Former librarian walks 91 miles for cancer research

A WOMAN from Sonning Common walked 91 miles through the Scottish Highlands to raise money for cancer research.

Rosemary Dunstan, 69, finished the Rob Roy Way over eight days, adding 12 miles of the West Highland Way to the south to her route.

She has now raised half of her £2,000 fundraising target, which will be donated to the Institute for Cancer Research to fund research into the prevention of and cure for cancer.

Ms Dunstan started the walk on Saturday, October 18 at Milngavie and reached Pitlochry the following Saturday.

She said she was “well blessed” with the weather over the week and faced downpours on one of the days.

Ms Dunstan said: “I only had one day when it was absolutely pouring, and I got soaked.

“The worst bit about it was the end of the day, when I got to Aberfoyle, I was walking up the road to the bed and breakfast house and a car went through a puddle by me.

“It felt as though I had a bucket of cold water thrown over me — so that was the low point.

“I was literally dripping. I turned up at the bed and breakfast place, the lady was so kind and turned the heating on and got all those airers out and we managed to get everything dry by the next day, which was good. After that it was mostly sunshine, with odd bits of drizzle.

“Looking back at my photos now, even the photos that I took in the mist and the drizzle, they look absolutely gorgeous.”

The walk was the 23rd undertaken for the charity by Ms Dunstan, who was the librarian at Sonning Common Library for 20 years before retiring last year.

Last year, she raised £1,200 walking the Coast2Coast route from St Bees Head in Cumbria to Robin Hood’s Bay in North Yorkshire, which took two weeks.

The year before, she completed West Highland Way, which adjoins with the southern end of Rob Roy Way.

Ms Dunstan said that she decided to restrict her walking to one week so her legs wouldn’t be “complaining” at the end.

She said: “Last year I did the coast to coast which took two weeks and that I found absolutely exhausting, so this only being a week was fine.

“There was one long day where it was 16 miles and at the end of that I could feel that my legs were complaining.

“They were fine after a night’s rest and the next day it was okay. I think a week’s worth of walking I can manage, anything longer than that and I might be really tired.

“I am getting older of course but I’m not finished yet.”

Ms Dunstan said the walk was relatively quiet compared to those she has done in the past.

She said she only saw four other walkers on the Rob Roy Way, significantly fewer than that which she had encountered on other walks.

She said: “I do like walking on my own but it was a little lonely because I also like chatting to people.

“I only came across four other people who were doing the Rob Roy Way, which is amazing.

“Usually, you’d meet about 15 to 20 a day at least. On the first day there were about half a dozen couples or groups who were walking the West Highland Way.

“So I thought, this is going to be good, if I find the same number of people walking the Rob Roy Way but they weren’t, they simply weren’t.

“I don’t know if it’s not been publicised enough, if it’s not quite as interesting as the West Highland Way, it’s certainly easier walking than the West Highland Way.”

Ms Dunstan said along the way she enjoyed scenic views and took notice of industrial archaeology.

She said: “The scenery in Scotland is just fantastic anyway, but there were bits of industrial archaeology where we went through various water systems, walked by pipelines dating from the 19th century construction of waterways.

“There was a stone circle that I passed. I saw houses, really out of the way you would come across a house, and you would think, ‘gosh, fancy living here’.

“I was disappointed I didn’t see any red squirrels because there were signs on the road saying beware of them.

“I was a bit sad about that, otherwise, it was just beautiful. But I’m in love with Scotland so there you go.”

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