Nurse plans to trek to new heights to raise funds for Marie Curie

ENDEAVOUR: Jane McLelland from Anstruther has signed up for South African challenge to raise £10,000

A Fife nurse is hoping to raise £10,000 for Marie Curie to mark her 10th year working for the charity which supports people living with terminal illness.

Senior healthcare assistant Jane McLelland, 54, from Anstruther, has signed up to the South Africa Trek for Scotland with friend and chairwoman of the Marie Curie St Andrews fundraising group, Sue Lydon.

The pair are now fundraising for the challenge in September next year, when they will be walking up to seven hours each day.

Their journey will take in the grasslands, woodland and valleys of the Royal Natal National Park, culminating in a 9,678ft climb to the top of the Drakensberg Mountains.

Jane said: “I wanted to do the trek to mark my 10 years and I’m calling it ‘walking with memories’ because I hope people will donate in memory of someone we’ve cared for so that in the future someone else will benefit.

“The type of care Marie Curie nurses are able to give people in their own home, one on one, is very important.

“I don’t look at it as caring for dying people in their last moments. I see it as helping people live.”

She added: “One memory of a lady I was caring for is very vivid. She was a Russian ballerina and she told us all we had bad posture!

“Her last wish was that her two boxes of very expensive Champagne were opened and that everyone who came to the house enjoyed a glass.”

Jane said she was very passionate about raising awareness for Marie Curie and the fact they do not just care for people who have terminal cancer. “It’s all terminal illnesses,” she said. “Every family I’ve cared for has stayed in my memory and when I’m in South Africa I’ll be able to look back and take in all those days and what Marie Curie has achieved for people.”

Training and fundraising for the challenge has already begun in earnest for Jane and anyone wanting to donate can visit justgiving.com/fundraising/ angela-jane-mclelland

Marie Curie nurses in Fife made 4,062 visits to terminally ill people last year with 97% of those seen able to die in their place of choice, often at home.

The charity needs to raise £15 million every year to run its services in Scotland.

I wanted to do the trek to mark my 10 years and I’m calling it ‘walking with memories’. JANE MCLELLAND