Most people take a few snaps on vacation and stick it in a photo album. Ann Smith-Gordon uses her holiday photos to raise thousands of dollars for sick Bermudians.

Over the last 23 years she has held an annual slide show of her vacation photos to help the Patients Assistance League (PALS), a charity providing care to cancer patients.

Her latest slideshow 'Exploring the Canadian Maritimes: Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, Prince Edward Island and a Peep at New Brunswick', will be on March 11 at the Mount Saint Agnes Auditorium.

Tickets are $15, but donations are accepted. Ms Smith-Gordon's slideshows are usually very popular with as many as 300 people attending in some years.

And Ms Smith-Gordon said this year the money is needed more than ever.

"We had the most referrals last year, with 140 new patients," said Ms Smith-Gordon. "It is all different cancers we are seeing.

"It is costing PALS a million dollars now to operate. We have patients on drugs that can cost $5,000 to $6,000 a month.

"If you don't have major medical, who can afford it? Even if you have major medical, it will pay 80 percent, if you have been ill and can't work, 20 percent of that is still a lot of money."

She attributed the increase in referrals partly to an increase in awareness.

"People are finding cancers earlier now," she said. "Another thing is patients are living longer so you have to look after them for longer. But a million dollars is absolutely staggering."

But she said PALS received amazing support from the Bermuda community.

"I got a donation today from someone I went to school with. She is over 65 and doesn't have to pay for a car licence.

"She sent us the amount of money she would have paid. People have golf tournaments, and birthday parties to raise money for us. It is amazing the support we get.

"Recently, we received an anonymous donation for $10,000. Sometimes I know who has made the donation, but others I don't. But in this case even I don't know. And we are so grateful."

The upcoming slideshow covers a road trip Ms Smith-Gordon took with a friend last June. "We spent four weeks there and we drove 1,133 kilometers," she said.

The slideshow covers the wonders of the Canadian maritimes, from the the Bay of Fundy, which is contested as having the highest vertical tidal range in the world, to the newly built Confederation Bridge linking Prince Edward Island with mainland New Brunswick, Canada, and the Halifax Citadel to Pier 21 Canada's Immigration Museum in Halifax, among many other things.

She also has slides relating to the Halifax Explosion of 1917. "One ship was loaded with explosives, and another ship ran into her," said Ms Smith-Gordon.

"It was the largest man-made explosion prior to the atomic bomb of 1945, few structures within 400 metres of the blast were left standing. Shock waves broke windows 80 kilometers away. Everything was flattened."

To buy tickets to the slideshow contact a PALS volunteer or telephone them at 236-7257 or go to their office at 18 Point Finger Road.