A 21-strong team from BEAR Scotland helped to raise over £4,300 for Scotland’s Charity Air Ambulance (SCAA) by taking on Scotland’s Virtual Kiltwalk for the first time.

This was the first year that BEAR Scotland put forward a team for the annual Kiltwalk event, which had ‘gone virtual’ due to the Covid-19 restrictions in place across the country. The 21-strong team set themselves a three-week challenge of reaching 1,578 miles between them which is the total length of the trunk road network that BEAR manage and maintain on behalf of Transport Scotland.

Together the team logged their daily miles over three weeks from walking, running, cycling and even horse riding, with some of the team doing the whole event in full kilt-attire.  After three weeks, the team clocked up an impressive 1,793 miles between them, smashing their original target!

As well as clocking up an impressive number of miles, the team raised over £2,870 for Scotland’s Charity Air Ambulance.  This figure was generously topped up by 50% by The Hunter Foundation as patron charity for The Kiltwalk, meaning the team raised a grand total of over £4,300 for the SCAA thanks to their fundraising efforts.

Graduate Engineer Matthew Ross, one of Team BEAR’s Kiltwalkers, visited the SCAA at Perth Airport this week to meet the team after helping to raise funds for the charity.

The SCAA was picked as BEAR Scotland’s national charity of the year following a staff vote, with the organisation topping the poll.  Various fundraising activities will take place throughout the year in support of the SCAA, alongside BEAR’s existing national charity partnerships and regional and local causes in the areas that BEAR work in.

Iain Murray, BEAR Scotland’s Managing Director, said: “At BEAR we continue to support a huge variety of good causes and we’re delighted to support Scotland’s Charity Air Ambulance, after they topped our staff vote this year.

“It was great to see such a fantastic team effort from our staff during this year’s Virtual Kiltwalk event despite all the current circumstances, with many getting creative in how to log their miles –some went out and scaled Munros once restrictions eased and one person even ran 5K every day in full kilt-attire! Our teams thoroughly enjoyed the challenge and went above and beyond in helping to raise as much money as possible for such a deserving charity.

“We’re pleased to have visit the SCAA base at Perth Airport and talk about some of the amazing work that the charity does. We look forward to building on this partnership with SCAA and for future fundraising events as the year continues.”