With a Jubilee slant this year’s Peldon Festival runs from 1st to 3rd June with a range of entertainments and activities for the whole family to enjoy. Starting Friday evening with The Shantymen from Mersea entertaining in the Peldon Plough the Festival moves on to a traditional Fayre on Saturday. The Fayre provides a range of fun activities as well as refreshments a beer tent and Jubilee cream teas. More Jubilee cream teas on the Sunday as Gardens are opened for viewing around the village with the festival rounding off Sunday evening with The Medlars and No Strings Attached performing in the Church.
Rainbows, rain and lambing
Quires in our Villages – Peldon History Lecture
With vocal support from members of Quire (The Colchester World Music Community Choir), Bill Tamblyn celebrates the work of local music historian, Chris Turner, revealing the wealth of music sung in West Galleries in our area from the 18th century onwards.
Come and join in a rumbustious song or two on Wednesday 16th May at 7:30pm in St Mary’s Church, Peldon! Tickets £8
Tel: Bill Tamblyn 01206 735770
This is NOT about Anglican choirs as we know them today. But interestingly enough, the story does reflect the antagonism between choir and clergy that goes way, way back into our folk history. Nothing new here!
Professor Bill Tamblyn begins with the mystery: What ever happened to the West Gallery at Peldon? All the evidence was cleared away when it was pulled down in the mid 19th century.. or was it?
Was there a West Gallery Quire of rustics who sang loudly from the gallery and ‘led’ the singing? If so, what did they sing? Can we sing it too?
Building on scraps of information from Peldon, and records from other parishes round the country, Bill creates a musical picture of a lively, rumbustious and irascible bunch who created a whole new form of music-making that was to liven up services and, as is still true to day in the North of England, liven up pub singing at Christmas.
Bill brings with him members of Quire – The Colchester World Music Community Choir to help us enter in to the spirit of the times. You will go out with a lively spring in your step and a song in your heart such that you will ask “why cant we sing like that in church these days?
Improved bus shelter at Salcott crossroads
Working under a Parish Council initative together with the manufacturer, Littlethorpe, who kindly provided the timber, and a grant for the labour from Essex County Council, our local handyman, Terry Simmons, was pleased to announce completion of the enhancements to the bus shelter at the Salcott crossroads.
The shelter is made from quality hardwood and since Littlethorpe bus shelters are expected to last for up to 50 years we hope it will be providing a pleasant, user-friendly and weatherproof facility for many years to come.
Village Design Statement & Parish Plan
Cause for rejoicing! The Village Design Statement is complete and has been approved by Colchester Borough Council. You should expect your own copy to drop through your letterbox in a month or so.
It covers the villages of Peldon, The Wigboroughs, and Salcott cum Virley. Many of you contributed to it by completing a long and detailed questionnaire back in 2009 and a small group have been working on the results ever since.
A Village Design Statement is a statement of a village’s character and qualities. It documents what residents value about their area and what they consider are the important character and features which should be retained and preserved for current and future generations when new developments are considered. Once approved by the Borough Council the VDS must be taken account of when planning applications are assessed.
In giving unanimous approval to our VDS the Borough Council were most complimentary. Comments included “wonderful”, “fabulous”, “interesting and unique”, ”very useful to other groups”, “should be issued to Estate Agents to describe the parish to buyers”. A councillor representing one group who started their VDS before we did said they would be using ours as a model.
Unusually our VDS also includes a Parish Plan which highlights those issues the community would like the Parish Council and other authorities to address. Many suggestions were made during the lengthy process of producing the VDS and Parish Plan – not all of them correctly reported in the recent edition of the County Standard! The Parish Council will be formally considering the feasibility of implementing those suggestions which were supported by a majority of residents.
New generations
You can download the newsletter or visit their website at http://garrhousefarm.co.uk to find out more.
Constable & his Country
On Wednesday 14th March, 7.30pm in St Mary’s Peldon, the Friends of St Mary’s, Peldon present Constable and his Country: a talk by Simon Gallup.
Come and join us for a pictorial journey through the landscapes that inspired John Constable in his famous paintings.
Tickets (£8) still available (Bill Tamblyn 735770) or pay on the door. Refreshments are available.
Snow fun for chickens
Kate Gladwin’s latest newsletter is now live on Wigborough Traditional Meat’s website with some amusing tales of how the snow affected them this year as well as news of upcoming offers and freshly hung beef.
You can download the newsletter or visit their website at http://garrhousefarm.co.uk to find out more.
Hundred grand grant for Village Hall
The Peldon Village Hall Management Committee were pleased to announce that plans for a new village hall for Peldon took a big step forward in December when they were awarded a grant of £100,000 from the Abberton Reservoir Community Fund towards the project. Following the granting of planning permission in August, this is a significant contribution towards the estimated £600,000 needing to be raised.
As a condition of the grant, the new building will have a lobby area that is open throughout the day, even if the hall is not in use. This area will include toilet facilities, an information area about the reservoir and a vending machine for the convenience of visitors who may wish to park in the hall’s car park before setting off to walk round the easterly side of the enlarged reservoir, once pathways have been created.
Together with the £30,000 already awarded from Essex County Council’s Community Initiatives Fund and £20,000 accumulated from fundraising events in recent years, the committee are now about a quarter of the way towards their target. Three further grant applications have been lodged and more will follow, including a major one to the Big Lottery, about which more will be said in coming months.
In the meantime there are lots of fundraising events coming up you can support to help:
- Race Night on 17th March – flyer attached gives all the details (POSTPONED)
- 30th June –Soul Concert with the Crissy Lee Band and Grand Auction. Venue – Brickhouse Barn, Lower Road, Peldon. Further details to be announced.
- 16th September – Sponsored Walk – details of route, and how to take part and get sponsorship forms to be announced later in the year.
- 10th November – Quiz Night in the Village Hall.
To find out more about these, of how to help PVH in general, contact Bob Holmes on 01206 735510.
Interested in half a pig?
They go in on a Monday and are available to collect from noon on Thursday. Each half pig weighs about 35kg and storage space of 60cm x 40 cm x 20 cm – two shelves should be OK.
Price: £2.90/kg or about £97 / half pig.
You have the choice of how they are cut and bagged. Common choices are:
- Leg: – joints ( any size ), diced, ham or gammon.
- Shoulder: – joints, diced, sausages, burgers or collar bacon.
- Loin: – chops, steaks or joints. Back bacon: smoked or green.
- Tenderloin: whole 9oz strip.
- Hand & Belly: – makes approx’ 18 packs of sausages (8 / pack), you choose the flavour. The belly could be left as a strip, made into BBQ ribs or streaky bacon. The hand may be diced for casseroles.
Sausages and burgers are £1.90 / kg extra. Flavours normally available are: plain, Old English, Cumberland, Pork & Leek, Tomato & Basil, Garlic Chilli and Fennel – be warned theses are hot, Pork & Apricot, Pork & Apple.
Bacon, gammon and ham are £2.30 / kg extra and take 2 weeks.
The bones, liver, kidney and heart are yours if you would like them.
If you have further questions or to place an order please contact:
Kate Gladwin 01206 735 694 [email protected]