Charity Walks.........

My aunt Liz posted this on my Facebook page................."Janice Hines Schaub, just watched two girls jogging along our road and thought, wow, they've got energy. Then I remembered May 1967, Mark was 14 months and Laurajane Schaub Rodriguez just 5 months. I was working, picking Mark up from your house at 4.30, getting home, cooking dinner for he that had had a hard day at work, doing chores, then popping Mark in his pushchair and walking down Bidwell Hill, along Thorn Turn, then the A5 Chalk Cutting, back up to the village. Practicing for the 50 mile Cancer Charity Walk. Was good for me and good for Mark as he had my undivided attention, the pushchairs then had the kids facing Mum so I could chat to him all the way. Do you remember the actual walk? What fun that was, Sat night 8.00pm start, full moon, you had your transistor radio and tuned into local station who were playing requests for us. We had some little battery lights which clipped on our coats for safety but we turned them off for modesty when we had to dive behind bushes and then fell over in the dark! By 3.00am we had done 25 miles and were done for, but that was good going. We had to wait until around 6.00 am for a lift home so got there just as everyone was getting up. By the time I had got Mark up, fed him etc there was no time for a nap as someone was coming to buy our kitchen cabinet, so I had to keep going all day Sunday and was not at all sympathetic to other AC employees who couldn't make it to work on Monday! I still have my certificate for the 25 miles, we raised a lot of money but ohhhh the blisters and aching muscles. So, where did I get all that energy from, I wonder. And where has it gone?" Says Liz.

I see kids doing charity walks now and often think of that one. We had friends and family pay so much per mile, they assumed we would not get very far and were quite generous. We did 25 miles on that particular walk. I later did another one and manage 35 miles. Funny though I don't remember that one.

We walked up to Dunstable to the start and then doubled back to begin the 50 mile trek. We walked through the village and down Bidwell Hill, up Lords Hill to Toddington and onwards from there. They had people in cars spotting for us. A couple of ambulances patrolled the route. I think we had got as far as Toddington when we heard that the first people (Army) had completed the walk. Amazing. We were already dragging. It was fun though, especially as it was in the dark most of the time and out in the country.

Liz said about our little lights that we wore so that any traffic would see us..............well the first trip into the bushes we forgot to turn them off so were sort of glowing in the shrubbery. What a laugh we had about that. We probably expected it to be creepy walking out in the countryside in the dark of night, it wasn't though. We were young and that made it all fun. I can't remember who was with us now but we stuck together and kept on going even when it got hard to put one foot in front of the other. Around midnight a car stopped to ask if we were walking on or if we wanted to go home it was last call till morning. Maybe it was the idea of being out all night that kept us going because we did. I remember sitting on a farm gate when we just could not take another step. Heard my very first Dawn Chorus. First a Black Bird said hello, answered by another. Then a few more chimed in until the whole neighbourhood was singing and the sun was coming up. Eventually someone stopped and took us home. I went to bed exhausted. When I got up again my legs were so sore I could not move them. I had to slide down the stairs on my bum.....I couldn't walk. I did go to work on Monday though.

I agree where has all that energy gone. We are elderly now I suppose and walking one mile is an effort. Back then we spent Friday and Saturday nights dancing and walked a lot, thought nothing of walking to town rather than catching the bus. Was much nicer walking over Dog Kennels. Margaret and I would often walk to Dunstable and back just to see who we could see out an about. Now I suppose we don't walk unless we have to. If I was still in England it would be a different thing indeed, much easier to walk there. Sidewalks everywhere. Sigh!!!
As we have no pictures of this event (I do have my certificate somewhere) I am using local views.