Claire’s wonderful Welsh walk for the National Garden Scheme

We’ve always known how amazing and committed the volunteers who support the National Garden Scheme are, but some, like Claire James – who opens her garden and is an Assistant County Organiser – go beyond the call of duty. This summer she took on a 50km challenge to raise funds for the charity too. This is her story:

I was inspired to do the walk by my Scout leader friend Steph (pictured above right with Claire). We’ve done several long distance hikes together and Steph has completed two other Ultra Challenge walks before. She works for Johnson Matthey (JM) who encourage a team of their employees to take part. This year they offered the opportunity for friends and family to join in… Steph invited me to join her chosen walk of 50km. JM had chosen the Gower Peninsula challenge and knowing that area a little, I jumped at the chance.

Once signed up (back in November), I needed to choose which charity to fundraise for. Ultra Challenge have many very worthy collaborative charities, but I was looking for something a little more personal.

I have opened my garden for the National Garden Scheme for a few years and last year joined the Cambridgeshire County Support team. So few people are aware of just how much fundraising and support the National Garden Scheme offers to healthcare and garden charities. I also only recently became familiar with their Community Garden Grants programme … just fantastic! I therefore decided that the National Garden Scheme was the perfect charity to support and promote.

I have done a fair bit of walking in the last few years and like to have the goal of a good distance hike planned. Steph is a good training partner… we are similarly paced. We trained for and walked a 50km self- navigated Scout event in the Chilterns in February. Then I walked part of the West Highland Way and Ben Nevis with my husband and some friends at Easter. Since then it’s been a matter of keeping up my step count (walking the dog helps), in between getting the garden ready for open gardens in June. Steph and I did a couple of practice hikes in the weeks before the Gower challenge… the heatwave didn’t help with this.

The walk itself was great… not too much elevation, but enough contours to keep it interesting and challenging. The Gower Peninsula is truly stunning and certainly didn’t disappoint. We were very pleased that the temperature was forecast to be much cooler than recent weeks, although it did get quite sunny and warm in the afternoon (which slowed us down somewhat).

The whole event was very well organised. The route was clearly marked, the starting area and checkpoints were well managed and supplied with food, drink and toilets, as well as medical assistance if needed. The atmosphere was great, lots of encouragement and support from the Ultra Challenge team, the JM group were really welcoming and all the participants were positive and supportive of each other.

There were very many different charities being represented and many competitors just taking part for the personal challenge. Our 50km walk was just half of the full challenge. Many people walked, jogged or ran 100km, either continuously or over two days with a sleep over night in between. There were also those that walked, jogged or ran 25km or 75km, as well as some that did a marathon distance. We saw every type of competitor from super fit runners to seasoned walkers to those who were pushing themselves and their bodies well beyond their comfort zone and physical limits. I take my hat off to them all…

Steph and I completed our 50km in 11 hours 45 minutes. We were aiming for under 12 hours, so that was good. We got medals and T shirts and (after quite a wait) a massage. There was also a good hearty supper awaiting us, but I had been so well snacked up that I didn’t need much. After a good hot shower and a cup of tea it was time for bed.

It was wet and windy overnight, but the tent held up well. In the morning we struck camp and headed back over to the competitor’s enclosure to get a coffee, just in time to see some of the overnighters cross the finishing line. Well done you awesome people!

Claire has exceeded her £500 fundraising target but you can still support her here

Claire opens her garden with the Duxford Group in Cambridgeshire and is Assistant County Organiser for Cambridgeshire.

Thank you Claire!

If you are planning a fundraising challenge for the National Garden Scheme do let [email protected] know