An 11-year-old has raised thousands for charity after managing to climb the three peaks just days after finishing his SATs exams.
Kaden Graham, from Ellesmere Port, completed his ambitious challenge on Sunday, having conquered Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Mount Snowdon over a three-day period. Last year, younger brother Callum, 8, climbed Snowdon to raise money to support worthy causes in the local community, and Kaden was inspired to take his own fundraising even further.
Dad Gary Graham, 40, told the ECHO: “Earlier this year, Kaden came to me and said he fancied doing his bit for charity. With him being a little bit older than Callum, we thought the only thing to surpass doing Snowdon was to try and do the three peaks.
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"So, we put a bit of a vote out to the community to get them to nominate the charities that they wanted us to support. We tried to pick from different areas of society and raise money for a mixture of causes.”
The community voted to support four different local causes, including Chester-based Hospice of the Good Shepherd and Ark Angels animal charity. So far, Kaden has raised more than £3,000 after walking the 23-mile route across three consecutive days.
Gary said: “We drove overnight to get to Scotland for around 7am on Friday. Kaden found it tough to get to the summit of Ben Nevis because there were still sheets of ice on the top, but after we reached it, he was just so determined to get to the end and complete the challenge.”
After travelling to the Lake District to tackle Scafell Pike on Saturday, Kaden managed to complete his final test - Mount Snowdon - in an impressive four and a half hours on May, 22. And Gary couldn’t be prouder of his son, who undertook training for his challenge whilst having to revise for his SATs exams.
Gary said: “He’s such a motivated lad and so caring about others. At 11, he’s happy to sit on his phone watching YouTube, so it was nice to just have a bit of time together without any of those distractions.
“I’m very proud of him. Up until February, the most walking he’d done was to school and back. We’ve been doing 20 – 25k walks at weekends to prepare and he’s been sitting his SATs as well, so he’s been having to juggle to fit his training in.
"He’s put so much effort in. But we also couldn't have done this without my wife, Carolynne, and the rest of the community, who have supported us through all of our fundraising.”
To find out more or to donate to Kaden, click here.
