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Welcome
Welcome to the autumn edition
of Alice Holt Forest News. This newsletter lets you know about some of
the activities that have been going on in your local woods and about some
of the forestry operations that we have planned for the coming months.
The ambience of the Forest has now changed. The
children are back in school, the car parks are quieter on weekdays and
there are no blankets to be seen on the open grassy areas. Autumn has
arrived and the colours in the Forest this year have been spectacular
and long-lived. A welcome site before the bleakness of winter takes hold.
It is of course, the time where the ground staff are able to immerse them
selves into some of the desperately needed maintenance around the forest.
The replacement of trail posts, a lick of paint on the various facilities,
the sprucing of the car parks and the ongoing vegetation management, must
all be done before spring. A busy period it is for the staff, but a rewarding
one, all the same. When spring arrives, the Forest is looking at its best,
awaiting a fresh influx of visitors keen to explore and enjoy what the
forest has to offer.
It is also a time for me as a manager of the forest to reflect on the
summer months and how successful the forest has been for so many who have
enjoyed their time here. It’s now time to plan and focus our thoughts
on what we need to do too ensure visitors have an equally enjoyable time
next year.
Enjoy the colours whilst it lasts.
Events
Alice Holt Forest is proving to be a popular location
for all kinds of events in the local area.
· Nearly 900 runners took part in this year's Farnham 10k in the
forest in September.
· In January we have a new sport holding it's first event in Alice
Holt - CaniX. CaniX events are for runners and their dogs, who undertake
a course, attached to each other by an elasticated chord.
· In March we have the return of the 'Bolt around the Holt' fundraising
event raising money for The Royal Surrey Hospital in Guildford.
· Southern Navigators will be using the forest for orienteering
events throughout the year.
· If you are interested in holding an event in the forest please
contact us on 01420 23666.
· Sony are to erect a number of remote cameras throughout Alice
Holt to record panoramic pictures of various parts of the forest which
will then be sent every 10 minuets to a TV screen, to be set up in the
Café building. The filming will run for 4 weeks so come along if
you’re interested and see the images for yourself.
· We hope to have a new disabled toilet facility in place in the
following weeks ahead. The footings are in place ready to accept the new
structure. The building will have all the latest safety features fitted
and will be a vast improvement compared with the old unit. There will
also be baby-changing facilities within the same building.
Christmas Trees
Christmas is almost upon us and I thought I would
take this opportunity to inform readers of our new location this year.
We decided to relocate the Christmas tree sales
centre to a new location in car-park 2 so that visitors could continue
to enjoy the Playwood play facility and visit the Cycle Hire building
unimpeded.
The new location will sit in the area of car park 2, just as you leave
the tarmac drive, with plenty of parking around the sales centre to ensure
customers don’t have to walk far with their tree. The Café
will be a short distance away for the usual refreshments including mulled
wine and mince pies.
The sales centre will open from the 5th December
Harvesting Operations.
Operations where due to start in October, but due
to the unsettled nature of the current timber markets, the harvesting
program has been suspended until after Christmas. Further details will
be sent out in the New Year.
Recreation and education activities.
The education team has, as ever, been extremely busy since the start of
the summer term. There has been a constant stream of children on school
visits ranging from 4 year olds to 17 year olds and we've run lots of
activities during the school holidays. (Our Holt Happenings leaflet provides
plenty of information about the events we run and it can be downloaded
from the Alice Holt website home page www.forestry.gov.uk/aliceholt)
But that's not all. We've also been working with
teachers, early years professionals and student teachers to train them
in working outdoors with children. This training and continuing professional
development work is important to us as we believe children need to have
far more opportunities to get outdoors. The outdoors offers so many opportunities
for overall child development and for learning right across the curriculum
that we want to help others to get out there, by raising their confidence
and providing them with a whole range of ideas.
Schools and groups can book an educational visit
to Alice Holt Forest at any time of year and there's something for just
about everyone. Details of the educational programmes can be seen on the
Education and Learning pages of the website www.forestry.gov.uk/aliceholt-learning.
Many thanks for taking time
to read this newsletter and have an enjoyable Autumn and a Great Christmas.
Julian Williams
Alice Holt Visitor Manager
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