Social: Puzzling time pulls in cash

[gallery type="slideshow" size="full" ids="870546,870547,870548,870549,870550,870551,870552,870553,870554"] DP World London Gateway’s quiz night raised more than £40,000 for Benfleet-based Little Havens Hospice and Meningitis Now. Customers and suppliers came together at Orsett Hall, Essex, to test their jigsaw skills and knowledge of the port and logistics park for an evening of fundraising. DP World London Gateway’s head of technical Andrew Bowen was quizmaster, and hailed law firm Norton Rose Fulbright as the night’s winners. A silent auction and raffles were also held, bringing the total raised by the firm over the past five years to more than £160,000. The event also featured guest speakers from both charities, Louis Van-Looy for Meningitis Now, and Dee Anderson from Little Havens Hospice. LifeCare riders roll out across country A team of 21 cyclists took part in retirement village operator LifeCare Residences’ 2016 Route 66 bike ride, raising £8,382 for the Hampstead Wells and Campden Trust. Now in its second year, the ride was led by LifeCare chief executive Richard Davis, and chief operating officer Craig Percy. The ride followed a 92 mile cross country route from Grove Place retirement community, Hampshire, to Battersea Place, SW11. Hampstead Wells and Campden Trust provides annual grants to individuals and organisations for services to assist hardship. Hotel group helps with young wishes Redefine BDL Hotels’ raised more than £66,500 last year for Make-A-Wish UK, smashing its initial target of £50,000. Make-A-Wish works with children and young people fighting life-threatening conditions. The money raised in 2016 enabled the charity to grant 16 wishes to patients. Employees from hotels across the country got involved in the fundraising initiative, with hotel management in Glasgow and London hiking up Mount Snowdon and walking the West Highland Way long-distance footpath. The firm also donated hotel rooms and meeting room space to the charity. Get involved >>> Coast to coast innings for the long haul David Harper will embark on the Cross Continental Madness challenge on 8 February. With 15 other adventurers he will attempt to cross Costa Rica, hiking, cycling and kayaking from the Pacific to the Atlantic – while wearing cricket pads. The challenge follows the 2014 Mt Kili Madness cricket challenge, where Harper and his team played the world’s highest cricket game at the top of Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. The challenge this time, is for the group to play the first innings of their “Ashes” game on the Pacific coast on day one of the challenge, and the second innings on the Atlantic coast on day 14. The team is raising money for Cancer Research UK and breast cancer charity the McGrath Foundation, and has set a target of £100,000. To add to the total, go to www.crosscontinentalmadness.com Lucky 13 pedal Dransfield to £50,000 fundraising target Dransfield Properties ended 2016 by hitting its annual charity cycle fundraising target. A team of 13 cyclists raised £50,000 in the 2016 tenth leg of the company’s Tour of Europe challenge, cycling more than 400 miles from Berlin to Copenhagen in five days. The annual Tour of Europe ride started in 2007 with riders covering a leg of the journey each year. In the past seven years the riders have travelled more than 3,500 miles, through six different countries, aiming to be back in London by 2020. Since the challenge began £400,000 has been raised for charity. Some of the charities supported by the ride include Action Against Cancer, Bloodwise, and CRY, which raises awareness of cardiac risk in the young. Sequence of successful events The charity efforts of national estate agency network Sequence has brought the firm’s fundraising total for children’s cancer charity CLIC Sargent to more than £390,000. A record £18,605 was raised in 2016 for the charity, which Sequence has supported since 2001. The team raised the money through participation in the London Marathon, skydives, Prudential Ride London and Christmas Jumper Day 2016, which raised £1,500. Cundall’s Crash course Multidisciplinary engineering consultancy Cundall marked its 40th anniversary by becoming patron of the construction industry’s charity, Crash in 2016. Crash, which reached its own 20th anniversary last year, assists homeless and hospice charities. As a patron, the firm will donate financial resources and pro bono expertise in support of the charity’s projects.