ride4acure

• ride4acure: Horses of Hope – coast2coast Horse Trek-  Crescent Head to Perth 4600km.

20 year old Esther Luxford-Matthews is riding her three horses 4600 kms over 97 days to ‘put melanoma on the map’ coast2coast across four states of Australia raising funds and awareness of melanoma in young people. A challenge she taking on in memory of her elder sister Hannah, a keen horsewoman who loved to campdraft and rodeo.  Hannah lost her life to melanoma two years ago aged just 20.

The ride4acure team are raising funds and awareness of melanoma  in communities en route supporting the Hannah Rose Melanoma Research Project, (which is administered by prominent melanoma researcher and Melanoma oncologist Professor Grant McArthur who was also one of Hannah’s doctors and is based at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre).

• Maura, Esther’s Mum has already completed two treks for ride4acure raising funds and awareness of melanoma particularly focusing on young people.  Firstly in 2009 riding 1680 kms on her pushbike from Kempsey to Melbourne in Oct/Nov  then following on in April 2010 rode three  of her horses from Kempsey to Melbourne on a solo pack horse trek covering 1860 kms.  Maura has presented a multimedia presentation she created called “Mela-What?” , to over 15 000 young Australians across two states.   It is an engaging youth friendly multimedia presentation that helps ‘join the dots’ on skin cancer awareness.  The ride4acure team; Esther as the rider, Maura and Joe doing logistics and support, will on this coast2coast trek, travel across four states.  Ride4acure leaves Crescent Head NSW (20kms east Kempsey on the Pacific Ocean) on May 2^nd (this date would’ve been Hannah’s 23^rd birthday and is also known as International Melanoma Day) and arriving  in Perth at Cottlesloe Beach on 6^th August 2011 (this date is Esther’s 21^st Birthday).