Hiking with cancer: The final frontier

A lot of people ask Tom Buckley why it is that he has opted to take on one of Britain's most gruelling long-distance trails in the middle of winter. The answer is simple – he might not be here by the time spring comes round. "People ask me 'why are you doing this now?' I tell them that two months ago I was told I could be dead in two months, so it could be anytime now," he says.

It is a typically straightforward and unsentimental answer from a young man who is facing the grimmest news possible, but has a steely determination to live out the rest of the days in the finest fashion and with it raise money for the hospital which helped him during his long battle with cancer, as well as benefiting those who will be left to fight on after he has gone.

Four years ago Tom found a lump in his leg and was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, one of the most common types of bone cancer. Doctors who treated him at Manchester's Christie Hospital believe the tumour was caused by treatment he underwent as a baby for retinoblastoma, an eye cancer. At the time, the radio and chemotherapy appeared to have been successful and Tom lived a normal life – albeit with only one eye – learning to drive, playing the guitar, skiing, hiking and studying at university. But in September, at the age of 23, he was told that the cancer had returned on the left side of his head and there was nothing more medical science could do for him. It was the 14th tumour he had developed.

"I thought rather than wait for the inevitable, I would do something that is a challenge to keep myself busy," he says. "That was when I stumbled across this coast-to-coast walk on the internet. I'm glad I didn't know what it would be like and how hard it is."

Having undergone a final blast of radiotherapy just a few weeks earlier, on 29 November, accompanied by his twin sister, Jennifer, the economics graduate set out from St Bees Head, near Whitehaven in Cumbria, on a walk that challenges even the fittest of hikers. Wainwright's celebrated 192-mile odyssey transports those brave enough to try it across England from the Irish Sea to the North Sea via some of the most beautiful landscapes known to man. There is, of course, the small matter of making your way across the width of the Lake District, scaling the Pennines before ascending once more up onto the North Yorkshire Moors, where hikers can celebrate the end of their ordeal by dipping their blistered feet in the icy-cold sea off Robin Hood's Bay near Whitby.

When The Independent caught up with Tom last week he was just coming in to Patterdale, having successfully negotiated his way up Hellvelyn and its notoriously treacherous Striding Edge. At 950m, it is the third highest peak in England and a very dangerous place to be in winter. Only this year Hellvelyn claimed the lives of two climbers swept to their deaths from the dizzying ridges by high winds.

Luckily, says Tom, there was little breeze when he was up there and the skies were clear, affording superb views over the surrounding fells. It was, however, a tad chilly, -10C in fact. Having completed his fifth day of walking and still on schedule, the mercury had as yet to do him the favour of rousing itself above freezing. The snow and ice were slowing things down, but the real danger is the short winter days. With dusk at 3.30pm, he is running the risk of being stranded on a hillside in the pitch blackness. "I am at my very limits. When it is flat I can power away, but at some points I am going at only 1.5mph, according to the GPS. We were wading through snow and under the snow was a thick sheet of ice. It was incredibly hard going," he admits.

But the elements and the season are not the only obstacles facing Tom. He is, he concedes with typical understatement, "not a good walker". When cancer struck for the second time in his short life, doctors decided to operate – replacing his knee and tibia. Surgery resulted in losing almost all the major muscles on one of his legs, which means that he is barely able to walk up stairs, let alone scale some of the most treacherous hillsides in England.

He has devised a way of getting up and down which involves pulling his legs from the hip, though this puts tremendous pressure on the joint and makes it feel like it is about to "pop out" at each step. To keep going he recites the mantra imparted to him by doctors: "Up to heaven with the good leg. Down to hell with the bad leg." Tom has also undergone various lung operations, which have left him feeling breathless, while a series of slips and falls have rendered him "black and blue".

As well as testing himself, Tom hopes to raise £20,000 for The Christie Hospital's Young Oncology Unit, where teenagers and young adults from across the North West receive world-class treatment. Six young people a day are diagnosed with cancer in the UK, yet many are still treated on adult wards, he explains,

"At Christie's Young Oncology Unit they don't wake you up at 7.30am and force breakfast down you. If you don't want your light turned off they don't make you. The nurses are all young and you can really relate to them. There is PlayStation. All the home comforts that young people need. It makes a real difference."

As he steadily trudges on, news of Tom's mission is spreading and swelling sponsorship money close to his target. On one day last week he received 50 texts from well-wishers and donors. "The thing that keeps me going is the people who have heard about what I am doing and want to give me £5. When you start feeling shattered, you think about these people who have gone out of their way to help and it keeps you pushing on," he says.

Tom, who comes from Comberbach in Cheshire, has been well supported in his quest by his family. His mother drives him each day from their rented cottage in Keswick to the starting point. When he crosses the Pennine watershed, the family will decamp to a new base in Richmond, North Yorkshire, close to his childhood home in Northallerton. His father, Gordon, an airline pilot, will join him for the final half of the trek and has vowed to complete the walk in his son's memory if, for whatever reason, Tom is unable to finish.

Tom admits he is not thinking too hard about the future at the moment – his current objective is making it across the M6. In January, however, he does hope to go on holiday, where he will write personal notes to his family and friends. But he rejects suggestions he is inspirational.

"It is just human nature – it is the way you react. I've got to be philosophical about it. I've had 14 tumours in my life and it has come back five or six times. You just have to admit defeat sometimes. It is not that I haven't battled harder than anyone else. It is just life."

To sponsor Tom Buckley go to justgiving.com/thebuckers

Special treatment: Young people and cancer

* There is no good age to get cancer, of course, but being a teenager is hard enough without having to contend with a life-threatening illness and the debilitating effects of treatment.

* It is estimated that six teenagers or young people between the ages of 13 and 24 are diagnosed with cancer each day in Britain. This accounts for approximately 2,100 new cases each year. Just as in every other sphere of life, these young people find themselves caught between being treated as a child or as an adult. According to the charity Teenage Cancer Trust (TCT), until the age of 16, sufferers are likely to find themselves on a paediatric ward. After that they can be in beds alongside elderly patients.

* More often than not, many find the staff, though dedicated, do not fully understand the distinctive patterns that cancers take in young people or the psychological needs of these youngsters at what should be the most exciting time in their life. When all their friends are out, spreading their wings for the first time, these patients can find themselves confined to a hospital bed and left exhausted by treatment

* Teenage cancers are rare – they account for just 0.5 per cent of cases – but they can be among the most aggressive, made worse by growth spurts. And because they are so uncommon, they are often misdiagnosed at first. As a result, survival rates have fallen behind compared to older or younger people

* The TCT has raised enough money to build eight specialist units for young cancer sufferers – complete with internet access, chill-out rooms, access to music and TV as well as trained staff. Each one costs £2m to build. It is estimated that another 15 are required nationwide in order for all teenage and young adults to be treated.

Private Medical Cover from £30 per month with Independent Compare