Why We Walk: 2025 Walk for Water
20 years ago, a 13-year-old girl named Jacqueline living in Namataba, Uganda, spent her days walking miles to collect water for her family. The journey was long and arduous, especially on the way home as she balanced a heavy jerrycan full of water on her head.
Jacqueline’s story illustrated the fact that women and girls around the world walk an average of three miles, collectively spending 200 million hours, per day to collect unsafe water. In 2005, Water Mission implemented a safe water solution in Namataba, our first project in Africa, so that Jacqueline and her neighbors no longer had to walk for water.
In September 2005, Water Mission board member Bruce Okkema took this photo of Jacqueline’s everyday experience of walking for water, inspiring an iconic oil painting by Kevin LePrince.
Jacqueline inspired Water Mission to create the Walk for Water in 2007. George and Molly Greene, Water Mission’s co-founders, started the Walk with the goal of giving others the opportunity to experience walking for water, which is a daily reality for millions of people.
Despite the rainy weather, walkers gathered at Riverfront Park in North Charleston for the 2024 Walk for Water, honoring the event that has taken place annually since 2007.
Since 2007, the Walk for Water in Charleston has been Water Mission’s key annual event, bringing thousands of people together to raise funds and awareness to fight the global water crisis. Participants walk 1.5 miles carrying empty jerrycans, fill them with water, and then walk another 1.5 miles with the full buckets, mimicking the average walk for water of the people we serve. Year after year, people return to walk, knowing that the global water crisis is enormous and urgent.
We’re here today as a family, and we’re walking for water, representing the walk that a lot of people around the world have to do every day to get clean water to drink. We enjoy being here as a family and supporting an important mission.
The Walk includes opportunities to learn more about the 2 billion people worldwide who lack access to safe water, introducing them to Water Mission’s innovative solutions. Not only that, but the event provides fun for all ages with food trucks, games, and sponsor tents with raffles and prizes.
Children enjoy the Walk for Water as well, making it an event for the whole family.
The 2025 Walk for Water will take place on Saturday, March 29, 2025, at Riverfront Park in North Charleston. You can register as an individual walker or as part of a team, which may include your family, church small group, coworkers, or neighbors.
Our goal this year is to raise money to provide 14,000 people with access to safe water so that they do not have to walk again. Every person who receives safe water from a Water Mission project also receives the opportunity to experience the love of God, often through our Living Water program.
Six-year-old Celestine from Kambu, Kenya, is one little girl who used to walk 2 miles roundtrip daily to collect water. Visit our blog to read about her walk and how safe water will transform her young life.
For those unable to attend the Walk for Water this year, you can still give a gift to help us reach our goal. Just $50 will provide one person like Celestine and Jacqueline with safe and Living Water.
We hope to see you at the 2025 Walk for Water!
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