August has been a busy month of fundraising at Growing Well with two key annual events taking place only a few weeks apart, the first being our Cross Bay Walk on Sunday 13th August.
We’re always grateful of the opportunity to walk across the magnificent Morecambe Bay under the expert guidance of Michael Wilson from The Guide Over Sands Trust.
The walk is only possible at certain times of the year, and we set off at the slightly later time of 4.30pm which meant that we were finishing at Grange-Over-Sands not long before sunset.
Despite horrendous weather the day before and the day after we were lucky enough to get a perfect sunny afternoon and after checking in our group of nearly 200 participants (including lots of dogs!) we set off promptly after a quick briefing.
The length of the walk varies each day, depending on the route taken and this year our walk was around 10km, or six miles in length and most participants completed it in around 2.5 hours.
You can check out our exact route in the picture below, sent to us by one of our supporters, Kelvin James who also took the magnificent panoramic picture which gives a wonderful view of the expanse of Morecambe Bay.
Our second major event was Growing Well’s attendance at Cartmel Races on Bank Holiday Monday, 28th August, the last day of their annual racing calendar. Once again, we were fortunate that the weather held out for us, and we enjoyed another sunny and warm day.
Cartmel Racecourse are a supporter of many local charities, and we were very appreciative that once again they selected us as their nominated charity of the day, giving us lots of opportunities to raise awareness of our work and do some all-important fundraising to support the ongoing delivery of our services to those who need us.
We set up our bright orange gazebo and our human fruit machine game, check out our picture below – there really was no missing us! We were joined by several staff and volunteers during the day who generously gave up their Bank Holiday and thankfully were more than happy to get dressed up in our vegetable costumes and wander round chatting with the thousands of racegoers, spreading the word about our charity and the valuable work we do within our local Cumbrian communities.
These events and the many others we get involved with throughout the year are vitally important for us to ensure that local people are aware of who we are, the support that we can provide to those struggling with their mental health and how to access us.
However, they also serve a crucial role too in helping us to raise much needed funds. This year these two events combined have raised nearly £3000, a sum which almost covers the cost of us providing a place to a beneficiary at one of our sites, one day a week for up to a year.