You will notice from this news item that Friendship Link visits involve a lot of time for socialising over food and drink – always a great way to get to know one another and to build on one of the Soroptimist objects to develop “international good will and understanding” – well that’s our excuse anyway!
This Friendship Link visit was organised by the Soroptimist Friendship Link co-ordinator for Muenster, Sylvia Vornhecke and the co-ordinator for St Albans, Jean Eaton. SI Muenster President, Brigitte Borchard was travelling with her husband, Raphael and daughter Felina, plus another Member Irmgard Klotz. Eva Hoffman and her daughter Mia flew in with Sylvia, and Sylvia’s husband Axel flew in on Saturday to join the group and make it eight.
Different Soroptimists were able to join the group from Muenster for different parts of the programme over the weekend which was lovely and seemed to work out really well.
On Fri 26 April, once our guests had all been collected, there was a “welcome get together” at Jean Eaton’s with cheese & biscuits, nibbles & drinks.
On Sat 27 April the group visited an exhibition at the Roman museum in Verulamium called “Women doing everything, everywhere, all at once” – this was about the women archaeologists of the 1930s who brought Verulamium, the St Albans of 2000 years ago, to life. See the photo above of everyone on the steps of the museum.
After the museum everyone went to the Six Bells Pub – a lovely 16th-century pub serving delicious food just a short walk from the city centre and Abbey, and close to Verulamium Park and Museum. This meant that after lunch our visitors could decide what they wanted to do – visit the Abbey, go shopping, and climb the clock tower for a unique view of the city.
In the evening 16 of us enjoyed a wonderful dinner at Cote restaurant in St Albans.
By this time the last member of the group had arrived – Sylvia’s husband Axel. We were also joined for dinner by a few more St Albans “Soroptimisters” which made it feel even more celebratory.
On Sunday the Borchard group had an earlier flight to catch – they had been in London the week before so it was time to go home. The rest of the group ventured out to historic Knebworth House which turned out to be the perfect thing to do on a day with some rather mixed weather conditions…
Everyone agreed the visit was a great success. SI Muenster are hoping that members of SI St Albans & District will visit them in 2026 to celebrate their 50th anniversary – now that should be fun – I wonder how much eating, drinking and socialising that will involve?!