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Support Our Emergency Relief Container for Haiti

Over the last few months, Haiti has been suffering a major humanitarian crisis. In 2020, the country was hit by the pandemic, overwhelming the already fragile healthcare system and worsening its pre-existent economic situation. After decades of instability, the country has once again been plunged into political turmoil after Haiti’s President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated last month in Port-au-Prince. To make matters worse, on August 14th, Haiti was hit by a devastating 7.2 magnitude earthquake. Nearly 2,000 people have died and around 10,000 people have been injured. On Tuesday, the situation was exacerbated by the tropical storm Grace that swept through causing heavy rain, major floods and landslides. Our hearts go out to everyone who has been affected by this devastating earthquake.

Together with our long-standing local partner, Hope Health Action (with whom we have built our HHA Walkabout Wheelchair Distribution Centre in Cap Haitian), we have identified the need for an emergency container of 80 wheelchairs to be issued in the southwest of the country, the epicentre of the earthquake.

As we continue to #PrayForHaiti, we ask for your help in providing these 80 vital wheelchairs for those who are injured and have lost everything. One wheelchair costs £250 ($300). 80 wheelchairs will cost us £20,000 ($24,000). Please, help us help Haiti today and donate to our emergency relief campaign. Click the donate button to help us change 80 lives today.

Impact Overland For Kenya

Walkabout’s Virtual Cook-Along!

Wednesday, April 7th 5:30 pm BST (12:30 pm EST)

Get your aprons, cooking hats and rolling pins ready and gather your budding chefs to the kitchen! Walkabout Foundation is hosting its first-ever virtual Pizza Cook-Along with our co-founder, Carolina. Get ready to turn up the heat, as this is the perfect chance to cook a delicious pizza dinner (or lunch) as a family and eat up for a good cause!

To sign up, simply donate a minimum of £20 (or $30) by clicking on the button on the right and you will receive a Zoom link and the list of ingredients.

100% of your donation will go 100% to our programs.

Luis’ Birthday Campaign!

Walkabout is so excited to celebrate our co-founder Luis’ birthday on Tuesday, the 29th of September!

As September marks Spinal Cord Injury Awareness Month, we’re asking you to celebrate Luis’ birthday with us by making a donation in his honour and helping us get one step closer to finding a cure for paralysis!  

In order for Walkabout to continue funding The Shirley Ryan AbilityLab’s study: Boosting Spinal Cord Plasticity in Humans with Chronic Spinal Cord Injury we need to raise $55,000!

Help us reach this goal today!

#GivingTuesdayNow

Dear Friends,

We are all facing unprecedented challenges under the weight of the COVID-19 pandemic, but here at Walkabout Foundation, we are really taking a huge hit as our fundraising events for this spring and summer have been cancelled, and we have had to postpone so many different initiatives and activities we had planned. 

Many of you may have heard of “GIVING TUESDAY” which typically takes place on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving day. As a result of this global crisis, the charitable sector has launch #GIVINGTUESDAYNOW, a global day of giving and unity, to take place on Tuesday, May 5th around the world.

We would like to take the opportunity to ask you to help the 30 severely disabled kids we host in Nanyuki, Kenya each day, whose families live on less than one dollar a day, and who rely on our support to have 3 meals a day and much needed physical rehabilitation. Our centre has had to close down and is on the verge of closing down indefinitely if we can’t find a way to fundraise. We have set up a #GVINGTUESDAYNOW fundraising page on our site and we ask that you kindly consider donating any amount to help us keep our Kenyan centre alive. It costs us £300 pounds a year to maintain each child, so perhaps you may consider sponsoring a child for a year. We promise it will be a gift you will not regret and a gift that keeps on giving.

With all our love and gratitude,

The Walkabout Team

Carolina’s Birthday Campaign

Dear friends,

The past few weeks have been difficult, uncertain and frightening for many of us. That’s why, this Mother’s Day, we feel it is more important than ever to give thanks for the hope, kindness and love that mothers bring into the world every day.

Last month, I visited our Walkabout Wheelchair Centre in Kenya, where we assemble and provide wheelchairs to people across the country, as well as offering rehabilitation to children with disabilities and training programmes to their carers.

In the majority of cases we see in Kenya, the main carer of a child with a disability is their (often single) mother, and I met many during my visit. As a mother of two myself, I was particularly struck by two things: firstly, the strength of the love that these mothers had for their children, despite their often incredibly difficult situation; and secondly, the multifaceted way that our centre is helping these mothers.

A wheelchair makes it easier for a mother to take her child out with her – meaning she no longer has to leave her child alone when going to work or to the shops. It also often means that a child can go to school for the first time – giving mum the time to get a job. The rehabilitation that the children receive often leads to great improvements in their condition, making their care easier. And, perhaps most importantly, the training and counselling programme offered to carers – which covers everything from physical exercises, to feeding, to understanding disability – gives mothers the tools they need to put their love into practice in the best way possible.

So, today, on a day to show our gratitude to mothers everywhere – and a day that also happens to be my birthday! – I ask you to celebrate with me in a special way. Let’s give more mothers, like those I met in Kenya, the possibilities that are opened up by giving mobility to their child.  Please, donate today!

Walkabout Kenya Team – Desert Wheel Race!

Dear friends,

Lucy, Peris, Carol and Sam from our Walkabout Kenya gang will be taking part in The Desert Wheel Race on 12th October (Peris and Sam) and The Desert Fashion Gala on the evening of 11th October (Carol and Lucy) in Isiolo County, Kenya. The Desert Wheel Race is a patented annual flagship event in Kenya, organized by NONDO, a Public Benefit Organization that advocates for the rights, inclusion and participation of persons with disability in Kenya.

Help them fundraise enough money to provide 10 wheelchairs for disabled children in a local rehabilitation school!

These guys know first-hand what it’s like to live with a disability. They work tirelessly at our Wheelchair Assembly Centre in Nanyuki to not only provide wheelchairs to people in need, but they also are an amazing example to the beneficiaries, fighting stigma attached to disability in Kenya and proving that if you’re differently-abled you can still do all the cool things!

“Disability is not inability and I believe in myself. I can do better and encourage other ladies with disability to have self-confidence and self-esteem when it comes to representing their talent in a congregation. Walkabout Foundation helped me to be independent, they encourage me to accept my condition, and give me ways to improve it – it’s not just mobility it’s possibility.” – says Carolyne, Wheelchair Assembler.

“This NONDO fashion show means a lot to me because I have never done this before, nor even thought that I would be able to stand in front of more than two people, it’s like a dream to me. I am so excited. Also I will be able to interact with other people living with disability and those who have lost hope, to show them that it’s not the end of the world. “Be Happy!”” – Lucy, Office Assistant at our Wheelchair Centre.

Help Lucy, Peris, Carol and Sam reach their target – Donate Today! Every penny counts!

Peris and Sam.

Carolyne and Lucy.

 

Miss Daisy’s Nursery fundraising for Walkabout

Wheelchairs from Wetherby

Friends of St. Nicholas Fundraising for Walkabout

Walkabout’s mission is to restore dignity, freedom and independence to people with mobility disabilities by providing wheelchairs and rehabilitation in the developing world and funding research to find a cure for paralysis.

Sponsor a child for part of a break per lap or pledge to donate a wheel, and together we can help Walkabout Foundation provide wheelchairs around the world to those that need them most.

 

Camilla & Gatien’s Prudential RideLondon-100 2019

Dear Friends and Family,

We will be completing (or attempting to!) the Prudential RideLondon-Surrey 100 on Sunday 4th August 2019. For those of you that don’t know what this entails, it’s 100 miles (160km!) cycling through arguably, the best capital city in the world, and the one we call home, London.

100 miles in under 6.5 hours is our target (that is as far from a casual stroll along regents canal as one could imagine!) In addition to the edgy streets of east London and the leafy avenues of Richmond, we’ll also have to battle the Surrey Hills (which include the infamous box hill) – let’s hope we make it, because we aren’t only doing it because it’s the challenge of a lifetime, but mainly in the name of mobility.

As many of you know, Camilla worked at Walkabout Foundation and was witness, first hand, to the importance of their work and just how much difference a wheelchair can make in someone’s life. Take Selina for example. Born with cerebral palsy, Selina has never been able to walk, therefore relying on her older siblings to carry her to school. As she grew, she became too heavy for her sisters to bear her weight on the three hour walk, so they would often leave her on the side of the road and only pick her up on their way back home. Now, thanks to her first ever wheelchair, Selina will be able to return to school and play with her siblings. For Selina, her wheelchair means the opportunity to have a childhood – something that every little girl deserves.

It is for all young girls like Selina that we are setting off for this challenge this year, to not only raise money, but also awareness of this fantastic charity, where every penny that give goes directly to Walkabout’s programmes due to their 100% promise. So loosen up your purse strings, and please donate to our cause today.

If you do, we’ll send you a sweaty selfie with our medals at the end, and we’ll be forever grateful. At the end of our campaign we’ll be able to share updates with you on the exact beneficiaries whose lives you’ll have single-handledly helped us change, and their happy faces!

We also hope to seeing as many of you as possible cheering us on the day. For those not able to make it, you can follow our progress and results on our Strava pages: Camilla & Gatien

Thank you so much in advance for your support!

Camilla & Gatien

Pamela Hartling’s London Marathon 2019