Notts Derby Walking Group Meeting Held On Tuesday 19th June 2025 At The Horse & Jockey, Stapleford

Present

Andrew Cowell in the Chair & acting Secretary, Stuart Broadhurst (Treasurer), Jonny Bramley-Maye + Lucy the dog (Member without portfolio), Gary Olds (Walks Organiser), Alistair Green (Webmaster), Joanne Morris (social secretary), Rob Stevens (General Member)

1. Apologies

Rachael Drewery (Membership Secretary)

2. Minutes of the Previous Meeting

Minutes of the previous meeting were distributed with the agenda. Raised for approval.

Proposed: - Andrew Cowell. Seconded: - Jonny Bramley-Maye.

3. Matters Arising from the Minutes of the Previous Meetings

None arising.

4. Officers’ Reports

4.1 Group Secretary

The group secretary position is currently vacant and unlikely to be filled. Andrew is performing the duty for the time being. I will be unable to attend the next Nottinghamshire Area meeting on 15th July 2025 as I’m leading a walk, but I have provided a group report for the meeting.

4.2 Group Treasurer

Stuart confirmed we are in a healthy financial situation with £3310.47 in the bank account (£4238.72 at the last meeting). We have subsequently booked several weekends and need to get some income before booking any further weekends. Stuart confirmed we had received £268 stipend from the Ramblers based on our membership at the time of 149 members.

4.3 Walks Organiser

Jonny had raised the issue of walk end times, as this can cause problems when a walk lasts longer than expected. Explained that both Meetup and the Ramblers walk finder require an end time, so we have to specify one. Agreed to make end times later to allow for most unforeseen circumstances.

Andrew agreed to check the insurance situation with technical walks. We also considered whether we might have slightly earlier walk start times in the winter to make the best of the daylight.

A joint walk with the West Midlands group will probably be in October. Have not heard anything back from the Chiltern Young Walkers. Talked about several options for the autumn programme. Andrew agreed to have one Friday day time walk a month as an experiment to see if there is much demand. He would offer on weeks with no Saturday walks.

Joanne had agreed to start posting regular monthly pub meets and monitoring numbers. Numbers have been a bit disappointing to date but we’ve found Derby pub meets are the least popular. We’ve agreed to rotate between Nottingham, Beeston and Derwent Valley. It was agreed that tagging meals onto walks may be a more popular format and many other groups are doing this. Joanne agreed to book a meal in January at the Oakhill Hotel (formerly Alison House) with a short walk beforehand.

4.5 Weekends Organiser

A long time spent discussing various options. Agreed to do a weekend in Castleton at the beginning of December staying at the YHA on Saturday night with a Christmas meal in The George. 14 spaces to be booked.

Several Lake District options were raised, all with various pros and cons, including Elterwater, Buttermere, Ambleside independent and Langdale. October and November dates were also considered. October has the benefit of likely better weather, more daylight and it sits half way between the Conwy weekend and Christmas trip. Andrew agreed to go away and look at the various options, bed split and availability.

Scotland options also discussed as well as whether to hold it Easter week or early May Bank Holiday. No clear winner as Easter would sit better with the planned Isles of Scilly weekend and mean less annual leave, but property is cheaper early May and weather likely to be nicer. Andrew agreed to look at the various options. Joanne agreed to check on availability at Chy Carn on the Isles of Scilly in early June 2026.

Several other options considered which we will hopefully be able to progress at some point including Shropshire, Llangollen, York, Bath and Whitby.

4.6 Membership Secretary

The membership secretary sent her apologies and could not be present due to family issues. Membership has increased every month this year and stands at 155 as of the end of May. All present agreed that getting a regular walks programme and a community going in the group is the best way to attracting new and returning members. We have attracted a good number of returning new members, some of whom have already joined Ramblers, but some younger members have not returned.

4.7 Web

The main topic was around spreadsheet formatting causing problems importing into the Ramblers walk finder. Andrew sat down with Alistair after the meeting to identify the main problems and resolved to fix them over the coming weeks.

Gary raised the point that the public transport information on the website was out of date. Gary agreed to supply updated information to Alistair. We also agreed to put a link to our Instagram on the website.

5. General Chat

Jonny raised the previous idea of a forum for members discussion and arranging lift. This has the advantage of creating an exclusive area and creates an incentive for becoming a member. Need to investigate possible privacy complications, something I’ll also raise with area who have a lot of knowledge in this area. Andrew will action this before the next meeting.

Chat around the use of Instagram and whether Rob could use his talents in this area to post on the group page. I subsequently gave Rob access to the group page. Due to time constraints we didn’t manage to set an AGM date. We will do this at the next committee meeting.

6. Date and Venue of Next Meeting

Meeting closed at 22:04. Next meeting 7.00PM at The Horse & Jockey, Stapleford. Date to be confirmed.