Gwersyllt friends walk from Wrexham to Cardiff in aid of Nightingale House

A pair of Wrexham friends battled through gale force winds, snow, hail and heavy rain to complete a 130 mile fundraising walk.

Sam Roberts and Cindy Jones, from Gwersyllt, trekked from Wrexham to Cardiff to raise well over £2,000 for Nightingale House hospice.

The Wrexham hospice, which provides free palliative care services, is close to both their hearts.

This is because Nightingale House cared for Sam’s father-in-law and Cindy’s mother-in-law in their final days.

Having off at 6am on Thursday, February 27, they faced severe weather and foot injuries but finished in Cardiff at the Principality Stadium at 5.45pm on Sunday, March 1 – St David’s Day.

Sam said: “It was a massive challenge to take on but we did it, all sorts of weather, climbing mountains and pounding the roads.

“We managed to maintain a decent pace to enable us to cover the miles we did each day.

“And our feet sure are paying the price – with doctor’s orders of ‘feet up’ and ‘rest’ prescribed.”

And they came up with a clever way to deal with flooded roads.

Sam said: “During our training days we encountered some so thought about how we could cross practically, so we used blue recycling bags.

“They’re easy to carry and we just slipped our feet in a bag each and waded very carefully through – some parts were about a foot and a half deep.

“It worked really well until we lost one of the bags on the last day, but we reverted back to childhood and waded through like we were on a three-legged race which we didn’t stop laughing at.”

They were also assisted by a farmer in Powys.

Sam explained: “We hit a flooded road were just preparing our feet with the bags as this farmer in a pickup truck pulled up and asked if we wanted a lift for about 50 to 80 metres of heavily flooded road.

“So he dropped the back boot of the truck and and we jumped on. It was probably about two foot deep there was a a high probability of getting soaked if he hadn’t have rescued us.”

And the pair paid homage to all who helped them on their journey.

Sam said: “We’ve a special big thank you for Alan Jones and Paul Roberts for the behind the scenes support – they kept us safe, fed and watered us and became our medics.”

The pair have also extended their thanks to Steve Williams of Clean Solar Solutions who provided special walking equipment, Maria from Ashleigh Court Care Home for supplying energy bars and Costa in Ruabon for providing cake and coffee, as well as various farms and bed and breakfasts for their hospitality.