Take your pick – the Campbeltown man with the Welsh wife, Sal, he stayed away from the ‘wee toon’ to marry and live with in South Wales; the awesome kilted, Jock-rock rugby supporter [he did say 'I have no shame']; the runner finishing the Mull of Kintyre 10K run in 2011 – proving he regularly and literally sets foot on home soil.
All of these are aspects of Iain McCallum, former member of the Royal Marines and of the South Wales Police – and whose colleagues from the armed forces – serving retired and wounded – are about to take Campbeltown by storm in a truly epic land, sea and air test of physical endurance, athleticism and courage.
This is the Heroes Challenge UK – undertaken to raise money for Help 4 Heroes – for those we ask to give and take life in the service of our common country.
We’ll give you some details below of the challenges’s assaults on Kintyre but first, more about Iain McCallum – who is a one man bridge between the guys undertaking this breathtaking test of endurance and his home town – Campbeltown.
Iain McCallum – before and since he’s been away
Iain was born in Campbeltown and lived in and near Peninver for ‘the first 18 – idyllic - years of my life with my parents, Donald and Betty McCallum, my brothers Peter and Stuart and my wee sister Lindsay.’
He went to Peninver Primary before going to the Grammar School in Campbeltown.
In 1980, deciding that there was not much for him in the town, he joined the Royal Marines in 1980: ‘because they answered before the Argylls’.
When he’d completed his basic training and having been specially selected for a signals course, he served in the armed forces for 9 years.
He was first in Plymouth; followed by 18 months on HMS Intrepid; and for his final 4 years – in Arbroath, was with 45 Commando, Royal Marines – before signing out.
By then he’d met his now wife, Sal – at the wedding in Swansea of her brother who was a mate of Iain’s.
He says: ‘I moved down to Welsh Wales to carry out missionary work with the Taffs and to perpetuate the Celtic rivalry’.
He joined the South Wales Constabulary, now South Wales Police, in October 1989 and finally retired from the police in January this year, 2013.
In terms of the Heroes Challenge UK, Iain served in the police with many of the guys who are taking part in this marvellous endurance event – …’particularly Richie [Morgan]; Huw [Beckett]; Tyrone [Rees], my Sergeant; Bob Hamilton [who is in Force Planning]; and more recently with Neil [Richards] before he went on to bigger and better things.’
Talking about Campbeltown, Iain says: ‘I return home to see my family and relatives – my dad sadly died in 1994, about once a year and enjoy the drive “doon the road” from Glasgow because I feel comfortable as I get closer and the road gets rougher (reference to previous articles) and know I am getting “hame”.
‘I am now the McCallum that no-one knows because I have been away for twice as long as I lived there.’
Iain’s support for the Heroes Challenge UK team comes both from his friendship with so many of the team doing the hard yards but for his visceral understanding of how important is the cause for which it is raising money: Help for Heroes.
He says: ‘I am also a member of the Royal Marines Association and have become more aware of the efforts that are being made to raise as much money as possible for Help for Heroes and I do what I can to help with raising more money for the charity’.
Read about the challenge – come out to greet them on Friday and see them off on Saturday – and, if you can, please donate to the Heroes Challenge UK’s fundraising effort online or by text – details are at the end of this article.
The Argyll and Kintyre legs of the Heroes Challenge UK
The 12-strong team will:
- cycle a total of 1,206 miles from John O’Groats
- row across the Irish Sea’s no-holds-barred North Channel – there and back
- climb a total of 13,787ft in summiting the UK’s, four highest peaks (Scotland’s Ben Nevis in Lochaber, at 4409 ft; Northern Ireland’s Slieve Donard in County Down, at 2789 ft; England’s Scafell Pike in the Lake District, at 3029 ft; and Wales’ Snowdon at 3560 ft)
- cycle on to Lands End
- skydive from 13,787ft into Swansea Airport.
They’ll be arriving in Campbeltown on bikes, on Day Three – Friday 24th May, having cycled 107 miles from Oban after climbing Ben Nevis in the middle of cycling from Inverness to Oban the day before.
They’ll be leaving again in the morning of Saturday 25th May, with their endurance team in Celtic Long Boats on the , led by coxes from Mumbles rowing club – and rowing from the Mull to Ballycastle on the Northern Irish Antrim coast. They’ll have Campbeltown’s own fast passenger ferry, Kintyre Express, in support all the way over, on a route Kintyre Express runs daily as its business.
On the other side they’ll then cycle 86 miles to Slieve Donard in County Down and climb it. The next day, Sunday 26th May, Kintyre Express will shepherd the rowers back 18 miles across the Irish Sea from Newcastle to Portpatrick, form where they’ll cycle 126 miles to Cockermouth in Cumbria.
That’s the end of their connection with Kintyre – but not of the challenge which carries on in the same gruelling style for five more days – we’ll give you the details later – and ends with a sky dive on Swansea Airport.
Please DONATE, if you can
You can donate online here – and everything you give will really help.
You can also donate by Text: Text HCUK to 70900. You will be charged £5 plus your standard network rate and a minimum of £5.00 will go to Help for Heroes.
Maybe Iain should auction that photo taken before he went off to a rugby match?
