CLIMBING Snowdon three times a day has been just part of the training for an intrepid Redditch duo trekking the Himalayas on a fund raising mission.
Chris Thomas and Steve Betteridge, both of whom work for Church Hill Big Local, will be flying out today (Friday) on a 10-day trek to conquer the Annapurna region of the World’s biggest mountain range.
And they’re doing it for a cause close to Chris’s heart – the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation.
Roy Castle was a famous entertainer who in 1994 died from cancer caused by passive smoking – and a similar fate befell Chris’s dad, Terry.
It had started with a pain in his back, which at first was put down to him overdoing it laying the base for a garden shed.
However his condition didn’t improve, and indeed got worse, and it was too late when they discovered the real cause of his ill health, lung cancer.
Now Chris and Steve are doing their bit to help the charity, the only one dedicated to eradicating lung cancer.
“It should be quite an experience,” said landscape gardener Steve.
“Everyone seems to give to the big charities and forget about the little ones but we’re doing this in memory of Chris’s dad and to raise the profile of this particular charity,”
He’s been busy training in Snowdonia – including climbing Snowdon itself three times ‘most weekends’ – and is joined by Chris when he can get away.
The community has rallied round too – their initial £6,000 target has been smashed – helped by a clairvoyant night at Cutting Edge hairdressers in Church Hill which raised £1,700 alone – and now they’ve set their sights on raising £7,000.
“We didn’t know for ages what was wrong with dad,” said Chris.
“It wasn’t until he ended up in hospital because his back was so bad that they discovered it, but by then it had been going too long.”
To support Chris and Steve, visit https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/chrisandstevehimalayatrek
