Annual Gathering at Exeter

Over 80 members descended upon Exeter to celebrate 50 years since the first publication of Saucers Over the Moor. The Crossmead Conference Centre proved an excellent base and had accommodation for most of our members to stay on site for the weekend.

On Friday evening Paul Rendle from the Dartmoor National Park gave us a taste of Dartmoor in his illustrated talk. He covered something of the moor's grim history and literary connections.

Paul's talk having whetted our appetite, the coach tour on Saturday took us around Dartmoor to Dartmeet, Prince Hall (Kings Holt) and Princetown where the fictional action took place. The weather played its part and we were able to actually see Dartmoor in sunshine. Previous events in this area led us to believe that it always rained here. We returned to our conference centre base to relax for a couple of hours before having our annual dinner or, as Dickie would call it, a fabulous feast. The evening was concluded by a light-hearted, fun quiz in which teams fought to the death.

Light rain on Sunday morning meant that no-one was looking longingly out of the window during our Annual General Meeting. Having caught up on Society developments and deciding that we should go to Whitby next year, we returned to the main business of the weekend - meeting and making friends, conversation and good food.

A surprisingly large proportion of the members were enjoying the area so much that they decided to stay on longer and some informal and unplanned activities took place before we reluctantly returned home on Monday or later.

 

Photo's of event

Crossmead Conference Centre

Start of Saturday coach tour

Prince Hall

The Winners