Family of seriously ill Scarborough teen raise more than £6,000 in Lyke Wake Walk charity challenge

Harriet Allen and a group of nine friends decided to set out on the Lyke Wake Walk challenge, a 42-mile trek from Osmotherly to Ravenscar across the North York Moors in 24 hours, to raise money for the Leeds Children’s Cancer Charity, Candlelighters.

“At Christmas 2020 my 17-year-old cousin Tom had a seizure and we thought it was his new Xbox causing an epileptic fit, but it wasn’t,” Harriet said. “Since then every test he went for was slightly worse news until March when he was diagnosed with a brain tumour called a Glioblastoma Multiforme, which is a very aggressive brain tumour which has limited treatment options, if any.”

Tom, who has lived in Scarborough all his life, is “a normal lad who doesn’t want any attention,” Harriet said.

When out walking with a friend, Harriet had a light-bulb moment of a sponsored charity event as the family “wanted to do something positive to focus on”.

“Ravenscar is up the road from Scarborough, so it’s our back yard,” Harriet said. “The North York Moors were where we grew up. It’s a horrendously long challenge. You can’t get much more of an endurance challenge locally than that and it was just something that is a bit of a distraction.”

After discussions with Harriet’s aunt, Tom’s mum, Tom chose the Candlelighters charity to support as they have helped the family with respite and bucket list activities.

Harriet said that the walk was “brilliant” on the day.

“On the Friday we thought we might have to cancel because there were horrendous storms forecast and we met up at 5am at Osmotherly with a beautiful sunrise over the Cleveland Way. The hours just seemed to tick by,” she said.

The group of 10 core walkers of Harriet, Megan, Rebecca and Amy, who all went to school together, and Gemma, Chris, Pete, Helen, Luke and Tom, were joined by friends and family on and off during the challenge.

The walkers took a lunch break at the Lion Inn at Blakey Ridge who put on a spread of sandwiches for free. The group were met by friends and family at the pub. “It was very emotional,” Harriet said.

During the next section they were joined by walkers’ children, nieces and nephews who provided a morale boost as they “were really up for it jumping in all the puddles” at a boggy part of the moors.

Harriet said: “The weather suddenly deteriorated, at about 8pm it started to rain and it got dark at 9.30pm and the last leg was done in pitch black. It was absolutely hammering it down, we all had blisters and were thoroughly fed up by that point.”

The group could not see the finishing point as they approached due to the weather. Harriet’s dad turned his car around and put his full-beam headlights on as they approached the end, which was like “walking towards a bright spaceship,” Harriet said. The group completed their walk at 11.55pm on August 7.

“I'm really, really proud and quite emotional as well because my friends have been so, so supporting throughout the diagnosis," Harriet said.

"I’m a bit in shock that we managed to do it, I’m fitter than I ever thought I was and to have that resilience for everyone; I’m just so proud and so grateful."

The group have raised more than £6,300. To donate visit the Candlelighters website.