Sara’s Hope Charity was set up by her parents in 2007. Sara Hoburn passed away in January 2001 at the age of 16 following a two year battle with a very rare and aggressive form of colon cancer.
The aim is to raise the funds to open a maintain a holiday retreat on the island of Crete for children and teenagers from the North East who have been diagnosed with cancer.
To date the foundation has raised over £170,000 – a fantastic achievement for a very new charity, especially with so many well established and high profile projects in this area.
This is a real family charity – and most events involve children and having fun. We always invite some of the children from the RVI children/teenage cancer units to be guests of honour at our main events. We are thrilled that the charity has touched so many people including TV personalities Coleen Nolan, Blue`s Antony Costa,A Place in the Sun presenter Amanda Lamb and West End Star Jonathan Wilkes who have all pledged their term support by becoming patrons of the charity. We also have legendary guitarist Bill Nelson (formerly of Be Bop Deluxe) supporting us – Bill has composed several tracks for the charity to raise funds.
Fundraising Events
We did it!!!! We broke Chris Moyles record for the longest radio programme (team) and raised enough money to send one family to Crete with Saras Hope Foundation. A massive thank you to all who took time out to support us. A huge thank you to Jamie and Sarah for their marathon sleeplessness!!
Sarah Stewart, Centre Manager at a Northumberland based business centre operated by UBC (United Business Centres (Midlands) Ltd) has successfully completed a marathon 56-hour charity radio broadcast. Until now Sarah’s longest radio show had been four hours. The previous record was held by the Radio One team for an uninterrupted show of 51.5 hours in aid of Comic Relief.
“We completed 56 hours which was fantastic,” said Sarah, who started the record attempt with Jamie on Thursday September 15 at 7am and continued straight through with just a five minute break every hour.
Listeners called in during the show to offer support and request songs, and plenty of encouraging messages were posted on the fundraising web page to keep the pair going. Among those posted, one listener said “Good Luck – you’re doing brilliant so far, keep it up!” while another said “Good Luck and thanks for playing my Cher.”
Keeping you updated on Saras Hope Foundation
We are pleased to announce that the first family took a trip to the Saras Hope Foundation retreat in May 2011. This is so exciting but we realise that this is only the start of the challenge and that we need to raise a lot of cash to make the project a long term success. Since 2011 twenty one children living with cancer and their families have enjoyed a fun filled trip to Sara’s Retreat in Crete giving them Smiles, Hopes and Precious Memories.
To date seven applications have been received from families hoping to visit this year, so please keep the votes coming so Saras Hope Foundation can win the £3,333.33 to help fund their flights.
Cancer affects families financially as well as physically and emotionally so please help Saras Hope Foundation to give these children a break from the long hospital stays, surgery, chemotherapy and painful and intrusive tests so they can have some ‘normal’ family time together, (time, that we can sometimes take for granted)….. thank you.
Below are some messages from the very special visitors to Sara’s Retreat:
Joel Lockey 27/07/2011
“After leaving hospital I never thought I’d be able to go on holiday abroad but with the help of Saras Hope Foundation I did.
I cannot really describe in words how much of a fantastic time I’ve had on holiday from meeting the lovely greek people who were all so kind to us and visiting places like Chania or going to the beautiful lake kornas.
Crete is such a beautiful place and the Villa has a brilliant location with stunning views over the mountains.
I loved every minute of the holiday.
Massive thank-you to Ged and Julie”
28/08/2012
Master George Sanderson with Mum Laura, Dad Neville and sister Libby. George was 2 in June 2012, he was diagnosed with Wilms Tumor (Cancer of the Kidney) in April 2010. George had 9 months of chemotherapy, 7 shots of radio therapy and he had surgery to remove the tumor and one kidney. Mum Laura found it difficult to accept that her son had cancer, one of the longest and most stressful times in hospital was August 31st when he suffered a high temperature and his blood pressure dropped, they were told to prepare themselves for intensive care, their prays were answered when he pulled through. 2011 was a painful year filled with heartache, fear and pain.
Today is a different story and here they are jetting off to meet the Hoburn family and to have lots of fun and family time in Crete.
