A ride for Mum

By Lachlan Ellis

A Korweinguboora woman is saddling up for a ride that will take almost two weeks, to raise funds for breast cancer research and honour her late mum.

Abbey Wehrung said her family had done the same ride back in 2002 to raise funds and awareness for epilepsy, and she had been inspired to ride again in memory of her mum Kerryn, who passed away from breast cancer in 2020.

The original ride was dubbed ‘The Big Adventure’, and so, naturally, Ms Wehrung is calling this second ride in September ‘The Big Adventure 2.0’.

“We did the same ride as a family when I was growing up, I was six, my middle brother was eight, and my oldest brother was twelve. My oldest brother Nathan has epilepsy, so we raised money for epilepsy,” Ms Wehrung told the Moorabool News.

“We lost Dad when I was nine, then Mum in 2020…I want to do the ride in honour of her. When she died it was pretty crazy COVID times, and her funeral had to be quite small. There was kind of no event for her where everyone could come together and celebrate her, so I feel like doing this for her, and to raise money for breast cancer, just feels right.

“I think it’s something she’d love. She was horse crazy like I am.”

The journey, from Korweinguboora to Glenisla at the bottom of the Grampians, is more than 250 kilometres, and will take between 10 and 12 days.

“There’ll be lots of backroads, and we’ll camp along the way, but it shouldn’t be too crazy. My brothers and I were pretty young when we did the first ride, so we don’t remember every stop along the way, but we have it kind of mapped out. I’ll drive it one day soon and map out the camp spots,” Ms Wehrung said.

“One of my brothers will ride with me, my oldest brother doesn’t really ride much anymore. My two best mates will ride with me, so will a neighbour…we should have about eight horses, and some people will drive it. One of my basketball teammates plans to ride her bike, and others will stop in at the campsites for a kind of reflection on Mum.”

Ms Wehrung is hoping to raise $20,000 for the National Breast Cancer Foundation, and at the time of writing has raised $3,796.

For more information and to donate, visit fundraise.nbcf.org.au/fundraisers/abigailwehrung.