Hi Howard and Bob

 

As you may be aware, since Deb and I visited Africa I have been trying to put in place a friendship exchange with D9211 which takes in all of Uganda and Tanzania. 

 

The proposal as it stands is to have a group of up to 8 couples hosted in our district from Saturday April 8 to Saturday 22nd April which is the conference weekend.  These dates may change by a day or two but seem like a good option.

 

The visitors would be hosted by 3 different Rotarians for periods of 5 nights, 4 nights and 5 nights although the last night would be the Friday evening of conference and we would plan to take them there.  Ideally we would get a good geographical coverage within our district - last time we placed them in Wellington/Kapiti,  Ohakune/Waitara and PN/Horowhenua/Wairarapa.

 

Hosts are free to entertain the visitors as they wish.  The American exchange included activities such as walking the Tongariro Divide, Feilding saleyards, Mt Bruce reserve, visiting Napier, fishing at Taupo, Te Papa, golf etc.  Most visitors also appreciated a bit of down time.

 

Where they can be hosted by he same club it also offers the chance to organise group activity.

 

If you have individuals who wish to be involved please ask them to contact me or if you would like to work as a club/cluster could you arrange for 1 person to be in touch with me.  To date Plimmerton Club have suggested they will act as organiser for their area and can also work in the Wellington clubs if required.

 

At this stage I have not organised a return date.  My original thoughts were to try for May next year when their district conference is in Arusha, the launching point for many Serengeti safaris.  This is probably looking to be too short a time frame now and I would look to discuss this once I have the inwards better organised.

 

Thanks

Neville Gimblett

021 1212214