4 weeks – it all about the money!

26 days to go today and we can nearly forget the fundraising and move onto focusing onto the expedition itself! Only nearly though – I have been to the bank twice this week to make about 10 different deposits. We made £650 profit on the Barn Dance which although was off target we none the less had a wonderful warm summers evening dancing. Chris LW and family have raised £400 in total with jewellery sales at various events and Jonathan D about £300 from various boot sales and coffee mornings – these are fantastic individual achievements. We have had £1000 matched fundraising approved by Barclays – thanks to Jen Lilo and Susie Warren – so the Dog Show would have made £2300 total profit – absolutely fantastic! With gift aid we should go over the fundraising target but the grant target is still about £2000 short so any other individual efforts are greatly appreciated. We have sent the first lot of £2000 to the Gambians to start clearing the land for the building of their sun shelter / training area – a 14m diameter circular building and we have another £2000 ready to send on this – this is also still a bit short of the target but will start a longer lasting legacy of this trip. Participants weekend next weekend 5th/6th at Hargreaves Scout Campsite and the participant’s and parent’s briefing – hope to see you all there. Exciting times and getting really close!