May 2006

Winteringham Village Hall was full to capacity for the May meeting of the W.I. The members had invited friends from neighbouring W.I.s and posters had been displayed around the village inviting everyone to come along to listen to Graham Boanas - The Man Who Walked the Humber.

Graham opened his talk by joking that this time he had had to pay the bridge toll to get from the North bank to Winteringham but at least he had not got his feet wet.

He said that he had decided to raise money for DEBRA UK, a charity which raises money to help people with the genetic skin condition epidermolysis bullosa.

Initially he had planned to organise a ball in Hull but then he had realised that he needed to do something more than just organise an event and the idea of walking across the Humber had been born.

Of course, Graham explained, you do not just set off and walk across the river. Months of planning and lots of help had been needed before the day last August when he had actually achieved his dream and he had become the very first man in more than 1,000 years to wade unaided across the Humber.

Before Graham crawled across the mud to successfully complete his crossing the last person to have successfully made the crossing on foot was probably a Roman. Since then numerous people have tried the feat but have failed to cross unaided.

Graham said that he had set off from Weighton Lock, near Broomfleet and had been swept down stream by the currents so that he eventually landed near Winteringham. One of the ladies who had shaken Graham’s hand that day was actually in the audience and he offered her a much cleaner hand to shake.

The people waiting for him on the south bank had shouted encouragement as he struggled over the mud and he remembered thinking that no matter how tired he was there was no way was he going to give up at that late stage. One man had shaken his hand and had pressed a £5 note into it. Graham said that he still had this original note but he had put another £5 into the funds.

The audience were enthralled and amazed by the courage of this man. They were also deeply moved by the pictures of the children suffering from epidermolysis bullosa.

The members of Winteringham W.I. had donated numerous prizes for the raffle, the proceeds of which were given to Graham for DEBRA.