A RANDOM throw of a dart decided the starting point of a 2,500km cycle ride through the Baltic states for one former soldier who is raising money for the charity that cared for his mother.
Gareth Sell's last attempt to ride thousands of miles for charity ended in near disaster when he passed out in the Australian desert and was nearly killed on the road.
Yet four months after returning to Essex from that ill-fated Help for Heroes challenge, the former soldier will be cycling from the Finnish city of Jyväskylä to the UK to raise money for Barnardo's, the children's charity that looked after his mother when she was young.
Brentwood former soldier going walkabout in Oz for Help for HeroesStarting on August 4, he is planning to travel through Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany and Belgium before reaching the UK two weeks later. Now working for BT as a cable engineer, the 30-year-old from Pilgrims Hatch believes he has fate on his side.
A throw of a dart at a map of the Continent decided where he would start his trip.
The Scout leader with 1st Pilgrims Hatch said: "I wanted to let fate decide where I would be going so I got a big map of Europe.
" The dart hit bang in the middle of Jyväskylä so that was good enough for me."
As for his choice of charity, he said: "I wanted to move away from the Army and military charities.
"I want to move on with my life now and I thought that raising money for a children's charity would be a good thing.
"My mum was looked after by Barnardo's, so that was a good charity to support. I'm looking at this challenge completely differently.
"I've learnt a lot since the last trip – I won't be carrying much weight and not as much food.
"I will be trying to get accommodation while I go but I will not always be near civilisation when I need to stop for the night, so I'll take my tent."
As with his last trip in Australia where he found love – however fleeting – on the road from Adelaide, he is not discounting a romantic encounter with an Eastern European girl this time.
He said: "I won't be looking for it, but you never know, fate is not under your control."
