It’s been a little while since my last update. This is purely due to the fact i’ve had nothing to blog about until now.

I’ve just gotten back from the Outdoors Show at the NEC, where a stand was very kindly donated so i could exhibit my expedition. I only had a week’s notice before hand so it was quite a rush to get a banner and some flyers printed up in time(which, to those who came to my stand, is why i had a lack of information about the expedition). Luckily i found a 24hr printing company for the flyer’s and a friend of a friend helped me out with the banner. Also i managed to book myself and Andy into a travelodge for the whole weekend (complete with really fat rabbits outside the window) that i thought was 1.7 miles  from the NEC, but in fact was 17 miles from the NEC which kind of explained the free rooms, which explained the free rooms so close to a big event.

Over the weekend i had some really nice people come up to me and wish me luck, some even giving me tips or advice for certain areas that I’ll be traveling through. I met some really interesting people who were impressed by my expedition which i thought was crazy considering some of the things these people had done. One lady i spoke in a wheel chair, gave me contacts and took down my number to give to contacts at many different companies and organisations who may be interested in supporting my expedition. After a lengthy conversation (which was hard due to the mumblings of a certain person on a microphone commentating on a kayaking event) she gave bid farewell and gave me an A4 sheet of paper with details of her different accolade’s and achievements. It turns out she was a fundraiser for many different charities, had completed many different activities including being the first disabled person to dog sled across Arctic Norway and was awarded an MBE a couple of years back. Her name escapes me (i know shes called Judy but the surname i can’t remember) but i have it the piece of paper and will post a more detailed blog about her soon.

On the friday just as we were preparing to go home i met a gentleman called Steve Hughes who told me of his plans to walk from John O’ Groats to Land’s End this July. His Charity walk is in aid of Cancer Research UK and The British Heart Foundation will cover 1,200 miles and will take him approximately 3-4  months. Hopefully i will be up in Scotland training when he begins his walk and i hope to meet up with him and perhaps even get off my bike and walk with him for a couple of miles. Visit his site at www.steveslongwalk.org, it’s well worth a look and i think everyone should go over to his site and donate to one of his chosen charities.

The most important thing to me about the weekend was that we raised a bit of money and more people found out about the Combat Stress and the great work they do. Many ex servicemen came up to us and asked about the charity and what they do and took some leaflets away, so hopefully the people who need help will get it.

Andy helped me out with the stand for the whole weekend aswell as driving me and the gear to Birmingham, and my parents helped out on Saturday and Sunday, so i just want to say a huge thanks for their help.

Hopefully I’ll stay on top of blog from now on. This may mean that some of entries will be mindless, senseless crap that will only have relevance to me and a couple of people but it’s better than nothing i suppose. Keep checking back and if i haven’t written anything for over a week then drop me an abusive email to kick me back into line!

Bye for now..

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