Running 828 Miles From My Living Room

 

As other people contemplate and dread another 'lockdown' here in the UK due to the pandemic, I am still in my original lockdown from February 2020. Of course, there are the odd things I miss like walks and museums but overall I have been perfectly happy to stay safely at home.
During that time, however, I have been anything but bored and filled my time with my usual household tasks, taking care of our 10 animals, blog and photo work, reading, completing a couple of online courses and oh running 828 miles around the Ring Road of Iceland all from my living room!

Starting on the 21st of February 2021, over 282 days I completed 200 runs totalling 828 miles and crossed the finish line on November 30th 2021. 
During that time I also took part in multiple other smaller runs in aid of different animal-related charities which then made this medal my 7th of the year! As of writing this I have also completed one more 25k and hope that the 8th medal will arrive before the end of the year. 

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I did this particular run through The Conqueror Virtual Challenges which I also used back in January to complete the Hadrian's Wall 90 mile hike - which you can read more about here ' My 90 Mile Hike at Home ' and here ' Fundraising During A Pandemic. '
The reason I chose to do another challenge with this company is that I love the fact I can follow my route on the map and even see where I am by falling into street view, as well as get postcards throughout my journey and best of all contribute to planting trees when I hit each 20% milestone!

So why do I do these challenges? It gives me motivation and something to do, it helps me to have a reason to work out and keep fit which in turn has helped my chronic pain and best of all provides an opportunity to raise money. 
In January/February during my 90-mile hike I managed to raise £250 that I donated to a wonderful animal shelter I support in Serbia, Vukjac Shelter. At Vukjac they have to work against many adverse conditions to provide care to over 1000 animals, primarily dogs, and the remarkable man who runs the shelter never turns a dog away. 
On top of everything, this year has also been incredibly difficult for the shelter as a local right-wing political group, Leviathan Movement, posing as an animal rights group threatened the shelter when they had apparently 'investigated' them and they circulated a fake video and rumours accusing Dejan of animal cruelty. In turn, Dejan was jailed, the shelter was ceased during which time the dogs did not receive their required care and Vukjac Shelter's donation channels were taken over. 
Thankfully, Dejan was released and the shelter returned to the caring hands of those who have always looked after them but the drops in fundraising have been detrimental. 

Because of all that I set up another fundraising page in the hopes to provide some small amount of support. I don't know many people, haven't really any friends and don't like to push too much so this fundraising attempt has failed miserably! I plan to leave the page up for another month or so and once it ends I will add my personal donation and then send it over to the shelter.
If you would like to contribute to a great cause, you can find my Just Giving page here:
828 Miles for Vukjac Shelter

To learn more about the shelter please read this post My 90 Mile Hike at Home and this one too Fundraising During A Pandemic! 

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I wanted to share the rest of my medals too so below are:
Hadrian's Wall 90miles
Predator Series Hawk 20k (Half Marathon)
Blue Cross Rescue Run 26.2 miles (Marathon)
Virginia McKenna's 90th birthday Born Free 5k
Predator Series Black Dog 20k
Animals in War 11k 

Until next time...

Fundraising During A Pandemic

 

For more info and context, please make sure to read part one of this post here! 

One of my favourite things is to support my favourite charities. However, being not the most well off myself, but still wanting to help out has lead me to organize or take part in many fundraising events over the years. I have skydived, organized a sponsored dog walk and taken part in more 5/10/20ks than I can count on my hands. 
Not that I've mentioned it at all on this blog (that is sarcasm, I obviously have moaned about it very often), but we can't get out on our normal walks, hikes and exploring days and haven't been able to for over a year now so when trying to do something to fundraise during this pandemic I had to get a little creative.

My previous four charity events have been 20k hikes, virtual events that you complete on your own rather than with a crowd of others like a traditional distance challenge like The Great North Run or the Race for Life and so a virtual challenge was the way to proceed.
As I mentioned in the part one of this post, I chose The Conqueror Events Series and their Hadrian's Wall 90 mile distance in particular. You get to see where you are using Google Street view and get postcards during your journey which is great to spur you on. How was I going to travel 90 miles without leaving my home though?

With The Conqueror app, they actually have a whole exercise converter where you can take whatever exercise you've done and find how the equivalent distance in miles or km. Aside from completing my final couple of miles of the challenge outside, the rest I did on a mini trampoline! [FYI, I highly recommend a rebounder as a fun way to get exercise from home, especially for others like myself with arthritis or other chronic pain as it is low impact on your joints. It actually helped to improve my pains rather than make them worse considering the milage.]
Yes, I jogged, jumped, sprinted, rocked, walked and everything in between to complete the 90 miles worth of steps/distance within 24 days - an average of 3.75 miles per day. 

A completely digital way of raising money I also collected my sponsors fully online. I used Just Giving's Crowdfunder website where 18 wonderfully kind supporters raised £240 for my chosen recipient Vucjak Shelter. Make sure to read this post to learn more about them or visit their website https://www.vucjakshelter.org/ to see just how awesome they are. 

With the Crowdfunder website, you do have to pay a small percentage in fees so what was donated wasn't all received, however I made up the small extra amount and donated a straight £250 / €276 to the shelter on the 22nd of February.

I was so over the moon to hear that those funds went towards spaying and neutering two male and two female dogs (as you can see in the image below)! Such an incredibly important procedure. 

Obviously, as always, I wish I could have done more but I am so incredibly grateful to every single person who donated, shared and sent kind words. You will never understand what things like this mean to me and I need to make it clear that I do not want thanks or praise. I do these things because my dream is to have an animal sanctuary and while my dream may not be a reality, I want to show my intense appreciation and awe of all the extremely hard work people like Dejan put in to help those who have been let down by other humans. 

I urge you to follow Vucjak Shelter on their social media to see how life is at the shelter on a daily basis. Such difficult circumstances, but so much love. Please take the opportunity to donate to small organizations like this and other rescues, rehabs and sanctuaries as often as you can. A pound or two that you would spend on a drink or a chocolate bar can do wonders for smaller charities if we all just try and help.
Thank you.

Until next time...

My 90 Mile Hike at Home

 

On January 11th I began travelling the distance of Hadrian's Wall...from my living room.
Years ago I had planned an actual, in-person, trek of Hadrian's Wall. However, those who had initially said they were going to do it with me, all dropped, out one by one, and left me alone which would be an unsafe journey. After that, I never had another opportunity to complete the challenge...until now.

I have taken part in multiple other virtual distance events, raising money for a range of charities including Born Free and Saving the Survivors, so obviously the internet often advertises different events to me and at the start of the year I came upon The Conqueror Events Series who provided me that opportunity I needed. 

There are multiple reasons I decided to sign up to their 90 miles (145 km) Hadrian's Wall Virtual Challenge but the most important is that I am using this as a fundraising event to try and raise funds and awareness for an amazing animal rescue shelter in Serbia. Click here to view my Just Giving and read more.

To give a quick background on the shelter, based in Kragujevac, Serbia, it is called Vucjack Shelter and has been ran by Dejan Gacic for over 20 years. They have rescued, provided medical attention, fed and sheltered the growing number of stray dogs who are abandoned, discarded, starved and abused from the surrounding areas.
Dejan never turns an animal away and as of October 1st 2020 the shelter is the home to over 900 dogs, 130 cats, 13 wolves, 2 fox and 1 jackal. (The video shown above is from 2018 so numbers etc are outdated). 

Following life at the shelter online show photos and videos of happy animals being cared for by wonderful people, but in tough conditions. With the global pandemic and a harsh winter here, donations are needed more than ever. With so many animals and a lot of work, I wanted to raise some funds to contribute to the staggering costs they incur from food and vets fees to building of new winter shelters, rent for the home where the very ill animals are housed and way more.
I urge you to check out their website Vucjakshelter.org as well as their social media pages Instagram.com/vucjakshelter to get a true look into life at Vucjak Shelter. You can sponsor individual dogs, sign up to a monthly donation via their Patreon or give one-off donations to help them keep running.

As of writing this (January 26th) I am currently 50.6 miles into the total 90 miles! Along the way, I am able to view my surroundings on the street view map, receive 'postcards' from certain interesting sites along the wall and at every 20% marker they donate toward the planting of a tree - they have helped plant 450,000 trees since August 2020 which is so cool. 
I mentioned that I am doing this all from my living room, without the help of a treadmill or bike, while fighting against arthritis, asthma and back pain issues. After putting on 4 stone in 18 months, making all my ailments way worse I had to take action and get my body back to some sort of fitness. Going for walks outside like we used to isn't an option, I've tried using a cross trainer and I couldn't take to it but, after looking into options, bought a mini rebounder and it has been such a great purchase! Low impact on my joints as well as lots of fun. From running, jogging, walking, jumping and everything in between I've managed to work out for around an hour a day minus 3 this whole month. My fitness tracker converts my efforts into miles and I post them on my 'The Conqueror' app, tada!



If you'd also like to take part in one of their virtual distance challenges, click here! They have a range of events, based all over the world, starting from 21 miles ranging all the way up to 2,280 miles. After I've completed this one I'm hoping to join the 'Ring Road' in Iceland which is 828 miles...a bit of a step up from 90 haha!
Once I do reach the finish line at Bowness-on-Solway and my medal has arrived (yep, you get a fancy medal too!) I will be sure to write another blog post to bring my challenge to a conclusion, as well as show off the rest of my postcards and hopefully update on the status of my fundraising.

No matter how many events I do take part in or even organize I always struggle to raise money despite succeeding in the challenge/event. I am an unpopular loner with no friends, I don't work therefore have no colleagues and the charities I strive to help are always for animals, often lesser-known which seems to put people off. Therefore, this will be my last. My family and I regularly contribute in many ways to multiple organizations and that will continue but I will no longer be asking for sponsorship etc. 
That being said if you are able to spare the odd pound, please please consider supporting my efforts for this super special shelter. Again, my Just Giving page can be found here >  https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/hallow90miles < and I am more appreciative than you will ever know if you decide to be so kind as to donate. Thank you and thanks to those who have already sponsored. 

Until next time...