A YOUNG Dollar woman is gearing up for a “once-in-a-lifetime” trek that will raise cash for CHAS.

Lexy Graham will be going on a mammoth adventure to the Everest Base Camp in Nepal with Choose a Challenge at the end of this summer and is hoping to raise as much as £3,000 for the Children's Hospices Across Scotland (CHAS).

The former Dollar Academy student lived in the Wee County for 10 years and moved for Aberdeen University where she is currently in the second year of a medical degree.

She told the Advertiser: “It's a challenge for myself, but there is more to it than just doing something to prove it to yourself, we are raising money as well.”

The 20-year-old, who is thinking of working with children or joining the Navy upon successful completion of her course, was only happy that the trek could support a worthy charity.

She added: “I have thought about paediatrics as a career so the fact that it's for children's hospices touched my heart.

“It's a brilliant charity – the amount of people that they help, the amount of children that are ill – it's just really sad.”

Lexy and her fellow students will go on the trip together at the end of August and are training “big time” for the challenge.

The Clacks woman said: “We are all different abilities, I've not even done Ben Nevis. So over the next six months we are planning practice treks together and are getting more experience so everyone is the same level.”

Lexy will be taking the challenge on with around 20 other and has already benefited by meeting people she otherwise probably would not have through the programme.

Once she passes her exams in the coming weeks, Lexy will be redoubling her fundraising efforts with collections, car boot sales and more.

She has already raised more than £400 through her online page and is hoping those in the Wee County will get behind her too.

For more than two decades now, CHAS has been providing a full services for families with terminally ill children.

Staff at hospices, like Rachel House in Kinross, are determined to make sure no matter how short a time people may have, it is a period filled with happiness and fun.

To donate and to learn more about Lexy, the trek and the charity, visit justgiving.com/fundraising/lexyeverest