FOR the past six years the Times has been reporting on the exploits of 70-year-old Dousland resident Roger Mechan as he walked the pilgrim trails of France, Spain and the UK, all to raise money for Help for Heroes and St Luke’s Hospice.

To date, Roger has covered 2,350 miles and, in addition to being sponsored, has stood in the street for many hours with a collecting tin, which has raised a total of £33,000 for his chosen charities.

When asked what first motivated him to begin this physical and financial journey, he said: ‘It started soon after I retired as a local police superintendent. My wife, who politely informed me that she had been running the house perfectly well for 45 years without my help, suggested I went for a walk. So I did. And four weeks later I came home again having walked 480 miles along a pilgrim route that meandered over the French Pyrenees and through the hot and dusty drovers’ lanes of Spain.

‘I was later to discover what my wife was actually suggesting was that I walk down the road and get the newspaper!

‘Of all the miles I have walked since, that first adrenalin filled day, battling 30 degree temperatures as I hauled myself over the top of the Col to gaze down onto the ancient pilgrim abbey in Spain’s Roncesvalles, were the most memorable. For I was, unknown to me then, starting on a road that so far has never ended.’

It took Roger 22 days to walk those 480 miles. The route took him through the vine fields of Rioja, through the cathedral cities of Pamplona, Burgos and Leon before arriving at the shrine of St James in the pilgrim city of Santiago de Compostela, one of the three great pilgrim destinations, the others being Rome and Jerusalem.

‘I had only intended to do one walk but once pain is forgotten the good memories surface and I knew I had to do more,’ added Roger.

The following year he followed in the footsteps of the 19th century author Robert Louis Stevenson, walking from Paris to Cevennes in central France. The route the author took and the book he wrote of his trek, Travels with a donkey in the Cevennes, have become legendary. The trek took Roger ten days over rocky terrain that constantly rose and fell, making walking difficult. On the eighth day the walk took him in a lonely forest near Mount Lozere. He was close to tears and nursing an excruciatingly painful knee, while wondering how he was going to carry on.

‘I was rescued by the local ladies’ rambling group from a nearby village who happened to be out for their weekly walk.’

But the next charity trek to the Languedoc region of southern France would have to wait, after an accident in his garden left Roger with a complete rupture of his quadriceps.

After three months of rest and an operation, Roger was able to take on the 250-mile trek he had always longed to do as he was fascinated by the Cathars’ story — they had been all but annihilated in a vicious crusade by the Catholic Pope Innocent 111 but they left behind a series of fortified towns and castles stretching from Narbonne to Carcassonne.

Roger said: ‘The walk was memorable for three reasons: firstly I was caught in the most vicious hailstorm I’ve ever known. It left me with a bleeding head that was tended by a good samaritan in their canal side garage. Next, I stayed in a chateau run by a Count and Countess who not only invited me to their table as their only guest but also washed all my clothes. Lastly, as I approached the end of the canal, my formerly ruptured knee became the size of a grapefruit and I was rescued by the local gendarmerie.

‘They not only got me to Roscoff but they had also arranged interviews with the local press who were curious as to why an old man would want to walk such distances.’

Roger has only had to abandon a trek once — back in 2016 he was walking along the north coast of Spain when he received a call that his wife had been taken to hospital.

‘Thankfully she recovered but I was, as happened a few years back, left with pledges for which I had done nothing. I decided to walk the Camino Inglés, otherwise known as the English Camino, on account of it being the track that English pilgrims would take from Ferrol in north west Spain to Santiago. I waived my “walk alone” rule in favour of a friend who had little time left to live and I would take him as far as he could go.

‘Sadly he died before we could set out but I was afforded the privilege of taking some of his ashes with me and spreading them along the route we would have walked together. I left some in the cathedral at Santiago and cast the remainder into the sea at Cabo Fisterra. He was a great traveller and I like to think his journey continues.

‘2017 is a year of anniversaries in our house with my wife and me both attaining 70 years of age. It is also our golden wedding anniversary year.

‘It was politely suggested to me by my family that I would not be flavour of the month if I became lost while wandering off abroad so that is why I’ve just returned from walking the 150 miles from Bath Abbey to Westminster Abbey along the Avon and Kennet Canal and the Thames path.

‘Next year I will return to the north coast of Spain and finish what I started.’

• For more on Roger’s journey, please visit www.justgiving.com/ stlukespilgrim