Emma raises twice her target for Caithness General Hospital after sponsored walk around Wick area – 28.28 miles for her 28th birthday
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A young Wick woman has raised more than twice her target amount in a fundraiser to support Caithness General Hospital with her JustGiving page currently sitting at £1015.
Emma Evans decided to walk 28.28 miles on her 28th birthday to support Caithness General's A&E Department which had helped an ill family member last year.
"Without them it would have been a very different story today," said Emma.
Last year, Emma walked 27 miles on her 27th birthday "just randomly" on her own and since she enjoyed it so much she thought she would repeat the experience this year but with a fundraiser attached to make it "much more worth it".
On her JustGiving page Emma writes: "I did it for the NHS and for how well they have worked over the pandemic. We cannot fault the level of professionalism, respect and care that gets given at the times we need it most and I truly believe the staff go above and beyond past their duties to offer reassurance when we have little hope."
The idea was to raise £500 for the local hospital, so Emma set off on her fundraising walk at around 8am and took pictures of a beautiful sunrise over Old Wick Castle.
"The weather was brilliant from first thing in the morning up until around 4pm roughly. On the last three miles of my walk the heavens opened and completely soaked me right through but it didn't bother me as much as I thought it would. I was on a high all day doing the walk with messages coming through from so many people every two minutes – it was lovely."
At around the 10-mile mark, Emma went by her workplace at Nucleus: The Nuclear and Caithness Archives, where she was joined by some of her colleagues who were given time off to join her on the walk. "Some of them even went home and had taken their dogs to Noss to meet me for a mile or two," she added.
"I walked a total of 59,830 steps and had to run the odd mile or so as I felt that the walkers who joined me slowed me down a bit and I didn't want my time to be bad compared to last year's.
She worked out that the 28.28 mile walk was the equivalent of "76 floors climbed and 237 zone minutes covered".
"I ended the weekend away in Aberdeen with my partner in a hot tub for my birthday and found it very easy to walk in my heels for dinner but I couldn't walk in trainers to save my life. Surprisingly, I wasn't as sore as I was last year which was a bonus. I hope to do this every year for my birthday as long as I'm fit to and for a different cause each time."
Though Emma's walk took place in February her fundraising page is still open for donations and recently broke past £1000 to double her original target of £500.
If anyone would like to give further donations, the JustGiving page is at: www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/amileintheirshoes
