North Mainland Notes 24.04.09

Voe Show royalty

This year’s Voe Show will break with tradition for the first time since it began when there will be both a prince and a princess complete with attendants.

This is in comparison to years gone by when just a princess with two attendants has been chosen. Princess Megan Leask of Tingwall, accompanied by Lorraine Peterson of Sullom and Prince Craig Manson of Brae, accompanied by Stuart Clark of North Roe, will all take part in the show on Saturday 1st August.

The lucky four were chosen at a disco held by the show committee in the Voe hall on 14th March. Delting Up-Helly-A’ Guizer Jarl for 2009, Stuart Robertson and his wife Ann from Muckle Roe, had the unenviable task of picking the winners. Congratulations to all four boys and lasses.

Good as New openings

To complement the Delting Parish Church sale in the Brae hall tomorrow, the Good as New shop in the Brae Youth Centre will be open from 2pm to 4pm.

The shop usually opens every Tuesday and the last Saturday of each month, but this will temporarily change during May and June.

During that time the youth centre will become the exam venue for Brae High School pupils so weekly Good as New shop opening days will move from Tuesday openings to Saturday for the exam period. This will begin from next Saturday, 2nd May, and continue until 13th June. Tuesday openings will resume on 16th June. Opening times will remain unchanged from 2pm to 4pm.

1,000 miles to Chelsea

Sue Hayward, garden designer and project manager of the double award-winning Motor Neurone Disease Shetland Crofthouse Garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show last year, is in Shetland for a holiday and has kindly offered to host a talk and slide show.

The show, entitled “1,000 miles to Chelsea”, will take place in the Brae hall on Tuesday at 7.30pm with tea and home bakes to follow. Donations will be sent to the Motor Neurone Disease Association. Funds will help support the work of the association co-founded by Martin Anderson, the man with the original idea of the garden.

Ms Hayward mainly works in the East Midlands, covering the Derby and Derbyshire, Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, Leicester and Leicestershire, East Staffordshire and South Yorkshire areas. She also works on exciting projects such as the Crofthouse Garden, both nationally and abroad.

Work with communities plays an important part of her life and she is always keen to give advice on community amenity schemes and projects. As well as giving talks to horticultural clubs and societies, she finds time to lecture on garden design at Nottingham Trent University.

The evening will also include a joint raffle by the North Mainland Gardening Club and the Nort Trow Gairden Group at North Roe. The Nort Trow group was lucky enough to secure the plants from Chelsea and spent last summer transporting stone to help build the croft house façade and preparing the soil ready for the Chelsea plants.

The group is continuing with improvements to the garden and fundraising forms an essential part of the programme. The garden is situated adjacent to the North Roe Church of Scotland and is open to visitors, and helpers, at all times.

CLAN fancy dress walk

Sponsor forms are now available for the annual Muckle Roe to Brae fancy dress sponsored walk, which will take place on Saturday 23rd May.

This year’s chosen charity is CLAN 1,2,3 and many walkers are already filling up their forms fast. The walk, just over four miles, proves more popular each year and anyone who would like to take part should contact Alice or Louise Ratter on (01806) 522307 or 522477 Events at Hillswick Due to an event clash and the crofting calendar in general, the date of the crofters’ ball in the Hillswick hall has changed a few times over the past couple of months.

A final date has now been fixed for Friday 29th May when organisers hope that most lambing duties will be past and folk will be ready to celebrate the end of another successful lambing.

Isobel’s marathon

Look out for runner 11,073 in the Flora London Marathon on Sunday!

The North Mainland will be represented by veteran runner Isobel Mowat of Brae who will be taking part in her third marathon. This is her first experience of the London event though, having competed in the Edinburgh race twice previously.

The week prior to her run has been spent winding down after some intensive training that has included 18 mile runs in some pretty wild Shetland conditions.

Isobel feels that running in such adverse conditions is great preparation: “I feel ready for it, and if you can run in Shetland in driving sleet or wind and rain you can run anywhere.”

She spent yesterday at the Northern Lights Holistic Spa in Bressay where any knotted muscles and lactic acid were banished from her legs, with the various massage treatments on offer at the centre.

The size and stature of the London marathon has increased since it started in 1981. Entry has now reached capacity levels with over 46,000 entrants accepted this year.

Although Isobel is thrilled to be taking part and delighted that so many people have sponsored her so far for her chosen charity, Friends of ANCHOR, she is especially looking forward to returning to Shetland in time for the birth of her second grandchild due in May. Good luck to this super gran on Sunday.

Music with Da Corbies

To celebrate the beginning of the boating season, the Delting Boating Club is holding a musical evening tonight with live music by Da Corbies. Members and guests will be made welcome and the fun begins at 9pm.

Cafe closed

Braewick Cafe at Eshaness will be closed on 1st, 2nd and 3rd of May due to a staff wedding.

Toby Smedley, chef at the cafe since it opened, will marry Alison Mowat from Hillswick next Friday. Best wishes to the couple.

Colin set for powerdown

After an award of funding from the Climate Challenge Fund via a consortium bid though Community Energy Scotland and the Development Trust Association Scotland, the Northmavine Community Development Company (NCDC) has appointed Colin Dickie as community powerdown officer.

Colin, a native of Yell, took up the post recently and has initially spent time considering the outcomes of the project. The main focus of the two-year project will be to build up a picture of energy use in Northmavine and form an action plan around ways to reduce consumption and energy costs for the community.

Colin also plans to research local food production in the area and consider ways in which this might be increased and better marketed.

The third strand to the project will consider small-scale community renewable projects and how Northmavine could benefit from this scale of renewables. Initially he would like to build up a baseline picture of energy consumption of the area and will be contacting local householders and businesses to ask for help to build up this information.

Anyone in Northmavine with any ideas, questions or queries should contact Colin at the NCDC office on (01806) 544222 or e-mail powerdown@northmavine.com

Good luck Strictly Boston

Finally, best wishes to all the Strictly Boston finalists who have quietly been polishing their polkas and buffing their Boston performances over the winter.

According to Miss Plookytrams, personal assistant to Mr Wattly Leask of Skea TV fame, filming for the final will take place at a secret location in downtown Zoar this weekend.

Results of the finals, and perhaps a commemorative DVD, will be available around mid-August, which will also coincide with an annual event in North Roe.

Maree Hay