Minehead Rotary Club featured in the news recently when BBC Points West visited to see how our EVAG (Emergency Volunteer Action Group) operates helping West Somerset households take steps to alleviate the damage that can be done by rain and flash floods.
Article on the BBC Somerset website: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g39kz4xy1o
Information on our website: https://www.mineheadrotaryclub.co.uk/household-flooding.html

We had a great evening on Friday 16th January  when we held our Quiz and Raffle at Minehead Barbarians in aid of Dorset and Somerset Air Ambulance.
There was wonderful support in the form of a full house of quizzers who enjoyed a challenging set of questions, followed by a raffle draw with a lovely array of prizes.
We're pleased to say that we raised a total of £1,000!
Thank you to all who joined us for the evening for your generosity and also to those who donated all of the raffle prizes and helped to organise the evening. Special mention to the Rugby Club for being excellent hosts - a great venue!

We had barely warmed up from Friday evening when it was time for our annual Santa Fun Run, on the morning of Sunday 30th November.
With the usual great team effort, we were all set up by 10 am for runners to come and register. Blessed with a perfect morning the turnout was good and after a briefing by course director Peter Conrad an array of runners of all ages set off enthusiastically at 11 am to complete one or two of the 2km laps set out along Minehead's lovely sunlit promenade.
The Club would like to thank all of the runners for taking part. Thanks are also owed to everyone who helped arrange the event ensuring that everything went so smoothly. We enjoyed having two lovely Butlin's Redcoats with us who walked the route with one of our collecting buckets encouraging all of the participants. We were also joined by  David Jones, Community Partnerships Fundraiser for St Margaret's Hospice, and we have donated £200 from the proceeds of this year's event to the charity to support the vital work that they do.
#rotarypeopleofaction

We were pleased to support Minehead Town Council’s preparations for the lights turn on and Town Clerk Ben Parker and team had done a great job arranging things.
It was a slightly smaller footprint than in 2024, with the road closure stretching from Tregonwell Road up to the top of The Parade. The stage was positioned at the junction of Blenheim Road and The Parade and there were food and craft stalls along The Avenue. The Lions Club sleigh was in the forecourt of the Old Hospital so was much more visible than last year when it was down near the seafront.
A happy team of marshals  gathered for a briefing at 4pm before setting off to patrol the area. Thankfully the weather was favourable and it was quite quiet to start with but the crowd built as the evening progressed and there was a great atmosphere at the lights turn-on and the entertainment and market stalls continued until around 9 pm.
Thank you to everyone who helped with the marshalling and well done  to the organisers and all of the businesses that stayed open for the evening, adding to the festive atmosphere. 
#merrymerrychristmas

We hosted our second Volunteer & Recruitment Coffee Morning on Saturday 18th November at the Minehead Methodist Church Hall.
We had an excellent take-up and there were 20 community organisations there to chat to members of the public and also network with each other.
Feedback has been very positive and we hope that some new volunteers or members have joined some of the great local organisations!
You can see a selection of photos taken during the morning by clicking on this link.

With Foxes Hotel still closed for the school holidays on the date of our first September meeting, Geoff and Linda Dibble arranged a Treasure Hunt for Monday 1st September and four carloads of hunters set off from West Somerset College for an adventurous drive around Exmoor.
It was a very well thought out challenge and great fun to take part in. We all arrived at the final destination, The Bittescombe Inn at Upton, earlier than expected (and ahead of the adjudicators Geoff and Linda!) where we enjoyed delicious lasagnes and desserts to round off the evening.
Thanks to Geoff and Linda for arranging it - we’re looking forward to the next one! 

Saturday 30th August saw several members of the club helping Minehead & Coast Development Trust again by marshalling at the annual Minehead Bay Festival.
We also had the opportunity to set up our gazebo (@ no cost to us) and we used the occasion to focus on fundraising with the find-a-fiver boards (thanks Richard W.), the spin-the-wheel (thanks Mollie) and, at last, a Tombola made up largely of bottles and cans left over from our BBQ, with a sprinkling of toiletries and soft toys. Thank you to all who donated the extra gifts - we raised a total of £380.

The weather forecast in the run up to the Festival had not been encouraging but all was going well until mid afternoon when the tail end of an Atlantic storm arrived, most people ran for shelter and all went quiet. Fortunately most of our funds had already been raised so we weren’t too badly affected but it did make for a damp and rather quiet last couple of hours.
Thanks as ever to everyone who helped to set up and take down the gazebo, those who  volunteered to marshal and those who spent some time manning the gazebo. Some did both and it made for quite a long day. It turned out to be a helpful boost to Club funds, to be put towards our Youth activities.

We took up our regular spot at this annual event and the weather was kind to us - always a relief!
Thank you to the number of members who came along to meet and chat with passers-by and oversee the running of the Find-a-Fiver board (many thanks Richard Williams, as ever) and our recently-introduced Spin-the-Wheel game (thanks Mollie). Both contributed more funds to support our activities in West Somerset.
Both footfall and the number of stands seemed down on the past couple of years - a sign of people having to tighten their belts perhaps? However, we met a good number of people, visitors and locals, who now know a bit more about Rotary!

Our Boules team (which included a number of members of Rtn John Baker's family) pulled off a resounding victory in our Boules re-match on Monday 28th July.
We were invited to join Taunton Vale Rotary Club at the Farmers Arms near Taunton for a rematch following our defeat when they visited us at the Luttrell Arms in Dunster last Summer.
It was a display of sporting prowess of the highest order. To be honest I don’t really understand the scoring but the scores were totted up by a member of the Taunton Vale club so I have no reason to doubt the result