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Great
Walk Diary - April 7th - Day 1
Great
Walk to Beijing gets underway
A colourful
greeting party of locals welcomed Olivia’s
team to the base of Great Wall and a chorus of
singing, dancing and drumming set the walkers
on their way.
The
local greeters knew something the party of 45
did not. If the very generous locals could have
got passed the language barrier they would have
told this eclectic group of cancer survivors,
sporting stars and celebrities that what they
were about to do was going to be very tough.
In
fact within minutes of climbing on to this extraordinary
structure the visitors were confronted by some
very, very steep stairs that just didn’t
seem to end. It took little time for the walkers
to find out this was going to be tough, very tough.
Cancer
survivor, Rhonda Martinez, "It was unbelievable
- I’ve never experienced anything like it
in my entire life. It was just the wall itself,
the height, the structure, the scenery, everything,
mind-blowing".
Parts
of this apparently never ending wall have very
steep inclines, with uneven stairs, in other parts
the stairs have worn away and it’s a real
struggle not to fall forward or to slide away
on the loose debris.
When
you look up you can see the spine of the wall,
dotted with fortresses stretching for miles.
Team
leader, Olivia Newton-John, found the going heavy
at times but the group rallied around each other
and the cause. Aussie singer, Chantelle Delaney
turned both ankles but kept at it and managed
to complete the gruelling 16 kilometres, standing
on both feet.
Organisers
hope to raise around five million dollars to build
a new integrated cancer centre at the Austin Hospital
in Melbourne by getting supporters and fans to
sponsor the walkers steps’ at the website
www.greatwalktobeijing.com.
Many
of Olivia’s group have been running their
own fundraising campaigns to support their journeys.
Real-life gay cowboy, Adam Sutton spent part of
today wondering how he got into this, "the
terrain is incredible, my knee is twinging already,
this will affect people more and more as the walk
goes on".
And
go on it will for another 200 kilometres plus
and tomorrow there is bound to be many aching
limbs. Sutton strained his knee today but he’s
in the team so he won’t be letting the others
down. "there is a real bond, this is really
hard for people but there is a real sense of unity,
everyone is helping each other get through this
walk.
Hollywood
TV star Leeza Gibbons, is another committed member
of the team, "50 million people have gone
to the wall but when it’s your turn, it’s
almost like worshipping and praying and being
tired and being exhilarated all at the same time"
If
anybody says they were not challenged they are
a liar … it was really exhausting and very
challenging in certain spots. But whenever you
would think oh my gosh this is getting to be a
lot, you’d look around behind you and there
would be a cancer survivor".
"Everybody
else" kept cancer survivor Rhonda Martinez
going, "it was the company... if they hadn’t
have been there, the same people struggling alongside
me, I would have stopped".
"Yes
there’s another hill in front, another mountain,
but there’s no turning back", said
Adam Sutton. (Credit:
Great Walk to Beijing).
Profiles
(partial)
Annalise
Braakensiek
Ian
Thorpe
Cancer
Awareness
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