STAFF at a medicine manufacturing company are undertaking the Three Peaks challenge in aid of three charities next month.

A team of 11 from Crescent Pharma, mainly based at the firm’s head office in Overton, will be climbing the highest peaks in England, Scotland and Wales in a 24-hour mission which they have been warned “will not be comfortable”.

The group has already raised nearly 50 per cent of their £5,000 target, which will be split between charities Project Gambia, Inter Care and Beta Charitable Trust which support basic human needs projects in Africa.

Participator Marian Cole said: “This is the first thing we have done in a big team.

“We are training as a group which is really nice. We have all started early on with 10 miles, then 15 miles and 20 miles so we’re feeling quite good, but I think it’s going to be tough.

“We have worked with the charities before. Some of them help give medicines to countries in need and we’ve worked with sponsored children before. We really love the charities so we thought three charities for three peaks.”

The walking distance is 27 miles, with each mountain expected to take a five-hour climb on July 18. Travelling by coach the drive time is also estimated at around 10 hours and the team have been told they will need to rough it to succeed.

The team have been doing a lot of training at Beacon Hill, in Burghclere, where they achieved 10 repetitions as their highest number so far.

Marian added: “This is the first year that we have done the Three Peaks challenge. We wanted to do something big that would have the most impact for raising money for our chosen charities.

“The idea came from the employees and is something that Crescent has fully supported.”

Project Gambia works to improve the quality of life for families and local communities in the Gunjur region of The Gambia while Inter Care sends medical aid to health units in sub-Saharan Africa. Beta Charitable Trust provides clean water, sanitation, food, medical care and education across Africa, Asia, the Middle East and the UK.

To donate go to justgiving.com and search for Crescent Pharma.