Girlguiding IW played host to one of Girlguiding’s national ambassadors on Sunday (3rd November).
Anna McNuff is an endurance athlete, adventurer and speaker and this year her latest challenge has been to try and run the distance of 100 Marathons (2,620 miles) barefoot around Britain.
This ‘Barefoot Britain’ challenge started in the Shetland Islands on Sunday 2nd June and ends in London on Sunday 17th November. A route including Scotland, NI, Wales and the Channel Islands has been undertaken prior to the visit here on Sunday.
Anna travelled across the Solent with Red Funnel after running from Lymington to the outskirts of Southampton on the previous Friday.
Guide Section Commissioner Linda Stone, Brownie Katie Wells and Guide Keira Wells greeted Anna in St Thomas’ Square, Newport. The trio then ran with Anna and a number of other supporters at the start of her route to Ryde. Other runners carried on to Shanklin and one runner joined Anna for the 20+ mile run around the Island, which mainly followed cycle ways and footpaths.
Girlguiding IW members were invited to join Anna as part of this adventure by attending a talk on Sunday evening at The Bay CE School, Sandown. Here, Anna regaled her audience of Brownies, Guides Girlguiding IW leaders and other supporters with her exploits and spoke on her previous adventures in South America, The USA, where she visited every state, and her favourite destination- New Zealand.
Details of these exploits plus those encountered in ‘Barefoot Britain’ made for a very entertaining evening which the audience enjoyed. Anna’s talk was followed by a Q&A session.
Anna’s main thrust of the talk was ‘Be Yourself’ saying:
“Do not worry about starting things that you think you can’t finish. You usually do manage to finish them.”
Having been a Rainbow, Brownie and Guide in London, Anna has been only too pleased to support Girlguiding, the leading charity in the UK for girls and young women, by undertaking this challenge.
