Horseback Ride for Cancer Awareness

JACKSONVILLE — A Jacksonville couple are riding their horses — all the way to El Paso. Bob and Sharon Slayden will stay in the saddle though the end of the month as they trek 764 miles on their quarter horses to raise awareness and money for the American Cancer Society. Sharon says this is personal, noting, “My mom died of pancreatic cancer; I have a sister-in-law right now who’s going through brain cancer; and my husband’s mother and daddy died of cancer.” According to Sharon, research is so fantastic today “that a lot of people are getting healed and they’re ‘getting more birthdays,’ as we call it. You know, we’re susceptible to it, because genetically, it moves forward in the family. So we have to know this, and we have to let people know about it — that they can be helped.”

Sharon says she and Bob are covering 25 to 30 miles a day. This is their second such ride; last year they raised a little more than $3,000, and Sharon thinks they’ll do better this year.