Triglav Trek 2022- I will SUMMIT up for you.

Every year the team at Stocksigns/Messagemaker displays with friends like to push themselves above and beyond for charity. Over the past few years, they have trekked Toubkal, dashed around Dingle, swapped their beds for cardboard boxes in winter, slept rough for the night, and more. This year we have taken it to a whole another level. That level is above the clouds! Yes, we went to the clouds and above. After two failed dates, now third time lucky it was finally time to take on the mighty Mt Triglav! This is Slovenia’s largest mountain and it stands at 9396ft, just shy of 3,000m in elevation. We climbed this mountain for over two days. The charity for this year’s challenge is The Children’s Trust. The UK’s leading charity for children with injury. Based in Tadworth (local to our Stocksigns/Messagemaker HQ) the Trust runs a range of specialist care, education and therapy services for children and young people from across the UK and is the UK’s largest rehabilitation centre for children with acquired brain injury. Day 1 The only way is up… we climbed a total of 5025ft elevation. We walked just over 5 miles to get to the mountain hut. Which doesn’t sound like a lot, it took us just under 5 hours to climb. When we started at the bottom we were all very chatty, it didn’t take long for it to change, it was a constant climb and the chats became a little breathless. We passed beautiful cows and were lucky enough to spot a couple of Ibex, who looked incredibly graceful walking up and down the side of the mountains, unlike our scrambles! When we finally decided to lay our heads down for the night, we were not in for a quiet night I am not talking about the snoring and sleep talking, a storm was brewing, and we had thunder and lightning very very frightening! Day 2 Winter is coming! To the Summit 1200ft elevation. Forgot whatever heat wave England is having, we have had storms and hail/snow. We are all dressed for the North Pole! Never underestimate extreme and unpredictable mountain weather. Thankfully we had all Come prepared for any weather conditions. We left the mountain hut at 4.30 am with our guides and safety equipment to make our journey to the summit. The summit is about a 2.5km scramble, this roughly took us 1.30 hours, the climbing route (via Ferrata)… What is a Via Ferrata, you may ask? Well, a Via Ferrata is a mountain pathway that consists of a series of rails, cables, and bridges that lead you from the starting point to the end, walking next to the rock’s face, a tad scary. There were so many technical sections. If you are not one for heights then this is not for you. I’ve never thought of myself as scared of heights, but the via Ferrata definitely had me wondering what the hell I had signed up for, and can only imagine the others were thinking the same too! That climb was an uphill battle, the struggles some of us were facing were not fun. When we made it to the top it was all downhill from then! Eventually, after scrambling on our feet, hands, and even our bottoms, we finally made it. The view was, as I expected incredible, with all the endorphins kicking in, we felt on top of the world. While we were physically tired climbing up to the peak, it was more about mental fatigue going down. There was lots of bottom sitting and crawling down, we were not graceful like the mountain goats! We are so pleased and proud to share with you that we raised over £15,000 for the Children’s Trust in Tadworth. Thank you all for your support and donations, this fantastic amount of money, and will go a long way in helping this fantastic charity. The Stocksigns team was joined by friends from Balfour Beatty, Gatwick Airport, Nebosh, Tennants UK, and more. They are proud to share with you that w over £15,000 has been raised for the Children’s Trust.