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The Cycle Challenge

Who: Niels Gouw and his mum  Siobhan

Where:  from  Lancaster to Berwick-upon-Tweed via the Pennines: a route of 273 miles with 20,000 feet of ascent. 

What: Five days of epic, hilly, luggage-lugging cycling. 

Originally planned for October 2015 but postponed, due to a fractured wrist, until April 2016.

We have now completed our ride!  

Raising funds for Project Malawi 

Project Malawi is organised by 25th Stirling (Dunblane) BB Company working in partnership with  the charity "Classrooms for Malawi". Its aim is to improve education in one of the poorest and least-developed countries in the world. 

The project will sponsor the rebuilding and repair of two schools in Nansato and Psani in Malawi and send out a team to do the finishing work.  Niels is one of the 16 boys who will travel to Malawi this summer to do the work. 

The project motto is: "Learn to Build - Build to Learn".

We believe that education provides a sustainable route out of poverty. Project Malawi will make better education possible for hundreds of children but it is also about raising awareness here. Are we really some of the richest people on the planet? The Dunblane team will be immersed in a third world community and will learn the reality of this in human terms. They will also see for themselves that they are able to make a huge, positive impact through their collective efforts. Our global responsibilities can seem daunting: this is a project which will inspire a group of young people, and build the confidence which will enable them to go on to lead their communities in taking action.

Project Malawi is supported by the Dunblane Likhubula Partnership   which works with the Likhubula community where the schools are located. The project is thus augmenting an established and ongoing programme of support.  

Henry Brindle

We have chosen a family related challenge to remind us how recent our own relative affluence is and how dependent on educational opportunity. 

Henry Brindle from Blackburn, Lancashire was Niels's great grandfather. He was a well-read man with strong egalitarian principles and a love of poetry. He particularly liked Robert Burns and was wont to recite in a broad Lancashire accent, often lamenting  "Man's inhumanity to man"  and declaring "a man's a man for a' that". We hope to honour his memory with our work for Project Malawi.

The Cycle Challenge

Henry was a lifelong cyclist. Forty years ago he introduced Siobhan to cycling with the first big ride going over Waddington Fell to the threshold of, but not through, the legendary Trough of Bowland. She is, at long last,  returning to attempt to ride this favourite route of Henry's and to pass on the memories of him to the next generation. 

Day one of the challenge ride starts with  a very early train to Lancaster then 40 miles of cycling with over 4200 feet of ascent through the Trough of Bowland, over Waddington Fell to Earby Youth Hostel. Thereafter we spend four days riding the remaining 235 miles north on Sustrans route 68, the Pennine Cycleway, described as "The single most epic ride on the National Cycle Network“.  

We hope that our ambitious cycle ride will inspire you to support Project Malawi with a donation.  

Enjoy following our progress! 

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