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Hi everyone!

We have a provisional time and place Camp 2027:

Allington Court in Bridport, Dorset, with the dates being 4-11 June.

It's in the South-West, on the Jurassic Coast, with lots of interesting places to visit nearby, including the famous Cerne Abbas Giant.

Please could you let us know if you'll be able to make it on those dates? Pen and I would like to have fairly firm numbers before we commit and book. The house is a bit more expensive than previous Camps (location, and also just the general effects of inflation over the past few years) so we don't want to end up booking somewhere that's a lot bigger than we need.

ETA: As an alternative possible date, how would 21-28th June compare, since early June is awkward for some people?

pensnest

You know what? Next year will be the 20th Anniversary of Camp Sparkle.

nopseud and I reckon that we have mostly, as a group, grown away from Camp, but we also think it would be cool to have One Last Camp to celebrate our very special and strange little fannish community, and also, it would be so nice to see you all again.

So, what do you think? Would you come to Camp if we run it next year?

Could you make it whenever, or are there specific times in the year when you would be able to make it?

Do you have any other specifications? Is there somewhere in the UK you'd particularly like to visit, or even re-visit? Would you like to bring a partner? (Before we hunt for a house, we'd like to have a good idea of numbers.)

People aren't so much on LJ/DW these days, so do tell any and all Campers you know that it could be happening, and we need your answers. And anyone who hasn't been to Camp and would love to attend, this is probably your last chance!

pensnest

So, does anyone want to come over for Eurovision (finals) weekend? It's the weekend of 11th May, and if you'd like to stay and have some time to explore the lovely city of Norwich and county of Norfolk, you are very welcome. Let me know in comments, or email me.

pensnest

Hi Campers

Nopseud and I are not going to organise a Camp Sparkle this year, but what we're offering instead is a Sparkly Eurovision. Now that we no longer share one particular fandom, it feels as though Eurovision is about the campest thing we could possibly do, so we thought we'd have a go at it.

The Finals will be on 11th May. My house can accommodate quite a few of you, if you would like to come over, and we can have a very silly time watching together, eating ethnically-appropriate snacks, drinking things with silly names, and whatever else seems appropriate. You are also very welcome to stay for a few days before and/or after, if you'd like to have time to explore Norwich and some of what Norfolk has to offer.

The house could, theoretically, fill up, in which case it will be first come, first found a bed. So reply here if you are thinking of coming, or definitely keen to come, and book your spot!

turps

I had such an excellent time at Camp and wished I could have stayed longer, hope you're all still having fun!

I've been looking at the group photos James took for us and wondered if the Campers featured would like me to post them here behind a flock? I also have the excellent selfies as taken by Beast and his long arms and sent from A's phone so could post those too if wanted.

nopseud

This is the current food plan for dinners at Camp:

Pen will supply pies on Friday. We have the Afternoon Tea booked for Sunday, so we thought that in the evening we'd go for DIY-topping pizzas. On Wednesday we'll have a Somewhat Moderately Tidy Dinner, which is more-or-less a normal dinner only with cocktails and nibbles and dessert. If the weather is nice, it might be a BBQ -- we can determine that once we've got a better idea of the forecast (currently not great, sorry!) Thursday is traditionally eating up of leftovers day.

So that leaves us with a need for dinner on Saturday, Monday and Tuesday. Volunteers and offers to minion below, please!

adelate

Hi everyone! Camp is almost here and I’m actually going to leave for it the day after tomorrow (exciting!), so if anyone would like a particular candy or other such from Finland, here’s your chance! I haven’t planned on bringing much aside from requests as it seems like the older we get the less those snacks get eaten hahah but if there’s special requests I can definitely swing by the store!

Current Mood: excited
Current Location: home (for now)

nopseud

Hi, all!

As we're only a week away from Camp, Pen and I have been looking at things to do and we've come up with a proposed itinerary. If there's anything else you are desperate to do instead, leave a comment. We don't have a minibus this year, just cars, so it would be relatively easy to arrange trips to different places -- you just need to persuade one of the drivers!

Saturday: Sizergh, a National Trust property near Kendal. If we have time we could also drop in to Kendal and enjoy the famous mint cake.

Sunday: The traditional Camp Afternoon Tea is booked for 1:30pm at Falcon Manor in Settle, in handy walking distance of the house. We can also spend some time looking round Settle itself.

Monday: White Scar Cave, which is a long limestone cave with some lovely rock formations, which we thought would make for something different for a Camp trip.

Tuesday: In the morning Cliffe Castle, a museum in a Victorian mansion, with smallish but pretty gardens (and a tea room!). In the afternoon, Bolton Abbey, a ruined abbey next to the River Wharfe. There are nice, gentle walks along the river (with tea rooms!) and you can walk from the Abbey through the woods to see The Strid, which is Internet Famous for being 'the most dangerous stretch of water in the world'.

Wednesday: Parcevall Hall Gardens are very extensive gardens, and we might be able to arrange a group tour with one of the gardeners (I'm not sure what the minimum group size would be).

Thursday: A trip up the Settle-Carlisle train line. It's a famously pretty route over the Pennines, including going over the Ribblehead Viaduct. Rather than going all the way to Carlisle, which is a long trip, we'll stop at Appleby. There's a Norman castle there, where you can have a guided tour -- the 12:00 tour would work well as the train we're looking at gets in to Appleby at 11:19 and the castle is only about half a mile from the station.

There are also lots of places to go walking in the Yorkshire Dales. We're not far from Malham Cove (which despite the name isn't on the coast) and Ingleton. But in general, there are many, many beautiful walks, if people would like to do that as well as or instead of any of the trips.

Please can you fill in the following poll, so I can look into group tickets/tours.

Poll #29246 Camp Trips

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 10

View Respondents

I would like to do the following things:

View Answers

Saturday: Sizergh
9 (90.0%)

Monday: White Scar Cave
6 (60.0%)

Tuesday: Cliife Castle/Bolton Abbey
6 (60.0%)

Wednesday: Parcevall Hall Garden
6 (60.0%)

Thursday: Settle-Appleby railway excursion
6 (60.0%)

Thursday: Appleby Castle tour
6 (60.0%)

nopseud

I've just sent out the final cost emails. If you don't have it, please look in your spam folder. If there's something wrong with it, please let me know ASAP!

nopseud

I'm sorry that I'm so late with it this year, but I'm hoping to send out the final cost for Camp to everyone in a day or two. If you've had any changes of plans since March, please could you let me know so I can hopefully get everything right the first time this year!

turlough

Camp is getting closer (yay!) and in preparation I've been looking up interesting-sounding places ( we might visit... )

Current Mood: excited

nopseud

As several people have pointed out, Manchester Airport is an excellent option for flights for Camp this year. There's a train connection to Giggleswick, and the airport is very near the M6 so we can do a pickup on Friday afternoon on our way up to the house. If anyone is interested in doing that, other than the people I already know about, please let me know.

nopseud

I sent out an email a week or so ago about this years camp, plus checking who contributed to the 2020 deposit after we had to cancel.

If you didn't get it, please could you check your spam folder? If it isn't there, I might not have your current email address, so please leave a comment to let me know.

pensnest

Thank you all very much for your responses.

As usual, I have to disappoint some people, but I hope most of you will be delighted to learn that we have booked next year's Camp for 30th June-6th July, and that we'll be going to Woodlands House, in Yorkshire, where we were supposed to spend our holiday in 2020. The owner has agreed to put the deposit we paid back then towards the cost. (Which means some of you have already paid something in advance—we will work it out.)

If there are twelve of us, it will cost £300 each. If there are 16 (which I think is the max we can achieve while allowing everyone their own bed unless they *want* to share) it's down to £225 per person. Plus food costs, of course, and possibly a fuel contribution for the drivers.

It will be so delightful to see you again! I hope you have plenty of time to work out leave, flights etc. And don't forget your travel insurance, since we have no idea what the world will look like next year.

If anyone wants to make a bit more of your holiday, Beast and I would be very happy to have visitors before and/or after Camp, so you can come and see a bit of Norwich and Norfolk as well.

PS. I may not see responses for a while, due to the (temporary, I hope) demise of my regular computer.

pensnest

Hello, Campers!

Would you like to Camp in 2023?

We have the chance to go to the house in Yorkshire that we originally booked for 2020. The owner is willing to apply the deposit that we paid back in 2019 (which means some of you will get money off, as you gave me contributions at the time). The house is here, and I think it would accommodate about 16 of us. (There are a lot of double beds, but we don't have quite that many people who'll want to share a bed.)

First order of business is to decide when we want to go. I'm not clear on pricing, as it doesn't look as though the website has been updated in a while, but it was affordable before so presumably it'll be affordable now. I'm going to veto the Bank Holiday weekend at the end of May, but we could go for the beginning of May, or June, or July, even August. Or get a head start and look at April instead.

If you'd like to be part of Camp Sparkle 2023, please let me know whether there are dates you'd prefer, and times you cannot do. I'll have a preliminary look, and then put up a poll.

Please spread the word to people who don't watch this space regularly.

pensnest

Sorry I have been out of action for a while, the compulsions of my musical life have been a bit overwhelming of late!

Anyway.

How about you join us here in Norwich from 4th - 10th July? That's a Monday-Sunday span, but if you want to arrive a little bit earlier or leave a little bit later that will be fine. Anyway, I'm floating this week as a possibility to see who can make it—if enough people can, we'll go ahead, and if some of you can't make these dates but could do later in the summer, we can have another miniCamp.

Yes?

pensnest

Hello My Sparkly People!

I've missed you. It has been a long time!

So, I'm thinking, maybe we could do semi-Camps this summer? There is quite a lot of room here at The Hollies (aka Pen's Nest), and we've mostly been at around 14-16 people in recent years, so how about a couple of Camplet Sparkle weeks? There is loads to see in Norfolk—stately homes, cathedrals, the seaside—and good shopping, too!

I'm not sure who would want to come, or what your countries' rules will be (come to that, I'm not sure what my country's rules are), but dammit, let's give it a try. Obviously there won't be house hire to pay for, though we'll have to add a little bit on top of the food budget to cover extra cooking, water heating etc (won't be much), and if necessary, minibus or car rental. Details can wait.

I'm thinking basically May, June or July. If you'd like to visit, let me know your availability either in comments or by email, and I'll see what looks possible.

Camp! Ish.

pensnest

So nice to see so many of you yesterday! Isn't it lovely how the old jokes just keep coming....

Many thanks to CJ for hosting for us.

pensnest

The suggestion of Afternoon Tea this Sunday seems to have gone over well. I look forward to seeing many of you online then! Tiaras, I think, should be worn. CJ will be sending out the invitations as she has a proper Zoom account. Those of you who've not been using Zoom will need to download the program, but it does not take long.

My FIL has been doing some clearing out (!!!!!), and produced an unopened and quite large bag of VAHDAM Classic English Breakfast Black Tea 100% pure Indian tea. It looks as though it is best consumed before August this year. I don't know where it came from - I think it must have been a gift, but possibly Aldi had a special offer! It looks very smart, but is loose leaf tea, which is why we're probably not going to use it ourselves, so, does anybody want it? It seems a shame to waste it, and I'd be quite happy to stick the bag in the post.

First to claim it wins!

pensnest

I checked my calendar, and I am supposed to pay the remainder of the Camp Sparkle money on the 17th of this month.

I don't see us being able to hold Camp this year, at any rate, not in June. There's a reasonable chance that we in the UK will be out of lockdown by mid-June, but are we going to be allowing tourist flights into the country? I wouldn't count on it. Are those of you in Europe, the US, or elsewhere going to be able to get on a plane anyway? I wouldn't count on that, either. Are the local tourist attractions going to be open for business? Who knows. We will very likely still be working on 'social distancing' even if it is somewhat relaxed by then. As before, it's not really a question of being afraid of catching the virus - my understanding is that most people catch it and get over it - although I do have diabetes so am probably at somewhat higher risk. No. It's because the situation with regard to free movement has changed so radically that I just cannot see it being possible.

Besides which, are we all going to want to get together in a bunch of a dozen+ people, to spend a week in close quarters? No offense intended to anyone, but if I'm going to be allowed to spend time close to people I don't live with, the people I'm going to spend time with will be my children. I love you all, but.... Also, what if we went back into lockdown once you had arrived?

I propose that we cancel Camp for this year.

If by some miracle we find we can do it, later in the year... we might be able to get together in September or October and just grab a rental two or three weeks in advance. I should think we'd be able to find a suitable house at a bargain rate, maybe even the very house that we'd booked for this year. My sister runs a couple of holiday rentals, and her bookings have been cancelled for the next two months (so far).

Beast and I are willing to live with the loss of £800 (deposit). *If* we are able to get together at a bargain rate, we can discuss incorporating the lost deposit into the Camp fees, but we're not going to suffer any hardship if we don't get it back.

We could, maybe, do a Zoom meetup or two, just so we can at least see one another. Now that most Campers don't really appear on DW, I don't know what you're all up to these days. But I hope you've all been practising the Boyband Dance sequence!

This is more of an advisory "I am going to cancel Camp Sparkle" post than asking for advice, but if anyone disagrees, please make your case!

ETA: I have emailed to cancel, and inquired about our deposit in case there is any chance of getting it back or possibly using it next year. I will let you know, though I don't hold out much hope! Meanwhile, thank you all for being willing to pay a share of the deposit. I *think* there were only a dozen or so people who were intending to come this year, I'll check up on that and suggest a per-person amount.

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Camp Sparkle

all sparkle all the time...now with added tea!

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Camp 2027

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