Exmouth Beach Blog

Exmouth RNLI host a very busy bank holiday open day

Volunteer crew member Ian Taylor and Guild Assistant Secretary Beryl Cole with RNLI mascot Stormy Stan

Despite a wet and windy bank holiday Saturday, over 400 visitors came through the big wooden doors at Exmouth RNLI boathouse on 25 August. Crew volunteers gave up their holiday time to give informative talks and tours around the charity’s lifeboats. Volunteers from the fundraising guild ran stalls which raised over £850 for the station.

Visitors were shown aboard both the all-weather Mersey class lifeboat Margaret Jean and the B class inshore lifeboat George Bearman which was moved onto the ramp for the event. Members of the RNLI sea-safety team were available to talk to throughout the day, bringing along their road-show lifeboat Evelyn M.

This year saw a large number of young families visiting during the bank holiday and there was plenty for children to do: three lifeboats to climb on, dress up in crew kit and a chance to ‘launch the lifeboat’ Together with stalls, cakes, teas and coffees available, there was something for everyone. Margaret Griffin from Exmouth guessed the weight of the decorated boiled fruit cake, it was 10lb 11¼oz.

Onboard the all-weather lifeboat with volunteer Roger Jackson

Due to the large number of visitors arriving in the afternoon, some dedicated volunteers were still showing people around the boats and station an hour after the event was due to close. The boathouse finally closed its doors at 5pm, raising £857.31 in the seven hours. The RNLI shop also benefitted from the extra visitors and had a very successful day.

Cade and Louis from Topsham dressing up in crew kit

The Exmouth and Budleigh Salterton RNLI fundraising guild and their team of committed volunteers spent 11 months planning the event and now look forward to planning and hosting the 2013 open day. Chairman of the guild, Don Hodgkinson said:

‘We were very pleased to have so many visitors visit our lifeboats and eco-friendly boathouse. I’m very grateful to the crew volunteers who took time out of their bank holiday to show people around.’

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Categories RNLI

Outdoor gym for Pavilion gardens

19 Jun

Taken from East Devon Council website:

THE results are in! A successful voting event was held by EDDC and Exmouth Town Council for residents of Exmouth to choose their new free to use outdoor gym – and there was a clear winner.

The turnout was impressive, with 156 residents from all age-groups coming along to vote on Sunday at the Exmouth Festival. The outdoor gym will be on two sites, with half in a circuit around one of the paths in Phear Park and the other half will be put into the sunken gardens on the left hand side of the Pavilion near the seafront.

Residents got to vote on which one of three designs they wanted installed, the winner with 62% of all votes was Option B, a design from Proludic.

EDDC will contact the company who submitted the successful design and work with them to get the gym installed.

East Devon District Council (EDDC), a group of Exmouth Town Councillors (Cllr Pat Graham, Cllr Bill Nash, Cllr Jean Mitchell and Cllr Alison Greenhalgh) and three people who proposed the project have been working together to provide Exmouth residents with the free-to-use outdoor gym that they want.

The outdoor gym facility has been proposed and chosen by the local community. Last year, EDDC and Exmouth Town Council asked community groups, residents and other organisations to put forward their ideas as to how £150,000 of the sports funding accumulated from recent Exmouth housing developments (Section 106 money) should be spent.

These ideas were then taken out to residents and they got to vote on which ones they wanted to happen in Exmouth. One of the winning ideas was to spend £25,000 on free-to-use outdoor gym facilities.

Two local residents and Leisure East Devon (LED) proposed the idea and have been working with EDDC and Exmouth Council to research possible locations and what types of equipment could be provided.

Councillor Alison Greenhalgh, Exmouth Town Councillor and a member of the Steering Group for the outdoor gym, said: “A big thank you to everyone who came and voted! People are really looking forward to this new facility for Exmouth, and were really pleased to be given the chance to be involved.”

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For further press information please contact:

Nick Stephen, Communications Officer, on 01395 517 559

East Devon District Council, Knowle, Sidmouth, Devon EX10 8HL

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Editor’s note: A quick call to Proludic confirms that the order for the gym equipment chosen has been placed on 14th June. Here are the links to pdf images of the designs chosen: J3702 J3710

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Categories Children's Activities, East Devon Council, Exmouth Town Council, Fun and Games, Regeneration

Beach art competitions this Sunday

30 May

One of the most popular family events of last year’s Exmouth Festival was the sand sculpture and pavement art competitions held on Exmouth beach. It’s back again this Sunday (3rd June) aiming to repeat the success at this year’s festival, which runs from 31st May to 8th June. Click here to see last year’s entries.

When?

Sunday 3rd June. Registration from 10am. Judging from 3pm. Prize giving at 4pm.

Where?

On the beach by the Octogon, look out for the bright green pop-up tent.

Cost?

Sand sculpture competition £5 entry fee. Cash prizes and prizes donated by local businesses to be won!

Pavement art £1 entry fee. 2 age categories: 3-8yrs & 8-16yrs. Great art sets to be won!

Who?

Organised by Re:Solution copy print & design and Exe Entertainment.

Trophies and medals to be won from JJ Gems, from Exmouth Indoor Market.

All proceeds go towards the Exmouth Festival.

(Pavement next to the railings will be roped off for pavement art competition – please do not walk over children’s art!)

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Categories Children's Activities, Fun and Games

Every little helps…

25 May

This Sunday (27th May), Tesco Salterton Road are organising a beach clean as part of their “Spring Clean for the Queen” campaign. The clean up will begin at the Maer barbeque area at 2pm.

Volunteers will walk along the beach collecting rubbish before returning to the Maer for a barbeque and free prize draw.

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Categories Environmental

Exmouth beach alerts on “BeachLive”

22 May

Free text alerts to 5 favourite beaches

South West Water’s BeachLive website has doubled in size in time for this year’s bathing season, including Exmouth and Budleigh Salterton beaches.

BeachLive was launched last year in partnership with the Environment Agency, Surfers Against Sewage, tourism leaders and beach managers. It covers 41 beaches within Devon and Cornwall.

This year, a new facility to receive free text alerts on water quality on up to 5 chosen beaches has already proven popular. SouthWest Water operations director Stephen Bird said:

‘BeachLive is about giving beach users information they can use to make an informed decision on whether to swim or surf. Last year’s trial website received nearly 17,000 page views during the bathing season and we had lots of positive feedback’

Blue flag icons would be displayed on the map where there was no risk to water quality from the operation of combined sewer overflows. Amber updates would be highlighted with email and text messages sent to beach operators and subscribers when significant overflows occurred. Amber flag icons would be removed after 12 hours if all partners and Environment Agency data agreed there had been no significant overflows. This year a red flag icon has been introduced to indicate when a beach has been closed due to other circumstances such as dangerous currents or an oil spill.

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Categories Uncategorized

M&S Beach clean-up oversubscribed!

6 May

On Saturday 12th May, a Big Beach Clean-Up is planned for Exmouth Beach organised by Richard, meeting on the beach by the sand dunes at 11:15am. Since this has been publicised in the local press and through social media with the promise of £5 off a £25 M&S food shop per registered volunteer, help is now at full capacity.

Let’s hope everyone turns up to make a difference!

Exmouth Beach have a number of appeals for clean-ups throughout the year, usually run by environmental groups and sponsored by ethical brands, i.e. Lush and Barefoot Wines. Local business Stuart Line Cruises awards volunteers a free cruise in their regular estuary clean-ups. It will be interesting to see how many people turn up to receive a voucher from a large national retailer in comparison to a local business committed to helping the community. After all, this is not any ordinary beach – it’s an M&S beach (well, on Saturday 12th May at 11:15am it is!).

Some information from MCS website:

The Marine Conservation Society have joined Marks and Spencer in a three year partnership for their Forever Fish campaign, aiming to protect our fish stocks and the marine environment for the future.

Over the next three years, MCS and M&S will be working together to:

Reduce litter on UK beaches with the help of M&S customers and employees at the brand new Summer Big Beach Clean-up.

Promote sustainable seafood to M&S customers through the MCS ‘Fish to eat, fish to avoid’ advice.

The Marine Conservation Society (MCS) has organised nation-wide beach clean and surveys every year since 1994. Volunteers all around the UK survey beaches for litter types and quantities, and also clean the beach.

The aims of an MCS beach clean are to:

Increase awareness of beach litter and its impacts,
Identify and monitor quantities and sources of beach litter, and
Encourage action to reduce beach litter at source

MCS analyses the litter survey results to identify the main sources of litter and the most common litter items. MCS uses these results to tackle beach litter at local, national and international levels.

M&S will encourage its customers to help the MSC to clear our seas of the rising tide of rubbish that is so dangerous to sea life, including seabirds, whales and dolphins (Photo: MCS)

While Big Beach Clean-up is an exciting new addition to the calendar, Beachwatch Big Weekend is a well established and hugely successful event that has been taking place on the third weekend of September for the last 18 years.

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Categories Environmental

Beach dog ban begins this week

3 May

On Tuesday 1st May, the annual summer restriction on dogs on Exmouth beach started. The restricted areas, shown pink on this map:

The pink area is dog free between May 1st and September 30th every year.

Taken from the Exmouth Journal;

‘A council spokesman said that uniformed and plain clothes enforcement officers would patrol throughout the summer and people found walking their dogs in banned areas may be served with a fixed penalty notice of £80. Should any cases be taken to court, then fines of up to £1,000 may be incurred.

‘The spokesman added, “Please remember that in any public open space, dog owners must pick up after their dogs and dispose of the faeces correctly. Regular patrols will continue throughout the year and residents are reminded that it an offence to fail to pick up after your dog all year round.” He added that beaches still have areas where dogs are welcome.’

Last summer, Exmouth Beach Blog made an enquiry through the Freedom of Information Act to East Devon District Council to find out that only 1 person was fined.

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Categories East Devon Council, Environmental

Exmouth beach hosts trials of new lifeboat

24 Apr

The RNLI have spent two days in Exmouth (Wednesday 18 and Thursday 19 April) carrying out trials of a new class of lifeboat. The Shannon class all-weather is at present undergoing extensive sea and beach trials around the country where she’s been tested out in a range of conditions.

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For more information on the Shannon class trials and other stories relating to Exmouth RNLI, please visit www.exmouth-lifeboat.org.uk.

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Categories RNLI

First signs of life in bowling building

6 Apr

It’s the first week of “the season”, Good Friday and there’s already signs of holiday-makers in town. The open-top bus from the town to Sandy Bay has started running to an extended route along the beach, as far as the new lifeboat station. The children’s Exmouth Fun Park was full to bursting on Monday, with the fine weather. Probably the most promising signs of “the season” has been the appearance of Liquid Motion watersports in a retail unit in the impending bowling alley. Even more promising was the sound of work being carried out on a bank holiday weekend, in time for the opening in June. Watch this space….