Friends Mel and Julie raise £1,700 for Cancer Research with Brighouse Boundary walk

Mel Brown, 60, and Julie Ross, 63, who are both going through cancer treatment, walked the circuit, around 20 miles, in stages between the start of July and Thursday, August 4.

Mel was diagnosed with bowel cancer in December and had an operation in January to have part of her bowel removed.

Her chemotherapy treatment finished last week and she will have blood tests and a scan at the end of the year.

Julie was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin lymphoma in May and is having chemotherapy until September.

She will then meet with her oncologist to determine whether she needs radiotherapy.

"We've known each other for about 35 years," said Mel, who has two children and three grandchildren.

"We became friends when our children were little.

"Because we've know each such a long time, we had our children together, we went to university at the same time and then got jobs, we've sort of helped each other all the way along through our lives.

"This has just been another thing we've happened to be going through at the same time."

"We decided instead of sitting around moping that we'd do something positive," said Julie, who has two children and two grandchildren.

"We just did it first thing in the morning, so no matter what you felt like, you just got up, got our of bed, set off on the walk, and it started the day in a positive way and kept us going.

"We didn't walk every day, we had days off for chemo, days off if one of us hasn't been very well.

Mel added: "We're both quite private people so we were a bit wary of putting it out there, but people have been absolutely brilliant and really supportive.

"The response has been amazing and made us feel quite emotional and humble.

"We'd also like to say a big thank you all the staff at the McMillan unit at Calderdale Royal who have been so lovely, kind and supportive to us both during our treatment.

"And to my husband Alan who dropped us off and picked us up at the start and end of each section of the walk."

To donate, visit https://fundraise.cancerresearchuk.org/page/mels-giving-page-2041