2015 so far

It’s been a very busy and pretty varied start to the 2015 dance season for us, kicking off as ever with our annual Team Walking Weekend in a part of the UK. This time our terrific organisers Sue and Steve (hats off and hankies lowered to them) really came up with the goods and booked us into the Youth Hostel in Conwy, Wales. We enjoyed perfect weather, a hostel completely to ourselves with acres of room, a super music session during which we actually danced off against each other and, of course enjoyed a wonderful walk together.

The weekend was made even more special because we had also just reached (in fact surpassed) the £2k target we had set ourselves via a Crowdfunder project, to get the amazing Zulu Tradition group from KwaZulu Natal to visit six local schools to carry out cultural workshops. Double celebration with champagne!!! Looking forward to that happening in June. The Crowdfunder experience was a new one to us, it turned out to be a bit of a rollercoaster ride but thanks to some hugely generous people we made it with two weeks to spare!

On our return we were quickly into the first dance out of 2015, at the very picturesque Glansevern Gardens, close to Welshpool. This enables us to demonstrate several new dances that had been hard practised over the winter and at our “Boot Camps” in January. Although a little on the inclement side the weather brightened just as we started and remained sunny all through our programme – good start!
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This was swiftly followed by a highly enjoyable (albeit with an unfortunate casualty…get well asap Lynne) dance out in Shrewsbury for and with The Big Busk, a now annual event to commemorate through music, dance and all manner of entertainment, the life of a local busker Ben Bebbington who was murdered by two men on a canal towpath comparatively recently. The Busk fills Shrewsbury town centre with music and fun and is great to be a part of. We had a super time dancing in front of big crowds and caught up with lots of friends too. Note to selves….don’t dance Steeple Claydon in a space the size of a handkerchief again :)))

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Next stop….celebrating May Day at the fabulous National Trust Dudmaston near Bridgnorth, in front of what turned out to be (I believe) their biggest crowd ever for a single day! Some of us were on a beach on the other side of the world that day so couldn’t be there but the team (as always) had a great time, danced brilliantly and were thoroughly well looked after by the NT staff as always. We love going to Dudmaston :)))

Our most recent dance out was at the outgoing Mayor of Shrewsbury’s Garden Party in the tiny village of Cruckmeole just outside Shrewsbury. After an impromptu and unexpected maypole dance by myself and Cathy (knew we should have arrived later lol) the team danced for the party goers on the tennis court of a beautiful country house, finishing with perfect timing so that the duck race could start.
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We have a busy few days coming as we are dancing at Chester Festival on Sat 23rd May and then the following Wednesday (27th) when we’re dancing before the Demon Barbers XL show at The Place theatre in Oakengates, Telford all of which we are very much looking forward to.