The Challenge

This year, we're joining the Grand Appeal in a charity ride from London to Paris, to raise money for sick and injured babies and children at Bristol Children’s Hospital and the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. The ride will be over four days, covering about 130km a day.

The Extra Bit

To make this a bit more of a challenge, I'm also going to ride the 230km from Bristol to London the day before the start of the official ride. So I'll be riding 730km over 5 days. I'll post a link to the extra day of riding here, when finalised.

The Impact

Here are some examples of the impact your donations could have:

· £50 could provide a music therapy session for a premature baby, helping to calm and improve their breathing. ‘Darla was in hospital until she was nine months old. Usually, she would lie quite still but music therapy encouraged her to move her muscles and focus on the lights and sounds.’ Tina, Cheltenham

· £70 could buy toys, games, books and magazines to distract and entertain children of all ages. 'Our hospital stays would be 10 times worse without the toys, DVDs and oncology playroom, all funded by The Grand Appeal.' Victoria, Bristol

· £110 could pay for the video messaging service V-create for a week, allowing hospital staff to send video updates of babies to parents when they have to leave their bedside. Mum Katie was so pleased to receive regular video and photo updates of her baby boy, it meant the world to her when she had to leave Finley’s side.

· £200 Could support the running of our family accommodation house for a week, providing somewhere comfortable to stay for parents, minutes from their child's bedside. ‘We were scared confused and tired, having someone provide clean and quiet accommodation was the kindest thing. we also met other families going through the same thing who really understood what we were going through.’ Joe, Bristol

· £1,500 could pay for a family support practitioner for one month, providing a vital emotional and practical help to parents, grandparents and siblings to enable them to cope more easily with having a very sick child. 'You helped us during our most stressful time in our life; on one side our baby was fighting for his life and during all the financial issues we had, you were an angel who helped and helped us.’ Hannah, Cornwall

More Links

Find out more about some of the babies, children and families, who have benefitted from the charity's support by reading the patient stories section on our website.