Imagine having to walk for at least two hours every day just to get fresh water. Getting up before school or work to walk miles down dusty lanes, carrying buckets that will hold the water that quenches your thirst, keeps you clean and allows you to cook. Then imagine drinking this water not knowing if it's clean. If it will make you ill. If it will kill you.

This is a daily reality for millions of people round the world, as I'm sure you know. Some of them live in Tanzania. I've just returned from this east African country, on a trip-of-a-lifetime that included climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. 

At 5,895m it's the tallest mountain in Africa and the tallest free-standing mountain in the world. It was an utterly incredible, exhausting experience and one I won't forget in a hurry (nor will my legs).

I wasn't organised enough to set up a sponsorship page in advance but as I'm not likely to climb another mountain for a little while - at least not one so high and with so little oxygen at the top - and having seen firsthand what it means not to have clean water on tap, I've decided to set up this 'in hindsight' sponsorship page to raise money for Water Aid.

Water Aid is a global charity that helps ensure communities around the world have access to clean, fresh water. One of the countries it works in is Tanzania. So, in a bid to encourage you to donate to this worthy cause, over the next two weeks or so I will be blogging about my Kilimanjaro trek here: 

http://www.beccamusic.blogspot.co.uk/

You can follow the blog to find out just what it's like to get altitude sickness, walk to the summit for sunrise, and to bump into former members of the South African rugby team, including Percy Montgomery, on Kilimanjaro. But, more importantly, please donate to this cause. Here are just three statistics that Water Aid quotes about Tanzania, one of the world's poorest countries: 

- nearly half of the population, that's 21.6 million people, don't have access to clean water

- over 40 million people don't have access to adequate sanitation

- over 10,000 children die each year because they don't have clean water or good sanitation

Even from the remote viewpoint of a tourist, it was clear how precious water was. In both the cities and rural areas we drove through, there were always people walking on the streets with buckets, heading to water points. A notice in my lodge in the city of Arusha reminded me that water was in short supply there, and many of the area's households didn't have piped water. In other words, a long hot shower would be a cruel luxury.

I will be donating to Water Aid. Thanks in advance for donating as well.

Rebecca