Here you can find all of the latest news and updates for all the goings on at The Chequers.
- PUMPKIN WEIGH-IN - October 2009
Rather than seeing who could grow the largest marrow the challenge for 2009 was to see who could grow the heaviest pumpkin - and what a size some turned out to be. 19 pumpkins of various shapes, sizes and weights were wheeled in for their "weighing-in" - a strange spectacle in the 15th century inn. The winning weight was an incredible 61.7 kilos grown by Richard Barratt with Emily Stevens winning for the childrens' entries with her pumpkin weighing in at 31 kilos. For full list of weights see the results page by clicking here. £24 was raised for Kent Air Ambulance.
- RECITAL NIGHT - October 2009
The first recital night held by The Chequers was a great success on a Friday in October. Around 25 people gathered in the relaxed atmosphere and over the evening participated with a variety of poems, odes and lymerics varying from the serious to the rather less serious. Some material was written by individuals with a fantastic poem being produced by Mandy Wozney which portrayed the life and characters of the Chequers in very accurate manner! It was concluded that the evening was very enjoyable and a similar event will be held again at some stage. A donation of £22 from the evening was made to Kent Air Ambulance.
"People come and people go
in a village don't you know
But over the years - the good times and bad
I've been right here when you're happy and sad
A light shining bright for all to see
"come and visit" is my plea
A roaring fire to welcome you
a glass of wine, a beer, maybe food too
Over the centuries imagine what I've seen
there really is no in between
So as I said right at the start
this bit of knowledge I will impart
People come and people go
in a village don't you know .....
What Am I?"
- REGULARS TAKE ON 1 MILE OPEN WATER SWIM - August 2009
Many congratulations to Matt, Julie, Mary and Tracey who took up the challenge of swimming one mile in the Royal Victoria Dock in London. It was the first Matt, Julie and Mary had ever taken part in an open water swim and they did fantastically completing the full mile swim, enthusiastically cheered on by the group of 20 locals who went up to London to support them. Raising money individually for Macmillan Cancer Support, Breast Cancer, and Cancer Research they raised over £1,100 in total. Their finishing times were Tracey 31 mins 59 seconds, Matt 34 mins 26 seconds, Julie 56 mins 38 seconds and Mary completing in 1 hour 1 min 30 seconds.
- CARBON FRIENDLY TREASURE HUNT- September 2009
We are extremely grateful to Mick and Barbara Reeder and Chris & Lyn Ball for organising such an enjoyable challenge this year, setting out a delightful walk around the local countryside and presenting us with some challenging tasks. Thirteen teams took up the challenge with all we’re pleased to say coming back in one piece, although I think there were a few teams where the women were exasperated with the men – especially the picture clue of the horseshoe doorknocker on The Chequers door – we heard more than one lady say to her partner “how many times have you gone through that door and you didn’t even get that clue!!”. Congratulations to The Clark family who took this year's trophy. The event raised £254.22 for Kent Air Ambulance. For full results see the Results Page.
- BONKERS FOR CONKERS - October 2009
This year's annual conker challenge was as fiercely fought as ever. With 32 adults and 7 children taking part you can really see who are the “children of the village”. This year’s good weather seemed to have been suitable for conker growing and the size of the conkers seemed larger than usual giving many of us hope that it was going to be our turn to win this year. But as the sound of the knocks of conkers on conkers was heard followed by the shout of “oh no” the contestants were soon whittled down to the two finalists, James Smith & Mick Owen (however we cannot admit to this being the speediest of contests as Ruth & Gary were still on their first round while the other half of the draw had galloped through to the semi-finals!). James being a champion on two previous occasions was the hot favourite, but Mick’s tactics kept his conker remarkably unscathed and ended up the winner after smashing James’ in half. Thank you to everyone who took part in this fun afternoon which raised £45 for Kent Air Ambulance.
- CHEQUERS TEAM IN THE PADDOCK WOOD HALF MARATHON - April 2009
Well done to The Chequers team who ran in the Paddock Wood Half Marathon. Our gallant runners Andy the Farmer, Curly, Des, Stan, James, Guy, Debbie and Belinda raised sponsorship for Macmillan Cancer Organisation raising over £2,000.
Go team, go!!
- 2009 Annual Crib Competition
This year's annual crib competition was completed more or less within the time period of finishing the final game - a very unusual occurrence as many of you will know. A record number of entrants battled it our this year raising £44 for Kent Air Ambulence. Out of the four semi-finalists, three of the four had previously won the competition but in the nine years the competition has been going, non-one has won it twice. It looked as if the trophy was by-passing Laddingford and moving from Paddock Wood (Bob Dodd last year's winner) down to Yalding as Peter Mitchell and Matt leaver battled out the final. However after losing the first game, Matt went on to eventually win 3-1. Well done to Matt and we hope that everyone that took part enjoyed their games. The results were:
1st Matt Leaver
2nd Peter Mitchell
3rd Bob Dodd
4th Jane Prentice