Help wanted to reforge links in Bridgnorth twinning event after Covid disruption
Bridgnorth Twinning Association is looking for people to get involved in a major event in the town's calendar by volunteering to help out.
The Twinning Festival will take place on the weekend of Friday June 3 to Sunday June 5 and the association will welcome a delegation from Schrobenhausen, to celebrate 30 years of twinning with the Bavarian town.
Bridgnorth is twinned with two towns - Thiers in France being the other - and hosts guests from there and Germany every three years, with delegations visiting each one on rotation.
The first twinning ceremony was in Thiers over 40 years ago but two planned trips to Schrobenhausen over the last few years have had to be cancelled.
This year is expected to be a particularly busy weekend, with Bridgnorth Carnival on the Friday and the whole weekend coinciding with the Queen's Platinum Jubilee.
The carnival itself has been missing from the calendar for three years due to Covid-19 and the weekend is aimed at being a celebration and display of what Bridgnorth has to offer.
But for the twinning event, volunteers are being sought to host couples from Germany and people to act as guides to show them around the town and the area.
The Twinning Association itself is looking to boost its membership after it dwindled during the pandemic and an event has been arranged to introduce newcomers to the work of the group and try to get them involved in the visit later in the year.
Former Bridgnorth Mayor Ron Whittle is the chairman of the twinning committee and said more help would be welcomed.
He said: "This year is going to be massive for Bridgnorth with us hosting the twinning event, the town carnival and the Queen's Platinum Jubilee all on the same weekend.
"But we need help to plan the twinning weekend, volunteers to host families which would mainly be couples and drivers to take them out and show what the area has to offer.
"We could also do with more members in the association generally, numbers did go down during the last few years understandably but hopefully we have seen the end of the restrictions as they were and we could do with more bodies to help us plan events in the future as well as for this year."
The association is holding a cheese and wine evening on Thursday March 17 to introduce the work it does.
It is at the Town Hall at 6.30pm and is a free event but donations are welcome.
Anyone interested in attending can call 07801 615880 or e-mail ronawhittle@icloud.com.
