We are over half way through April and The Big Bra Hunt.
The picture is of the Oxfam shop window in Abingdon.
“Oxfam launched the ‘Big Bra Hunt’ on Sunday 1 April 2012, appealing women to dig deep into their drawers and donate their forgotten, spare and unwanted bras to Oxfam in Abingdon, or any other Oxfam branch in the UK, throughout the month of April.“
A group of scantily clad young men came through town on Saturday collecting money for one of their good causes. Last time I pictured the Didcot Thong Rangers in Abingdon it was back in November 2008 when they were pulling a truck for Breast Cancer research. This time they are raising money to help a baby with Meningitis. With them were some young ladies on roller scates – the Rangerettes – on a 16 Mile Rollerskating Challenge Didcot-Abingdon-Didcot. I was too slow to catch the Rangerettes.
I see today that a van has taken away the last of the stock from the YMCA shop in Abingdon. They had to vacate by the end of the month as their old premises is getting knocked down in the cause of progress.
Visit the YMCA website to find where there are YMCA shops still “Helping Young people build a future.”
Most years the annual Christian Aid walk clashes with the Boundary Walk (see yesterday’s article), but not this year. A lot of the Christian Aid participants were presumably in church on New Year’s Day and so the walk was put back to Bank Holiday Monday.
The walk started at St Michael’s Church at 10 am. Route leaflets with maps cost £1. So that money, together with donations, and sponsorship helped raise funds for Christian Aid.
The route headed from St Michael’s through Albert Park, and then through some residential areas before hitting a country path that led over Lodge Hill to Radley College.
Here are two walkers passing near the famous Radley Oak, a tree of unknown age but said to have been rejected by ship builders during the Napoleonic Wars because it was misshapen. In the centre of this picture is a man often seen in the Oxfam Shop. He was one of the founding members of Oxfam, Abingdon over 40 years ago and still does the accounts, and helps in the shop.
The walkers stopped for a coffee break at Radley Church Hall then returned to Abingdon via Radley Lakes and along the sustrans cycle path. Bank Holiday Monday is likely to be the sunniest day of the week, and there were lots of other people out walking, cycling and running. The sustrans Route 5 cycle path was the busiest I have seen it. Cycles could not move for walkers at times.