Canon puts on his walking boots

Canon Geraint admits he had not done any specific training.

An energetic clergyman is putting his best foot forward on a 130-mile walk to raise funds for his Gwynedd church.

Canon Geraint Meirion Jones, 69, aims to complete the whole of the Anglesey coastal path in just 10 days.

The "half retired" former Canon of Guildford admits to not having done any specific training for the walk.

Instead Canon Geraint, as he is known, plans to use the "psychological" approach to raise cash to put in a disabled toilet at Betws Garmon church.

Canon Geraint got involved in helping out with churches in the Arfon deanery, when he moved from Guildford.

I'm taking the psychological approach Canon Geraint

In particular he looks after Betws Garmon church in a small hamlet just outside the village of Waunfawr near Caernarfon.

The church, built in 1842, is not particularly ancient, he said, but is possibly one of the "prettiest, tucked into a tight place against the foot of Snowdon".

"There has been a place of worship there for many centuries and the font in the present church dates from 1614," he added.

The walk begins at Penmon on Saturday, and the walkers will be staying in an old school, and a church hall at night.

It aims to raise cash to waterproof the walls of the church at Betws Garmon, and put in a small kitchen and disabled toilet as "nothing has really been done to it since 1842".

Heating is also being put in for the first time, despite the place being used for services all year round.

"The heating will be an extraordinary transformation," he said.

A very 'pretty' church but the walls run when it rains.

Walkers from all over Britain are aiming to join Canon Geraint, and his wife Grace, for part or all of the walk.

The most walking the Canon himself has done recently is a 10 mile section of a pilgrimage from Bangor to Bardsey Island (off the Lleyn peninsula) although in the past he has undertaken numerous long-distance walks.

"I'm taking the psychological approach," he said.

"We'll start at 8.30 each morning then coffee time is a third of the way along whatever the route is for that day, then lunch-time is 2/3 of the way, whatever the time is.

"Then after lunch you've cracked it really."

Canon Geraint said he's like to raise around £2,000 over the 10 days to at least "start to get the loo in" at Betws Garmon.