can't have my money?
Charlie was a friend to me. He was a mentor, and a team mate. As a trainee in the mountain rescue team Charlie forged the way ahead for the rest of us and always made time to check how we were doing on the way.
Charlie was an active, highly competent member of the mountain rescue team that we are walking for and a person with a singular, heroic heart.
Tragically, he passed away very recently, taken way too young due to a sudden illness. The team and everyone who came into contact with Charlie, have suffered a great loss.
It is for the team, and to honour a man who affected me personally in many ways that I would like to do this challenge in honour of Charlie's spirit of endeavour and kindness.
You still can't have my hard earned money because I'm a Dickensian trope and will not be moved by emotions
To you, then, I say think of the services that the Exmoor Search and Rescue Team (https://www.exmoor-srt.org.uk/), and Mountain Rescue England and Wales in general, provide as charities. Blue light services funded entirely by charity.
The team covers an enormous patch over most of North Devon, and much of Somerset (not just Exmoor). Last year there were more than 50 callouts to which the team provided expert prehospital care, search capability, casualty access and retrieval on difficult terrain, swift water and flood capability and in general, a professional blue light service delivered in their own time. The money goes 100% to the running and operation of that service. All of the people in the team are volunteers.
Okay, bloody hell! Take my money and leave me alone!