Get Together events and gatherings.
We enjoy keeping active and hold varied events each month including our popular Walking Group, Book Club & Library, History Group, Reading Circle and regular social events.
See below for more details on our activities and forthcoming events.
Forthcoming Events
Lunch & Wine Group – Tuesday 11 June 11.30 in Cherveux
The June lunch group will be hosted by Lesley & Neil Ritchie at their home at Cherveux. The theme will be light Wines for light summer lunches.
A maximum of 14 bookings on a first come basis, due to how many reasonable tastings from these bottles of wine, but in the event of over subscription anyone who cannot be accommodated will be offered first refusal for the following meeting.
If you would like to book to join us or would like more information, please contact Diane & Keith.
Reading Group – Wednesday 11 June 10.30 in L’Absie
The book for the month of June is Fresh Water for Flowers by Valerie Perrin.
As always we will be meeting at the Pause Café in L’Absie. New members are always welcome. Please bring along any recommendations of books to discuss or to be read purely for pleasure. Please contact Yvonne Pond to let her know if you plan to be there.
Walk and Lunch – Friday 27 June 10.30 in Sepvret
This walk will start at 10:30 hrs at Dorothy Peel’s home in La Maisonniere, 79120 Sepvret.
There will be a short walk of approximately 5 kms and a longer one of 8 kms. The source of La Sèvre Niortaise is in Sepvret, both walks crossing the river a few times. The river is more than 160 kms long, 100 kms of which are navigable. Both walks pass l’ancienne école clandestine Protestant and le logis de Foucault.
Lunch will be at 13:00 hrs at Le P’tit Berland, 5 Place de la Payse, Lezay, menu €15.
GT Summer Event – Sunday 27 July 12.30 in Noirlieu
A new member has kindly offered her house and garden for this summers event. It is a little further north than usual, close to Noirlieu.
Les Jouteaux has extensive mature gardens, including a lake and a wet weather location if required – hopefully not!
We would encourage you to bring friends and family to this event, it’s great fun,
especially with the games.
We will be holding our annual horse racing game, there will also be additional outdoor games eg, molky, pétanque and giant jenga.
Food will be a bring and share event, with GT providing aperos, wine, hot drinks, cheese and bread. You need to bring crockery, cutlery, mugs, glasses for wine, and water/soft drinks.
Activities List
| Walking Group | A 8 km walk, with a short walk option of 4km, usually on the last Friday of each month. Organised by individual Members with lunch at a restaurant afterwards, which non-walking members are very welcome to attend. |
| History Group | Bi-monthly talks by Members on Anglo/French history and summer visits to historical places. |
| Reading Group | Adhoc meetings at a Members home to discuss and review the latest novel read by the group.. |
| Lunch & Wine Club | Meets monthly where people bring and share a starter and a dessert with a talk on and tasting of a particular wine complimentary to the dishes |
| Fine Wine Evening | An occasional opportunity to taste a selection of more expensive wines, with a presentation by our very own expert Member |
| Quiz Nights | We hold 3 or 4 quizzes a year in local restaurants with an evening meal at a reasonable price. A fun evening and not too challenging! |
| Social Events | Summer BBQ, Summer Garden Party, Ten Pin Bowling, Horse Racing Day. |
If you would like to hold an event of any sort please contact the Coordinators, they will check if the date is free, discuss the details with you and let you know the date they need information for the Newsletter. We welcome volunteers (especially new members) to organise events which we would assist them with if necessary. All members are very welcome at any Get Together event wherever it is held. All information for events and events reports should be sent to the appropriate Coordinator first rather than to the Newsletter Editor direct.
If you are planning a large non Get Together event and you would like us to try and not have an association event clashing with it please also contact the Coordinators.
The idea for creating a GT History Library came as a result of receiving the very generous donation from Carol Andrews – a past President of GT – of her late husband’s collection of 250 history books, journals and miscellaneous articles acquired over a number of years. Keith had been one of the founder members of the History Group.
This collection has been augmented by a similar number contributed by Vaughan Wells such that the library now comprises a comprehensive collection of reference and text books, biographies and articles on aspects of world history with special emphasis on events in Britain and France.
We owe Carol a big thank you for her kind generosity in making this material available and thus ensure that Keith’s interest and enthusiasm for history can be passed on to both present and future members of the Association.
Jeremy Luckett, Chairman, GT History Group Committee, April 2015
The Group are very pleased to accept the collection of history books and genealogical tables of English and European royal families from the estate of John and Pauline Tonks who died within a few months of each other recently. John and Pauline had been members of GT since coming to France in 2007, following their retirement and their marriage in England. Both had a longstanding interest in genealogy and as well as running courses in the subject for GT members, John had traced his own family back as far as King Canute. A particular interest was the family trees of English and European royal families and their interconnections as a result of which the Collection contains a large number of history books on monarchs and prominent public figures of their time.
The History Group is delighted to receive this kind donation from John and Pauline who, as well as being members of Get Together were also members of Les Jardiniers de Poitou gardening club and active in raising funds for the Combined Services Support Group.
Jeremy Luckett, Chairman, G.T. History Group Committee, February 2016
Requesting/returning a book or article:
The Library is available to all members of Get Together, but you must be a registered user. The catalogue is available to download below or a hard copy can be consulted at History Group meetings. Requests should be submitted by e-mail to hglibrary0@gmail.com, or by hand at HG meetings. For books you will need to include your user number, the author and the title; for articles please include also the reference number to be found on the right-hand side of the listing. The maximum loan period is two months, or one month if the book/article is in heavy demand: the maximum number of books/articles that can be borrowed at any one time is four. A list of dates and times when books/articles can be collected/returned (usually at Menigoute) will be regularly updated under Forthcoming Events above.
NB: Library services are free of charge, and operated on a voluntary basis by the History Group Committee. Donations from GT/HG members are welcome, however, and will be forwarded on a six or twelve monthly basis to the cancer charity [CLIC Sargent] in memory of Keith Andrews.