The Official Wenvoe Homepage
We were delighted to welcome three new members this month: Viv, Mike & Lynette. And despite having never played the game before, Mike went on to win first price! Well done! Second gent was Trevor and the winning ladies were Marian, first, and Margaret, second.
Congratulations to all! Hope we see you all back next month.
On April 20th, Mr. Philip Davies, who has had a lifelong experience in Amateur Dramatics, gave us an interesting talk on the many things that go wrong on stage, such as lights that don’t switch on, and props not where they should be, and the way the actors have coped with the situations.
Margaret called Bingo for us again on the 27th, and on May 4th, Mr. Anthony Walton, talked to us about "The Birds in our Gardens".We saw slides of many of our native birds, some of which are, sadly, in decline.
This was followed on May 11th with a Beetle Drive, which was won by Shirley. We have quite a busy June programme, commencing on the 1st with a return visit by Pam and Cled Lewis, who will recall their holiday in Namibia. This is followed on June 8th by a talk, with slides, by Mr. Alan Salisbury about "The Durango & Silverton Railroad in the Rockies.
We will celebrate the Queen's birthday on June 15th, and on June 22nd Mr. Peter Finch will give us a talk on "Edging the Estuary". Lastly on 29th June Mrs Polly Davies will talk on Calamity Jane.
As always new members and visitors are welcome.
Could you write an article for the What’s On magazine?
We can only fill the pages by you, the readers, giving us material to include. What have you done in the last month? Been on holiday, attended a meeting, done something new, visited an interesting location etc why not tell others.
To include an item in the magazine just send it to a member of the production team or if you have not got computer access you can put it in the Whats On box in Springfield Store and we will aim to get it typed.
We look forward in anticipation.
The site has been down for a few weeks but hopefully by publication date it will be up and running again. The site has been looked after by Len Jones since it was built.
Following Len’s death we now have anybody to look after the day to day running of the site. The builder of the web page, Phil, is prepared to train a new local site operator.
If you would be prepared to manage this community facility please contact Ian Moody (see the Wenvoe Directory) or contact the Clerk to the Council.
The Council held its AGM in May. The Chairman for the forthcoming year will Cllr Colin Thomas and Cllr Ceinwen Frost the vice chairman. Membership of the various sub-committees was determined.
The following applications have been approved by the Vale of Glamorgan.
Land at Former Bus Depot Site, Chapel Terrace, Twyn-yr-Odyn, Following the refusal of the planning permission by the Vale for 15 affordable houses Nywydd Housing Association representative has met with the Community Council to discuss the future of the application. A traffic survey on St Lythan’s Road is in progress at present to determine the volume and speed of traffic using the road at present.
The Friends of the Library are hoping to hold regular book sales in the Community Centre, these have been delayed pending the judicial review appeal by the Rhoose library group. The lease for the Wenvoe library is being prepared by the council’s solicitors.
The allotment wardens reported that one plot had become available and that at present there were no names on the waiting list. An advert in the What’s On magazine was requested.
It has been agreed to remove the two fir trees from the Village Green. This will improve the appearance of the area.
Permission has been granted to the BBC to place their generator in the gateway to the Twyn-yr-Odyn playing field while they film for an episode of Casualty on the morning of 30th May.
The footpath from Tarrws Close across the park which was washed out by the winter rains has now been relaid.
It is anticipated that the work on installing a new nursery classroom at the school will commence in June requiring the school car park area to be closed while the work is in progress. People are asked to be tolerant of the additional vehicles parked locally.
The trees felled near the Brooklands Terrace roundabout are the next section of the metro work which is about to commence and indication are the work will not be complete until the end of the year.
It has been noted that cars are parking on the cycle way near the golf club entrance. Cars are also noted to be parking in front of the dropped kerb at the entrance to Rectory Close blocking the progress disabled vehicle users. Both matters will be progressed.
The police are concerned about the number of reports of people being contacted by fraudsters claiming to be from BT or tax office seeking details of bank accounts etc. These people sound very professional and convincing. People are advised not to give any personal details, banking details credit card numbers etc to such contacts but report incidents to the police. You can also contact Action Fraud on 0300 123 2040 for assistance.
This book is based on fact.
"A young man of humble background, Jean-Baptiste Baratte, is ordered to exhume the vast and ancient cemetery of Les Innocents in the poor Parisian quarter of Les Halles, and demolish the church. No one knows how many bodies are buried there – it is claimed that during one outbreak of the plague the graveyard received 50,000 in less than a month – but it has recently burst its banks, poisoning the city and spreading "moral disturbance".
Baratte finds that the stink of the dead dominate the quarter, fouling the air and tainting even the breath of those who live there. The vast smoke blackened church that presides over the graveyard obliterates the light. And yet as the young engineer begins the grisly excavations, he finds that the residents of this poor, labrynthine district have a powerful attachment to both.
The impending revolution hangs over the narrative like the blade of the guillotine to come."
Taken from a Guardian review
As you will have gathered not a book for the faint hearted.
A mixed reception of thoroughly enjoyed, quite enjoyed and not enjoyed at all. It did seem to us all that it was a weird, rather creepy subject.
We did agree that it was extremely well written with short, concise sentences. The descriptions were so good we felt that we could hear and smell the things he was describing, it was at once horrific and enthralling. The excavations were done by miners supervised by Jean and his friend who had both been miners. The descriptions of their work, the piles of bones, the transport of these bones to a quarry, the thought of all these men living in tents in the midst of all this- Ugh! The author had obviously done a lot of painstaking research.
There was a part where Jean was at Versailles and saw the elephant that the King had been given by the King of Siam. The writing about this was so well done and took you into the extremes of Paris and its environs at this time.
We discussed whether we would recommend this book to a friend – a difficult one due to the macabre subject. It did come out with a good score of 8.
As promised in last months What’s On, here are some photographs of our visit to Caerphilly Castle. Thank you Emma at Wheadons Coach Travel, for arranging our transport for the day. The children were so excited to be boarding the coach, regardless of our destination. The Castles’ dragon was there to meet us on entry and created a fun photo shoot. An enjoyable time was had by all. The next morning at playgroup, the children produced some lovely creative models of castles using recyclable materials and enjoyed viewing photographs of the day, shared by one of our children. During March, we also visited the library to return our books and say farewell to Mrs Lucas. The children thanked Mrs Lucas for allowing us to visit the library over the years by presenting her with a beautiful bouquet of flowers (purchased from the Secret Garden in Cardiff Market).
The Parents, Committee, Staff and Children would like to send their fondest wishes to Mrs Lucas and thank her for the support she has shown to the Playgroup over the years.
We are busy at this time practising songs to sing at our Easter Fayre and look forward to sharing our photographs and news in next months What’s On. The Playgroup is now fully booked until the Autumn Term. Please contact us should you wish to enquire about our future services as Gwenfo School prepare for their Nursery Unit. We are working closely with the School, to support families who require longer hours of care. We hope to offer care for children aged 2 years and 4 months from September and will share more information in our next article. We will be holding an open session from 3:30pm on Thursday 30th June, to register those on our waiting lists and for families to view the facilities and the care we can offer moving forward. Please register your interest by calling 029 2059 7494 during playgroup hours or email wenvoeplaygroup@btinternet.com .
You can keep up to date with our changes by visiting our website wenvoeplaygroup.co.uk