TWO firemen’s wives will be heading out into the heat themselves to raise money for brave officers who get injured in the line of duty.

Linda Lavery, 43, and Lindsay Redman, 39, from Dunmow have set themselves the mammoth task of walking through the Sahara Desert for the Firefighters Charity in March next year.

The women, who go on holiday together and whose husbands, Rob and Kendal, work as firefighters, are looking forward to tackling the adventure but admit to often having second thoughts.

Linda said: “It goes in stages, I have good days where I wake up looking forward to it. Then I have bad days where I think what the hell are we doing!

“But Lindsay and I know each other so well, we will push each other through the training and the challenge, and we both know it will be an experience of a lifetime.”

The girls will be trekking 100km in the North African heat enduring temperatures of 82C in the day and -3C at night. Camels will be used to carry some of their equipment but they will have to carry some kit in rucksacks.

The journey will take ten days in total, three of which will be just getting to and from the start and the finish lines in M’hamid and Marrakech, and the pair will sleep under the stars in a small tent.

The biggest fears they both have is meeting big spiders and having no washing facilities – and of course not meeting their fundraising target of �5000.

Lindsay said: “We wanted to take on a challenge that was different and that would really test us. This is really out of our comfort zone, we will be leaving our families behind. But there will be an amazing sense of achievement at the finish line.”

The girls have already raised half of their target after arranging a number of events including a car wash last Saturday and a sold out quiz night in October.

Training started a number of weeks ago, but Linda said it would be difficult to actually prepare for the event because the temperatures are so different.

To support them and donate visit their fundraising webpage at www.justgiving.com/Lindsay-Redman0.