Saturday 12th July 2008
Midnight Walk a huge success’
Organisers of the first ever Midnight Walk in Shropshire are celebrating after the huge success of the sponsored event – and promising to repeat the fundraiser next year. Over 160 women turned out on a cold but dry Saturday night, each wearing their special Midnight Walk t-shirt. Many of the shirts had been customised and some of the women wore fancy dress, including clown wigs, Hawaiian grass skirts and Grease-themed Pink Lady outfits.
Women had travelled from throughout the Hospice’s Shropshire and Mid Wales catchment area to take part, including walkers from Bridgnorth, Market Drayton, Newport, Newtown and Shrewsbury.
The pace setters set a fast speed and the first women completed the walk in just over two and a half hours, with all walkers returning to base by 4am. Lucy Proctor, Fundraising Manager for Telford and Wrekin, said ‘The walkers were absolutely brilliant. They were all determined to have a great time and although the ten mile distance was a real challenge for some of them they all completed it in a fantastic time.
‘As well as the enthusiasm of the walkers, the event went so well because of the many volunteers who gave up their own time to register participants, man checkpoints and make sure that the walkers were safe all the way round the route. We had five minibuses of marshals moving around the route to monitor road crossings and junctions and they made such an enormous difference to the night.
‘We had the support of a number of businesses, including The Junction, the landlords of The Forge Retail Park, who let us take over part of their site for the best part of twelve hours, Press Red who provided a fantastic PA system, Birse Construction who sent traffic cones, luminous jackets and two minibuses, and Minibus Stop, who also sent two minibuses. Events like this really do bring the community together and without the support of these businesses they would not happen.’
We would like to thank every walker who took part. With the sponsor money already starting to roll in it looks like the event has been a huge success. The feedback from the night has been absolutely wonderful and we are already starting to plan for next year so that we can add a separate Shrewsbury route to the event.’
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