

The team tackling the Three Peaks to raise funds for the Festival is down from Snowdon and downing well-deserved celebratory pints.
What started as a drizzly walk on Day One of the national Three Peaks Challenge for the group of five Freemasons and five friends ended with a snowy summit atop the first peak and potentially-wonderful views obscured by mist on the second and third.
In the picture above are, from left, Rob Wright, Thomas Maliyil, Marcus Hannay, Jez Hyland, Dave Andrew (driver) and Ian Hugget.
The picture below shows the group at the top of Scafell Pike, the highest point in England. The picture at the foot of the post shows that surprising snow.
The quintet of Freemason challengers are aiming to raise £1,000 in one of the last fundraisers in the final year of our five-year Festival that’s already seen us raise more than £2m for charity.
The weather didn’t get any better at the top of the other two peaks, so the the team weren’t rewarded with the potential views from the top.
Said Jez Hyland: “Four of us are survivors of either the Kilimanjaro expedition in 2022 or the Everest Base Camp Trek of 2024. This is a final effort to raise funds towards the Lincolnshire 2025 Festival.
“We’re doing the challenge over three days instead of the ‘standard’ 24 hours because none of us is as young as we think we are or used to be, and it is far better to set an achievable goal than be defeated simply by the time constraints of the 24-hour challenge using a Senior Bus Pass!
”We’re really grateful to supporters who’ve added several hundred pounds to our fundraising totals having read these posts over the days of our challenge.” If you’d like to simply sponsor their assault, there’s a dedicated fundraising page at this link, with everything you donate doing straight to the MCF and being credited to the Lincolnshire Festival.