Walking on the Moon
One of the many friends of Manor Farm recently seemed ‘spaced out’ when she told us she was going moon walking. We soon found out she hadn’t lost her marbles but was taking part in the ‘Walk the Walk’ charity event in London with all proceeds from her sponsored ‘moonwalk’ going to breast cancer charities.
Mary Clarke, pictured centre with Diana Southall and Sue Braidley, has worked in community education in Walsall for many years and was part of the team that helped launch the Big Lottery Silver Scheme here at Manor Farm back in January.
She happily celebrated her 65th birthday [she said we could tell you!] by taking part in the London Moonwalk marathon on the evening of Saturday May 11 2013. After training hard, buying new trainers and put up with jibes and jokes from friends and family, she covered the staggering 26.2 miles in just 8 hours.
She also completed the walk in a sequined bra top, bright fuchsia pink tutu and matching feely-boppers!!
As for the birthday celebration, anyone else would ask for birthday presents, fancy flowers or delicious treats. Not Mary! She asked for donations for this very worthy cause.
She said, ‘It was a fantastic experience especially hearing the start of the dawn chorus power walking towards the breaking sunshine. Having said all of that I am NEVER doing it again. I am hanging up my marathon trainers forever!’
Somehow we think that is dehydration taking effect as Mary is always up for a challenge and typifies the strong Walsall resolve to help others in need.
The power walk sounded great fun as well as being physically challenging. There was one difficulty though. As Mary explained, ‘I hit the ‘wall at 16 miles but overcame that with sheer will power. The real difficulty was finding a toilet. I walked for 8 hours with only one loo stop behind a bush in Hyde Park - the queues for the public loos were a 45 minute wait!’
Well done Mary. The breast cancer charities will be quite rightly be over the moon with the generous sponsorship which is still pouring in thanks to your effort.
