Rotary New Year is July: Colin Every is our new President. Colin is a retired Auto Engineer, former owner of Kings of Witcham. His wife Liz is a councillor.
Four Club Members spent a few days in June walking the North Norfolk coastal route to raise money for the excellent charity Therapy Dogs Nationwide and, through the use of a Just Giving page, the team manged to raise well over £800.
For the walkers it was not a joyful experience – walking the length of Holkham Sands on what, up to then, was the hottest day of the year was difficult but the five miles from Cley to Weybourne on shingle beach made the Holkham stretch seem child’s play. For the walkers the arrival at Cromer, signifying the end of our walk, was the only truly joyous aspect of the adventure – however blisters, sun burn and overall tiredness were soon forgotten with one of our group already planning for the next adventure!
There are however far less tortuous ways to raise money and the Call my Bluff Wine Event, courtesy of The Anchor at Little Downham, was a pleasant evening which raised around £750 without anything other than a few sore heads! This is such a popular event that plans are already in place to repeat the same event next year and perhaps even a Gin Event based along similar lines.
As ever Rotary’s been on the go – in June working hand in hand with the two Rotary Clubs from Ely we took three coachloads of children from Ely and Littleport Highfield Schools to Wicksteed Park. This is an annual event and the park is full of the sounds of happy kids enjoying the various rides on offer throughout the day.
Other Rotary Clubs also participate and there are usually around 2000 special needs children being entertained by Rotary. Thankfully as a result of our fund raising activities there is no cost to the children or their carers – a classic example of Rotary at its very best!
Our new club President hosted his Annual Golf Event which this year took place at Felixstowe. It was a super venue and those who attended were most complimentary both about the golf course and the organisation that went into arranging the day. Some £1200 was raised for good causes in the Littleport area.
We attended the Littleport Leisure Centre Show on the 22nd June and thanks to the efforts of Clive Webber and David Ambrose Smith managed to raise well over £100 which all helps towards our goals of supporting those in need within the area.
Looking forward we plan to hold another Quiz Evening – this time on Friday 25th October. For those of you who have been before it will be similar to last year so will include a fish and chip supper. This is a golden opportunity to test those brain cells and this year we have decided to make the questions slightly easier (largely to help the compere who regularly has trouble pronouncing the big words!).
Why not visit our Facebook Page – you’ll see plenty of pictures of what we get up to and if may even inspire you to consider joining the club – new members are always welcome.
If you want to have a chat about becoming involved in Rotary, call Ron Bradney on: 01353 864949
If you want to find out more about our Rotary Club. Take a look at our website: www.littleportrotary.org.uk