Herne Bay Beach Hut Day

Herne Bay famous faces John Altman and Nicki Chapman had a stiff challenge on their hands as guest judges at the annual beach hut competition. A fiercely contested event saw owners get right into the festival spirit with an array of colourful designs and themes for their huts.

Former EastEnders star John and TV personality Nicki were joined by Jenny and David Cross from the Friends of the Herne Bay Museum in the judging as the number of entries exceeded expectations. Organiser Andrew Cook was overwhelmed with the response:

“The sun came out to shine and many hut owners frantically dressed theirs in time for judging. Competition was fierce and the quality was higher than ever before, some owners came from as far away as Yorkshire to enter. We had to give out some additional prizes to make the judges’ lives a bit easier. Jill Bell eventually took the honours for best dressed hut with her Mrs Sweeney Todd theme. It was great to have both Nicki and John there as they are firm believers of what Herne Bay has to offer and the town’s future potential.”

Kentish Gazette 16th Aug 2011

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Click here for the Beach Hut Day photo gallery

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Herne Bay Carnival

Herne Bay was awash with colour on Saturday as crowds turned out in force for this year’s carnival. The morning’s wet weather cleared in plenty of time for young and old to line the route and enjoy the annual parade from Lane End, along Western Esplanade through Central Parade, the town centre and back to Sea Street.

Around 60 floats, including 11 visiting carnival courts, brought noise and colour to the sea front, lead by music from the Herne Bay Sea Cadets band.

Among them were best in carnival, The Red Wheelies from Canterbury’s MS Therapy Centre. The ladies, famed for their formation dances on mobility scooters, dressed up as knights of the realm in full battle armour. Other entrants included members of the town’s football club and roller hockey clubs, as well as Greenhill Gymnastics Club and the Hasland Dance Academy.

The team from domestic carers Bluebird Care won the Carol Bosworth prize for creativity. In the evening, the Kings Hall hosted the traditional post parade party, with music from band Kelly’s Hero’s.

HB Times 15th Aug 2011

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Click to see the Carnival photo gallery

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Delicatessen plundered for scrap twice in one week

Metal thieves are running rampant through Herne Bay and not even your kitchen equipment is safe, according to one trader. Delicatessen boss Steve Dansey said his fridge has been plundered for parts - not once but twice in recent weeks. He said:

"My fridge was delivered on a Monday. On Tuesday when we went to assemble it we saw all the aluminium brackets had been stolen. It was assembled on Wednesday and by Friday they'd clipped the copper pipes off the back, even though it was running!"

On Tuesday he saw a teenager sifting through items left for a second-hand shop and taking scrap metal away on his bike. Mr Dansey, who runs Butterfly Meadow in the High Street, added:

"He had a black bag on his bike for the scrap. It seemed very Well organised. He wheeled his bike to the end of the road and just Waited to be picked up."

Other shopkeepers say they have spotted thieves stealing metal strips from steps, and in January iron drain grids were stolen for their scrap metal value, leaving holes in the road. Police are working to combat the problem by visiting about 50 breakers yards and scrap metal dealers across the county. Chief Superintendent Steve Corbishley, Kent Police's head of partnership and communities, said:

"Metal theft is a national problem and one of the UK's fastest-growing crimes, and it's having an impact on communities in Kent. We've had church roofs and school buildings targeted, telephone cable and manhole covers stolen by thieves recently. Around 15 million tonnes of metal is recovered nationally each year, with a sale value of £13 billion, which gives an illustration of the scale of this criminality, due to the rising value of commodities like copper. We are visiting scrap metal dealers, and will continue to work on days of action to raise awareness and to target suspects when we have information they are involved in crime."

ed.targett@KRNmedia.co.uk

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Butterfly Meadow Farm's shop is called High Street Heaven

at 80 High Street,  Herne Bay, Kent CT6 5LE

Bus rally threatened by Council

Our Council demanded £850 compensation for 'lost revenue' - and the red tape almost drove this Sunday’s Herne Bay bus rally off the road.

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Organisers admitted this week they were considering cancelling the annual event when Canterbury City Council demanded payment for unused parking spaces. Julian Bowden, who took over running the rally last year with Nigel Coupe, said:

"The city council's events team and town co-ordinator Chris West have been brilliant, and know how many visitors the rally brings to Herne Bay. But then the council’s parking services department stepped in and dropped a bombshell by demanding £850 compensation for lost revenue from the spaces the buses use in William Street car park. It was virtually the same amount We raised for our chosen charity, Demelza children’s hospices, last year. We felt it was a little excessive."

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The Pier Pavilion... not to be missed ;-)

Well, dear reader, here's an interesting little something... a report on our dainty little town, as viewed through the eyes of a visitor from afar.

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RE: Herne Bay Pier Pavilion

Dear Sir/Madam,

We recently visited Herne Bay for the first time and on the whole enjoyed our day in the town. However, we were both rather horrified and aghast at the sight of the 1976 Pier Pavilion.

After recovering from our disbelief we decided that while a building so municipal, imposing and downright ugly may have made sense on an industrial estate on the outskirts of Milton Keynes, as the focal point of a 'Victorian' coastal resort it was akin to seeing the Queen making a public appearance with chocolate spread smeared on her cheek.

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Message in a Bottle at Reculver

Local litter action group 'Shore' is a load of Rubbish! is still going strong, and their project for 2011 is Message in a Bottle.

With the help of two local schools (Westmeads Whitstable and St Stephens Canterbury) they are constructing a full-sized beach hut from recycled materials, including 2 litre plastic bottles filled with beachcombed litter and facts about marine litter. Message in a Bottle is now on at:

Reculver Visitor Centre open Thursday-Monday 11am-5pm till 29th August, on display are:

• a Bottle Beach Hut, made of 2 litre bottles filled with beach litter,
• a bottle top deckchair made up of 560 bottle tops threaded onto 40 metres of cord, and
• a Mermaid made from crisp packets, balloon litter and recycled items!
• More details below.

Click it to big it.

‘Message in a Bottle’ Dates 2011

Herne Bay Band Stand/Sea Front
August, location TBC

Reculver Visitor Centre
1st-29th August
11-5 Thursday-Monday

Horsebridge Centre Whitstable
8th-18th September
9-6 Monday-Saturday 10-6 Sunday

For more information, and great pictures of work in progress and previous exhibits, visit

shoreisaloadofrubbish.blogspot.com

Drama on the foreshore

All sorts of noise and drama down by the Coastwatch Lookout this morning (31st July). It appears that a lady had fallen off her bike and injured her back or neck. This was right outside the Lookout, where the black and yellow barrier crosses the prom. The barrier was vertical by the time I got there, but it might have been moved by the ambulance crew who were already in attendance.

The Kent Air Ambulance arrived at about 8:30am and landed (parked? settled?) on the promenade just east of the Lookout. An impressively neat piece of parking it was, too - better than a lot of people can manage in their cars.

As it turned out, the injured lady cyclist (Dutch or Belgian?) was whisked away in the road ambulance, and the air ambulance returned to base. It looked like a well-executed rescue: congratulations to all involved, and hopefully a speedy recovery for the injured lady. To find out more about the Kent Air Ambulance, and make a welcome, much-needed and well-deserved donation, just click the logo:

Jul 2011: most read

1. Job losses at Manston Airport
2. Waitrose gets 20-year lease in Canterbury
3. HBiB Blog
4. Motionless
5. Big Apple pie in the sky
6. Night Flights: too hot to handle?
7. Manston unmonitored
8. URGENT: Beach hut threat
9. Trickle of funding for Manston Parkway
10. Ban on fishing in Memorial Park pond

Former jet-setter finds the good life on the farm

The way Steve Dansey tells it; one minute he was a milkman, the next minute head of IT security at a major global corporation. Now he's running a farm in Whitstable and making sausages that he sells in his delicatessen on Herne Bay high street. It's a career trajectory so unlikely it makes you do a double-take.

The 52-year-old makes the move from dropping off bottles of semi-skimmed to scanning the files of international banks on the hunt for fraud sound disarmingly simple. And the sausages? Just a return to his roots as a butcher's boy and son of a meat salesman… He told Ed Targett how he ended up with thousands of pear trees, a herd of Badger Face Sheep and an injunction from Canterbury City Council...

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Review launched into HS1 impact on regular rail services

Canterbury City Council is conducting a review into the impact of fast rail services on Kent’s network after research revealed journeys on regular trains are now slower. Rail campaigners have accused operator Southeastern of slowing down mainline services by adding additional stops in a bid to make High Speed 1 more appealing.

It followed a report by Canterbury City Council which revealed the total journey time on regular services on the north Kent line was up to 20 minutes slower since the introduction of HS1. This has prompted a critical review by the authority, which is expected to be completed in two months. Southeastern denied the accusations of slowing down trains stating that timetables were based on service specifications set by Government, outlining how many services there should be from a particular station.

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