In this newsletter:
- Dates for your diary
- Urgent Request for your help on the committee
- Group news
- Accounts 24/25 to be presented at the AGM
- Answers to summer newsletter puzzles
- How to improve your phone service and save money
- u3a Online Learning Events
Dates for your diary
AGM – Thursday 18th September 2025 with entertainment from our Ukuleles.
Visit – The next visit will be on the 8th October to the Watercress Line. The tickets for this visit will be subsidised by the Hayling u3a and will include a cream tea. The cost will be £40 which covers the coach, train and cream tea. We have less than 10 places left. More details and a booking form here.
Visit to the Houses of Parliament - We have arranged with our MP, Alan Mak, to take a party of up to 40 Hayling U3A members to visit the Houses of Parliament in January 2026. The coach will pick us up at the Langstone Quays Hotel, and will cost £24 per head. More details including the date of the visit will be available in October, when we will start to take bookings for the visit.
Christmas buffet – 11th December, 2 pm. This will be a ticketed event at a cost of £5.
Island litter picking campaign– Several organisations are getting together to launch a major litter pick across the island. Watch out for more details in the next few months.
Urgent Request for your help on the committee
Every year we ask you all to consider volunteering to help on the Committee. For you to enjoy the many activities that the Hayling u3a supports, there are several people working in the background to make it all possible.
Many of the current officers have served numerous years on the committee. It is unfair to expect the same people to continue doing this work and indeed bringing in ‘new blood’ can only bring new ideas for the organisation to thrive and develop.
There are currently 555 members in our u3a. Surely there are more than 10 of us who are willing to help run the organisation by joining the committee. Roles can be shared if you are worried about taking on a post or shadowing a current officer.
Following a meeting in August the committee have agreed that if no one comes forward to help with the work, then we would have no other option but to close the organisation down at the end of the financial year 31 March 2026. Join us and keep Hayling u3a alive!
Group news
D’Ukes
Played at Sam’s Sunflowers again this year
Peter Haskell
Island Shanty
The u3a Shanty group Island Shanty rounded off the summer "season" with another very successful performance at Sam's Sunflowers over the bank holiday weekend.
Blessed with beautiful weather, thirty-five members the crew enjoyed a wonderful afternoon in the sun and played to a large appreciative audience.
We are now taking a short break from outside performances to concentrate on enhancing our repertoire particularly with the addition of several more instrumentalists.
Although the group is currently full, with a short waiting list we invite any member to register an interest on the u3a Web site as vacancies do arise from time to time. Full details of our "sailing" times etc are on the Web site or you can follow us on our Island Shanty Facebook page.
John Cushion
Play Reading
Members of the u3a play reading group continue to enjoy their thespian aspirations every month at the Station Theatre.
Over the last few months the plays have varied quite considerably and included Derek Benfield's comedy Caught on the Hop, J B Priestley's An Inspector Calls, Conan Doyle's Hound of the Baskervilles and Durbridge's A Touch of Danger.
Our reading this month is I'll Leave to You, the first play ever written by Noel Coward at the age of 19.
A quite eclectic mix!
The group is currently open to new members and if you think it may be for you, please see our web page which gives you contact details.
John Cushion
Photography group
If you can tell a story through photography or rise to the challenge of a set subject then come along to the Photography group on the last Wednesday of the month 10-12, Sinah Room, Hayling Golf Club.
These pictures are the loving hands of a couple married 70 years, fond memories of a holiday with vibrant colours and a cheeky squirrel snacking on the face of a gnome.
Sue Wakely
Science and Technology
The next season of talks at 2pm, in St Patricks Church Hall, Hayling Island, starts on 24th September and is titled “The development of Sailing ships in Europe” given by Bob Hornby. We always think that we invented everything but when I saw sailing ships in the Dubrovnik Maritime Museum, which resembled the ones being built in the UK in the same time period so I thought who produced them first, so this was the catalyst for my talk.
This is followed on 22nd October by a talk by Jan Barrett entitled “Paper clips, coffee tins and rockets - not necessarily in that order...” and covers the V1 and V2 rockets; The Black Knight; and the Hovercraft. This should be a very good talk and well worth coming along to support Jan who actually worked on these projects, so we should be in for a treat and insider information.
I am struggling to get a presentation for November, so if you know someone who would volunteer to give up their tie to come along and entertain us then please let me know.
Also if anyone has a particular topic they would like to hear more about then please get in touch and let me know.
Bob Hornby
Accounts 24/25 to be presented at the AGM
Click/tap here to see the accounts statement. Note that it has been updated since the version published in the summer newsletter.
Answers to August newsletter puzzles
Summer anagrams
Sunshine, Ice cream, Inflatable ring, picnic in the park, swimming in the sea, beach combing, suntan lotion, barbeque, traffic jams, harvesting.
Quick crossword - Wimbledon tennis theme
The code word in the shaded squares is Forehand.
How to improve your phone service and save money
Andy Henderson explains how recent changes in the phone service give you an opportunity to switch to a new, cheaper and better provider of phone services. Find out more.
u3a Online Learning Events
There are many online learning events coming up this September. Use this link to find out more about them.
Julie Taylor