As he reaches 8000 miles on his 15,000 solo-cycle down the longest mountain range on the planet, Speaker from the Edge Mark has set Scots a challenge to raise funds for this years Children in Need campaign.

Mark has challenged Scots to do their own sponsored cycles, urging them to “Catch Me If You Can”. By the Children in Need appeal night on the 20th November Mark will have pedalled over 10,000 miles and he is hoping that his fellow Scots will be able to match his mileage.

You can find out more about taking part at the BBC’s dedicated "Catch Me If You Can" website, which will also feature a a running total of the miles as they are clocked up over the next few weeks.

For the last month, Mark has been cycling through Central America, where he has been overwhelmed by the welcome and help he has received from some of the continents poorest citizens. Although unable to speak their languages, Mark has felt very at home cycling through Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Panama, despite the torrential rain and thunderstorms! Mark’s Central American highlights have included surfing (or trying to) in El Salvador on the Pacific coast, discovering a fantastic bike recycling organisation in Guatemala, Maya Pedal, which transforms old bikes into farming machinery to help the rural community and visiting a Ngobe-bugle Indian village in the Panamanian jungle. With so many vivid colours and fantastic scenery to see from his saddle, it can be difficult to choose just one highlight:

“If I had to choose, Nicaragua was the highlight. Every day I cycled past the most incredible volcanoes and saw people living hard but happy lives. The sense of community and family in rural Central America is wonderful to see.”
Mark Beaumont

You can keep track of Mark’s as he heads into South America on the BBC Cycling the Americas website, or listen to his weekly chats with BBC Radio One’s Greg James.