The very idea of embarking on a 10-mile hike through the centre of Glasgow on a Friday night is likely to provoke queries about sanity. Around 700 people, however, are expected to take to the streets this September to raise funds for Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres, a cause that the people of Scotland have taken to their hearts.

First staged in London as a fundraising event, the Night Hike is a sponsored walk with a difference. Not only does it happen at night but walkers will be granted special access to buildings normally closed to the public as they make their way round the city as an additional event during Glasgow’s Doors Open Days.

The Glasgow walk will begin with an opening party in the cloisters at Glasgow University. The route will take in the Maggie’s Centre in the former university gatehouse on Dumbarton Road, and a tour of the Kibble Palace, with other stops still to be confirmed but likely to be cultural venues.

More than 500 “night-hikers” wearing turquoise t-shirts and glo-stick headbands lit up Glasgow during a 10-mile fund- raising trek, via the best of the city’s art and architecture. The fundraisers for Maggie’s cancer care centres who set off from Glasgow University at 7.30pm helped raise around £100,000 in the first Scottish night-hike, which took in the Mitchell library, Gallery of Modern Art and Kibble Palace. Mhairi Campbell, 29, from Clydebank, who took part with her sister Eilidh, said: “My mum was diagnosed with breast cancer last year, so that’s why we decided to take part. This is the first time we’ve done something for Maggie’s.”

A team of secretaries and surveyors from the Glasgow branch of Ryden raised around £1000, adding to the £52,000 they have already sent to the charity in the last three years. Secretary Doreen Elliott, 54, said: “Everyone’s been touched by cancer in some way. Everyone’s got a friend or relative whose been affected, so that’s why we support Maggie’s.”