PARENTS of a teenage car crash victim walked through scorching sun and pouring rain, covering 125 miles on foot in nine days to raise nearly £3,500 in their daughter’s memory.

Alex Pickering died in September 2007 when the car she was a passenger in left the road and hit a tree in Scarborough.

Nearly three years on, her parents, Jill and John, decided they wanted to do something to keep her memory alive, while also supporting the road safety charity, Brake, and the NSPCC children’s charity.

In May, the couple completed an epic walk between their home in Acomb and Bowness-on-Windermere in the Lake District – and now their fundraising total has reached £2,166 for Brake and £1,196 for the NSPCC.

John, 58, a property surveyor, said: “It was a red hot weekend when we set off and we had two days of blazing sunshine to cope with before it got colder and rained.

“We had about eight hours of walking every day and by the end we had a lot of blisters.

“It was a great feeling to dip our toes into Lake Windermere at the end and I think Alex would have been proud.”

John, whose wife, Jill, works as a democracy officer for City of York Council, said: “We wanted to do something to keep Alex’s memory going and also raise money for two really good charities.

“We didn’t set a fundraising target and we were surprised when we got to £1,000. Everybody has been so generous.”

John said the charity, NSPCC, was chosen by pupils and staff at Carr Infant School, in Acomb, York, where Alex worked as a trainee teaching assistant.

He and Jill visited the school this week to tell the children about their walk. John said: “After assembly, one lad asked me why we didn’t go in a car instead of walking.”

He said they wanted to thank Jill’s parents, Rita and Keith Pollard, for transporting their luggage by car from one pub to the next during the walk, Carole Hartley, who collected £345 for Brake, and Ashby’s Delicatessen, in Tadcaster Road, York, which raffled off a hamper to raise £175.

It is not too late to sponsor John and Jill. Log on to their online fundraising pages justgiving.com/alexpickeringnspcc and justgiving.com/alexpickeringbrake