Peak of courage: Amputee Crawls up Ben Nevis
DETERMINED dad Paul Ellis has beaten Ben Nevis again – by crawling up it.
The double amputee strapped on knee pads to scale Britain’s highest mountain in just 12 hours, despite snow near the top.
The brave 57-year-old fundraiser had conquered the 4,413ft (1,345m) peak before on prosthetics, but put them aside this time to show how tough amputees can be.
Father of two Paul, from Widnes, Cheshire, said: “It was a very hard challenge which left my knees and back very sore. But I made the decision to crawl because I wanted to get people’s attention.
“It was gruelling and at times it was quite emotional, but I just kept going. I was made up when I completed the challenge... to help raise funds to give amputee children the holiday of a lifetime.”
Paul, who is not currently working, had a fall in 1992 which left his legs paralysed. A break led to him needing the double below-the-knee amputation in 2008.
Following the surgery, he has used a wheelchair or walked on prosthetic legs.
He became friends last year with Ben Lovell, founder of the Amp Camp charity.
Tough
Paul has completed challenges to help Amp Camp, including scaling Ben Nevis and Snowdon on his prosthetic legs several times with the charity’s team.
But this crawl up “the Ben” was his toughest task. He said: “I knew it would be very hard. I had walked it before so I made the choice to crawl. I wanted to get people’s attention and show what amputees can do.”
He set up a GoFundMe online page to attract donations and was helped on the trek by a team of 30. They camped overnight at the summit and Paul said: “When I got to the top, I could have cried my eyes out. Such an amazing feeling.”
The walk back down next day using his prosthetics was “more painful” than the ascent due to soreness in his muscles but he said: “Seeing my family again was fantastic. There were lots of big hugs.”
He plans more fundraising missions, saying: “When I went to Amp Camp [Tenerife] it was out of this world. I had never even been in the sea before! It’s an amazing charity.”