A woman has walked 244 miles from Manchester to the Isle of Man for a smoothie at vegan cafe Vibe.

Agata Szczepaniuk did more than 560,000 steps to visit the cafe.

The 37-year-old previously walked from Leeds to the Isle of Wight for a slab of her favourite fudge in 2020 and was looking for another challenge this year.

Ms Szczepaniuk said: ‘I used to live in Leeds and went to the Isle of Wight from there to visit a place that does vegan fudge and then I thought I may as well walk.

‘When I did that walk in 2020 it was the best experience of my life and then I decided to do something similar with the other islands.

‘I wanted to go around all of these islands around the UK so when I discovered the Isle of Man it was perfect, so I searched for vegan places in the Isle of Man and found this cafe.

‘I wasn’t even sure I was going to be able to do it the first time, I just took my backpack and gave it a go to test myself but once I’d done that, I knew I could do it again.’

Having walked in 2020 for fudge, she was craving a vegan smoothie from Vibe, near the quay in Douglas, this time.

‘I was really happy to have found this place because I only found a couple of vegan places in the island,’ Ms Szczepaniuk said. ‘I went for a smoothie which was definitely worth it, very replenishing.

‘It took 12 days to get here. It would have taken 11 but I stopped in Belfast.

‘It was my birthday on the day I arrived and Vibe put out balloons for me when I got there, it was really cute.’

She added: ‘It doesn’t matter how good your shoes are, you’re going to have blisters so those first couple of days were the hardest.

‘But when you push yourself through you don’t really think about it.

‘After that initial hard work I can just walk and walk, it was very challenging though.’

Ms Szczepaniuk walked from Manchester, through Wales to Holyhead, took a ferry to Dublin, walked to Belfast and arrived in the Isle of Man by ferry on June 9 to raise money for Viva, the vegan charity, which is currently rescuing animals from the conflict in Ukraine.

She raised £630 from her trip.

Laura Mowat, owner and manager of Vibe, was delighted to have been a part of Ms Szczepaniuk’s challenge.

She said: ‘I thought it was lovely that she picked the Isle of Man as her walking challenge goal.

‘Vibe only opened in March and we haven’t had long to get our name out there yet, so for Agata to know about us and pick us felt amazing!

‘We are the island’s first 100% vegan cafe so I thought it would be nice to promote that the Isle of Man is finally seeing a new trend of more healthy eating options.’

She opened the cafe after changing her eating habits.

‘The dream of Vibe cafe was born after I got breast cancer in 2015 and started to look at ways of changing my lifestyle and eating habits to prevent getting sick again,’ the manager said. ‘The more I learnt the more I wanted to share.

‘I wanted to inspire other people to eat more plant-based foods that are delicious and nutritious to stay healthy.

‘A place where people can socialise and not compromise on their health. Positivity is a really important aspect of wellness so the cafe is designed to be uplifting, motivating and inspiring.

‘We make all of our food from scratch and offer an amazing variety of functional drinks including mushroom coffee, superfood lattes and smoothies that look beautiful, taste amazing and provide your body with everything it needs to help stay healthy.’