Walk Free

Greetings

We would like to welcome you to our website "Walk Free", our online home about our hike from John o' Groats to Lands End. On this site you will be able to find up to date information about our route, the causes we are raising awareness of and how you can help us out as we take on this 1,200 mile hike of the UK. We hope that you enjoy following the progress of our adventure.

— Charlie & Nick

We finished the hike on the 28th December 2009 and we are no longer collecting donations.

The Journey

In brief, we will be hiking somewhere in the region of 1,200 miles from John o' Groats, Caithness to Lands End, Cornwall. We particularly love green fields and mountains, so we'll be avoiding tarmac and exhaust fumes as much as possible and will be doing three months of fell walking… We can feel the blisters already!

We hope to start our hike on 5th October 2009: Charlie will have just finished her PhD and Nick will be taking some time out of work to accompany her on this long trek. The route we are taking includes as many complete long distance paths as possible such as the Pennine Way, Cotswold Way, West Highland Way and the Great Glen Way. We will be passing through many towns and villages – perhaps you can help us by offering somewhere to stay.

For more information on the route, please view the route page.

The Motivation

Obviously we love the outdoors; if we didn't the idea of walking such a distance would be outrageously insane. Regardless, a crazy plan needs a motivation. We are walking to raise awareness of modern day slavery, in which it is estimated a shocking 27 million people are thought to be trapped today.

With your help we are supporting both The A21 Campaign and the Gulu Project run by Watoto Child Care Ministries. These causes act in response to the tragedy of slavery of women and children for sexual exploitation and the use of children as soldiers. Both A21 and Watoto are committed to rescuing and restoring lives, and we wholeheartedly believe that all life is valuable and worthy of being cherished.