Most of you know by now that pretty soon I’m going to start my round the world cycling trip. If you haven’t then read this first.

One of the first things I’m asked whenever discussing my trip is which charity I’m doing it for. I guess it’s a normal thing to do these days but I decided that I didn’t want to raise money for charity. The trip never felt like it was really going to happen. Even now, nine months after the planning began, after buying a bike, spending hundreds of pounds on equipment and organising passports and visas, it still doesn’t feel real. So the idea of the added pressure of fundraising didn’t feel like something I wanted to get involved in.

Over time though, I began to reconsider. Maybe raising some money for charity would be a good idea. Then I was faced by a new problem. Which charity to support?

I narrowed it down with two simple criteria. I enjoy working with children so I wanted the charity to focus on children. Second, as I’m cycling around the world I wanted it to be an international charity, but preferably one that works in a number of countries, including the UK.

Even with these simple criteria there were thousands of options. The big names in charity popped up as you’d expect. Oxfam, WaterAid, Cancer Research and MacMillian all topped the lists on most websites I looked at. I admit I’m a charity pessimist. I’m not sure I trust big charity, so I wanted to choose one that is big enough to make a difference but not so big that I have to question where the donated money is going.

After hours of searching I finally found my charity. It ticks all the boxes. It’s children focused. It runs and supports projects internationally and in the UK. It deals with poverty, education, child trafficking, disability and water sanitation and more.

The charity is Hope for Children.

 “There are millions of children across the world who do not have enough food to eat every day, who do not attend school, live in slums or on the streets, suffer from untreated diseases, are abused and mistreated, die early, and never get the opportunities we take for granted. These children have no one to turn to.”  – http://www.hope-for-children.org/

In order to save myself from the horror of dealing with money and sponsorship forms and all those things, I have set up a page on Justgiving.com which I hope you will use to donate. If you would like to support me and Hope for Children there are three ways to do it.

1. If you’re in the UK you can text  ‘JJVW50 £1/£3/£5/£10’ to 70070. So if you wanted to donate £5 you would text “JJVW50 £5” to 70070. Please don’t do this outside the UK as it won’t work.

2. Go to my JustGiving page here and click donate. You can use a card or PayPal to give.

3. Finally, you can give me offline donations and fill in a sponsorship form.

I have set myself a target of £5000. It’s a big target but it’s a big trip.

So please. If only to give me a little more encouragement to pedal the 10,824,742 wheel rotations(approx) it will take to push myself around the planet, support me and support Hope for Children by clicking the logo.

James Vs World