Rainbow rovers will SHINE tomorrow

1:30pm Friday 25th July 2008

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A convoy of four rainbow striped Land Rovers will be appearing at the Lions Fun Day at Goodwick Parrog tomorrow (Saturday) to raise awareness and funds for the Rainbow Run, an overland adventure from Goodwick to the Gambia.

A total of eight series three Land Rovers, all painted in colourful stripes, will leave Pembrokeshire in March 2009 stocked up with educational, health and mechanical supplies for a one month overland journey to the Gambia, via Spain, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania, and Senegal.

The teams will donate all eight vehicles and their contents to the Gambian charity SHINE Africa, a registered charity that works to support nursery education in one of Africa's poorest countries.

They will then pay for their own flights home.

They also hope to have raised enough money to help SHINE build another school with a clean water supply.

The run has developed from the experiences of two Fishguard men in the Plymouth Banjul Challenge two years ago.

Norman Madison and Howard Bancroft braved deserts, minefields and gun toting border guards and donated their Land Rover to SHINE at the end of the run.

"Late in 2007 we thought it would be a neat idea to do it again," said the pair.

The idea to do the trip independently in a small convoy of Land Rovers soon caught on and before long other people had asked if they could join in.

They soon had eight interested teams and decided that all of them should travel in Land Rovers due to their superior ability to handle the difficult terrain of the desert.

Four of the eight Land Rovers have now been prepared, with four moer needing both mechanical and paper work to be completed.

These will be on display at the Lions fun day this weekend where the Rainbow Run teams and supporters will be raising funds for SHINE by selling ducks for the river race and tickets for various supporter events – including the Mediterranean Night to be held at The Drovers Arms, Puncheston on the 1st August 2008 For more information about the trip, future events and currents news log on to http://www.therainbowrun.org/