Three Dads Walking complete journey in Norwich

BBC Breakfast was among those to welcome the dads across the finish line and hear their fundraising feat had made £110,000 so far, and a further £15,000 in bucket collections.

Mr Airey, from Cumbria, said: “After we lost Sophie we didn’t know what to do.

“We were looking for a charity to support at her funeral and we were introduced to Papyrus.

“Once you realise what great work they do, I couldn’t help but get stuck in, and here I am five years later.”

In total, the Three Dads have now raised more than £1m for the charity.

Papyrus chief executive Ged Flynn paid tribute to them as they completed the equivalent of a marathon a day on their Walk of Hope.

He said their achievement had been a “transformation of tragedy to hope”.

It had enabled the charity to go “from having five offices to having 20 hubs around the country, from having a part-time helpline staffed by professionals there every day around the clock now, because of these guys,” he said.