Up to 22 travel and tourism students will have a sponsored
stay-awake at Kielder Castle in aid of BBC's Children in Need from
Thursday 12 November to the morning of Friday 13 November 2015.
The students, all aged 16 to 19, will be staying awake from 8pm
to 8am the following morning. They will put together an itinerary
of events including everything from ghost hunting to exercising to
make sure they stay wide awake all night.
Wearing onesies and Pudsey Bear ears, the Aviation Services and
Level 3 Travel and Tourism Diploma students hope it's going to be
"all fright on the night" at Kielder Castle with lots of ghostly
and ghoulish goings-on!
Aviation Services student Shelby Laws, 18, of Ashington, is one
of the students organising the event.
She said: "One of the places, which I visited as a Young
Ambassador for Northumberland, was Kielder Castle. We were taken on
a tour and told all about the ghosts at the castle.
"One of the things, which we do as part of our course, is event
planning so we decided we would do our own mini-event at
Kielder."
The Youth Ambassadors™ are a dedicated group of young
volunteers, who play a vital role in the planning and delivery of
many community and education projects. The programme is separated
into specialist areas to offer young volunteers training and
experience in an area of interest.
Helen Bramley, Lecturer in Travel and Tourism, said: "This event
ties into so many things on the course including raising money,
rural tourism in Northumberland and looking at tourist attractions.
It also gives students the chance to look at the Dark Skies
Project."
The Forestry Commission, which runs Kielder Castle, has let the
students have the premises free of charge as they are fundraising
for Children in Need.
Students hope to raise up to £400 through sponsorship and a
newly-launched Just Giving page:
http://www.justgiving.com/Sponsoredspookeystayawakeover
Kielder Castle lies hidden and isolated in the heart of Kielder
Forest at the head of the River North Tyne Valley.
A former fortified hunting lodge, the building sits on the site
of a burial ground dating back to 3000BC.
The castle was built in 1775 in the gothic style and re-built in
the mid-19th century.
It is reportedly one of the most haunted buildings in the North
East with numerous reports of ghostly activity by a grey lady, a
love-lorn servant girl called Emma, a stable boy and a number of
former Dukes of Northumberland.
